Up is the perfect embodiment of the dead wife trope. Carl isn't just grieving, he is unable to move on and there is a real feeling that he hasn't just lost his wife but also all of their shared plans and dreams. His entire story is about moving on and accepting the responsibility of being a father figure.
Oxtocoatl actually,the ‘dead wife’ trope is frustrating because the hero NEVER moves on.In Up we are shown they lived a whole life togheter,and Carl does move on which makes for a sweet and satisfying ending.
Also once the death happens you change FOREVER. I mean, I'm not going to claim that trauma like that would not effect you heavily, but when it effects every hero and changes them in THE EXACT SAME WAY EVERY TIME, Theeeen we got a problem.
@@ChasehaWing Really it just boils down to execution coupled with a lack of actual growth on the Hero's part... (The gender of the "Woman in the fridge" isn't even a key part of the trope itself but the trope name seems to have excluded other examples of this trope in practice, such as Uncle Ben, Mays Hughes, and the dog that John Wick got after his Wife died...)
I think Carl would be the antithesis of the woman in the fridge. He's paralyzed by his grief, not driven to be the hero of the story. And it takes a little boy and a dog to drag him out of it. In fact, we're probably only shown his relationship with his wife to keep us from hating him for being a grumpy old jerk. On the far other side of the spectrum would be Charlie Burns from Rescue Bots; he's totally functional and well adjusted, and the utter lack of mention of his wife in a kids show implies that she's dead. But she's not in the fridge motivating him to be a hero, she's *just* dead.
I like the widower trope when the character expresses ACTUAL grief and overcomes it along the story. Grief is not often portrayed in fiction and I wish more authors would write about it.
I think writers tend to assume the "becoming hardened" is the same as grief, but they never seem to try and get over it because people really like being miserable all the time.
I remember writing a book where the protagonist lost her boyfriend, who was her best friend of 15 yrs. I struggled with portraying it cause grief is such an intense and lingering feeling. I 100% agree with you. Characters don't feel human to me if they don't experience effects of losing someone dear
A character losing a loved one is almost always a good source of character development. When it's used as the inciting incident for the entire story it can lead to some problems.
@@hazeltade3679 same here! He actually shows emotion, is really funny and can actually display kindess. Sometimes grief and loss doesn't equal reclusive asshole
"It's just a scratch." I actually wrote a character that got his arm cut off and does the whole screaming in pain and passing out. He spends a good chunk of time going through emotional trauma and quitting the main character group(even tho he was the mc). The poor thing about modern writers is that they ignore realism and often don't expand on trauma and break down moments that would otherwise completely change a character to the core
@@jh.4761 Unfortunately, I haven't finished from having work and the occasional writers block. I do have a few chapters(12 or so) on wattpad. I only put it on the site to see the reception from people. However, I haven't gotten to that part I was referring to cause it doesn't happen until the second to last story arc. If your still willing to check it out, it's called 'The Black Edge' on wattpad by my other name 'TheBeastInUs'. Beware plot holes cause its not the most updated version. Hope you enjoy if you look at it. Feel free to comment
@@notthebeastinus2786 I'll check it out, thank your very much and I hope you can overcome your writer's block. Good luck with everything else too! :) Edit: I can't find it, do you maybe have a link?
NotTheBeastInUs I have a character that can only die of old age. They’re not that over powered. Well I mean they are but they hate everything and don’t care so they just don’t do anything...
"At that point he's just asking for syphilis." I actually responded out loud, "At that point, I'm usually pretty sure the entire story is the protagonist's syphilis induced hallucination."
thats actually pretty logical if based on irl as females are let in lower standarts than males locical example in fiction is on shannara where prinses basicly cheated her way into guard unit
A small modification to the useless princess trope to make it better: Instead of making her terrible at manners and socializing, how about making her unaware of how running a kingdom works and see her struggle through the tasks of meeting up with other diplomats, dealing with problems in her country and all that.
Because that would imply that the princess is traditionally supposed to actually run a country, not only getting married off to a prince and being impregnated by him to continue the royal lineage while in between biding her time by drinking tea and stitching and doing other women things and let the men rule the country. Of course there are historical examples of great stateswomen who did take the reigns and took an active role in ruling their country (both in the subtle way of using female influence and diplomacy behind the scenes as well as actually and officially being the ruler in charge), but writers who use that inept princess trope usually wouldn't want to portray a princess as being expected to be a strongminded intelligent politician, they want to portray her as the free spirited girl in the golden cage that breaks free from those bonds and proves herself as an individual who subverts the traditional expectations.
I had the similar idea of this for my book. Although the princess would have terrible manners from the start, since she was raised as a commoner, she would be to sole ruler of her kingdom. This would allow her to be focused on foreign affairs and issues running in her country by herself.
@@JennaMoreci you are decidedly not wrong. I've been watching your videos for like 2+ years and still you surprise me. I am not sure why. i should expect this by now.
@@Trinsicity Who needs regular STIs when you can have exotic space STIs that cause you to turn blue and cough up all your internal organs? And forget about getting pregnant with a boring human baby, get yourself a fancy alien parasite injected straight into your uterus and watch it develop a symbiotic relationship with your body as it slowly takes over your mind and transforms you into a nightmarish killing machine! Sex with aliens: for those moments when your bad decisions aren't nearly disastrous enough!
Idk if it's still a thing or not but when I was a kid all the villains had "stringy black hair" and I naturally have yardstick straight jet black hair. IDK why that was a thing, but it was, especially for witches.
[to the tune of Supercalifrajulisticexpialidocious] 🎶 _OHHHHHHHHHHH..._ Grizzled thirty-something brown-haired white male alcoholic His wife and kids were murdered so his mood is vitriolic To say this guy's in everything is not that hyperbolic Grizzled thirty-something brown-haired white male alcoholic! (From Tumblr xP)
@@lindales3959 in the story i'm writing being a chosen one doesn't even comes with extra powers, just a ton of responsability and danger, the mc's main goal is literally going back home and living a normal life
8:29 This trope reminds me of a quote in Predator. "You bleeding man." "I ain't got time to bleed." Still one of my favorite quotes despite the 80s cheese.
"Can we stop vilifying femininity?" Thank you! The leading lady in my WIP learns that exact lesson in her character arc. When we meet her, she's 17 and has grown up disconnecting herself from her femininity as a defense mechanism, but as the novel progresses, she realizes there can and must be a balance of both masculine and feminine. Also, anyone who thinks badass female figures can't be feminine, I refer you to Freya, Norse goddess of love and sensuality and the awesome leader of the Valkyries (female warrior spirits who collect the souls of the dead to bring them to the afterlife).
@@mimzy1921 Thank you! It's a lesson I myself learned, and am still learning. I was a tomboy growing up. It wasn't until I hit my teenage years (and started to notice boys) that I finally started acting and dressing more "feminine". And, years later, when I was in my late 20s (I'm 31 as of 2019) and discovered my spiritual path of eclectic Paganism, I really started to understand what being feminine and the energy of femininity meant. It's not something you can dress in with a skirt or shoes or put on your face out of a bottle. In short, to use Pagan terms, femininity is about recognizing and showing the Goddess within, in all Her aspects: Maiden, Mother, and Crone, light and shadow.
Plus Aphrodite (she has an epithet of 'Warlike' among a few others), Artemis (she is described as 'beautiful in several hymns to her). Also kudos on having that arc in the book. So many girls are being taught that being feminine = weak and bad and that's not true at ALL.
@@IceQueen975 Thanks! And yes, femininity can be badass. There's a reason that, in so many stories and in real life, people are terrified of women who find and embrace their own personal femininity, femininity that isn't tied to the patriarchal definition of it. Rubis, my leading lady, grew up with the idea that femininity was weak or meant subservience. It isn't until she meets Charles, a painter struggling with survivor's guilt from having not fought in WWI, and falls in love with him that she realizes being feminine, both for her own sake and as a partner in a romantic relationship, takes a lot of strength.
But it can also happen in real life. You’d be surprised what humans can do when their life is at stake and they have no choice, sometimes the body goes into survival mode.
#1: Man with Dead Wife *Remembers about hero having a "dead" wife* Oh no... "He's incapable of human emotion" *hero is literally the sweetest person imaginable* Phew...
I think that it's okay to have one. The problem comes along if you're trying to use hair colors as shorthand for personality and that means using red hair to say she's unique, quirky, fun, free-spirited, independent, etc. as a lazy way of not actually showing her BE any of those things. I see it more in movies than books because movies, with their shorter time limit, use visuals as shorthand and so personality is often coded into character design. Like with 'Brave', Rose in 'Titanic', Anna in 'Frozen', Satine in 'Moulin Rouge', Clementine's red-head phase in 'Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind' (although she's more of a deconstruction/subversion), etc.
@@midnight8341 oof honestly I think it's fine XD I said it more as a joke than anything, especially because my character is just really determined and fiery, but honestly I only gave her red hair because it's unique and it's a trait that connects her to her disappeared father, if that makes any sense. Also YEAHHH I think you're safe it's like saying: "I'm smart and I have glasses, but I'm not smart because I have glasses" y'know?
My main problem is that all those female MCs who scorn femininity and "aren't like other girls".... still manage to fit into the ideal of femininity. This is more obvious in TV and movies - yeah, she laughs at girls who do makeup and are afraid of getting dirty, but she always looks like a supermodel and the only way she ever gets messy somehow makes her look even hotter. She would never, ever diet, but it's a moot point because she's a size zero anyway. She works on bikes and cars, and yet her hands are always soft and her nails are long and perfectly manicured.
MC: *finding out they have amazing powers and are expected to save the world* Me??? But I’m so normal and boring and USELESS Me finding out: yeahhhh I always felt like I was destined for greatness so that sounds right....where do I begin?
Wizard guy: Ok, you have been endowed with incredible magic powers. Now, I know what you’re going to say. You just want a normal life, you don’t want- Me: I’m in! Wizard guy: See? Now- wait what? Me: Mate, I’ve been waiting for something extraordinarily cool like this to happen to me all my life! Why would I want a normal life when I can have one filled with magic and adventure?! Now come on! Tell me who’s ass I’ve gotta kick with my awesome powers! Wizard guy: Wait... So, you’re NOT going to go on about how you don’t want to be the chosen one? How you want to just be a normal highschooler? Me: Hmm... Nope! Now come on! Teach me how to blow stuff up!
Honestly, there's nothing wrong with using any of these tropes. Just make them unique in some way. If you keep watching trope and cliche videos looking for what to avoid, you'll run out of things to write.
I mean you can include cliches in your story. But having 90% of the cliches make one's story way way way too predicatable. A bit of creativity with a little of cliche is fine
Speaking of which, the story of Victor and Nora Fries in “Batman: The Animated Series” is arguably an example of how even a literal “woman in a fridge” trope can be used well to make a heartfelt story for a morally grey villain.
As an autistic woman--diagnosed ten years ago--I'd be ruling out an awful lot of my own lived experience as fictional material if I had to avoid the "princess sucks at princessing" trope. Not that I am or ever have been a princess--I'm just saying that what society as deemed as the female role is frequently inaccessible to me because I have poor social skills, little interest in fashion, and wouldn't want to wear a lot of things that are in style for sensory reasons anyway. On a related note, if I had seen this video when I was in my teens, I would have immediately assumed that this TH-camr must be a superficial air headed bimbo and clicked off as soon as she started trashing the "hating on femininity" trope, because back then I pretty much thought that that the conventional model of womanhood *was* being a superficial air headed bimbo, and I had nothing but scorn for women like that. But now I'm forty and I have a much more nuanced view of femininity. I realize that femininity comes in many different forms other than the "air headed bimbo" kind (which I think is just a creation of the patriarchy rather than a genuine manifestation of femininity) and I no longer think of femininity as being a bad thing in and of itself. Nowadays I have respect for pretty much everyone who is committed to being authentic, respecting boundaries, and allowing as much autonomy as possible in relationships. And if being their authentic self means that a woman has more conventionally feminine interests than I do, that's great. It might or might not mean that we have less in common or less to talk about, depending on her specific interests, but diversity is what makes the human race interesting.
People in YA: OH MY GOOOODDDD!!!! I don’t want magical powers! I just want my crush to notice me!! What would I do with amazing water powers anyway?! Me: ... IF YOU DON’T WANT IT, I’LL FRICKEN TAKE IT YOU UNGRATEFUL JERK!
Related to the 'Bad at Princessing' trope: Could we please get a male character in a position of power who is expected to be tough, lead his own army and conquer and colonize other lands, but is terrible at fighting and would rather do community work, take care of his citizens, make art and arrange flowers and shit? No? Just me? Oh.
Omg one of my current manuscripts has that character as the MC (it's not the manuscript I'm working on right now though so um yeah it'll take a wHiLe XD)
That's my heir to the throne. He's intelligent but genuinely horrible with any martial skill. This king isn't running into an army of orcs. He'll think of a way to win on his terms.
That’s literally my oc I mean Kinda It’s a fanfic in the mcu where the oc is the prince of Vanaheim, sucks at combat, and would rather tend to a garden. But like It’s the mcu so that ain’t gonna happen for the poor god of summer. Oh yeah, he’s also the god of lust-
in the story im writing, which is told in two books, after the first book's story, the mc pretty much does exactly that. he settles down and does most of the more community based roles in the kingdom hes a part of, while his fiancee handles the more combative parts of ruling. hes always been a very gentle soul, and the downtime between the two stories allows that part of his personality to thrive.
One of my main character's wife is dead, but her murder has long been avenged and it didn't make the widower any happier and his main subplot is actually finding new meaning and new love again. His dead wife is one of the few subjects he usually doesn't talk about by his own initiative.
Yeah I have a novel that's still in a planning phase but the idea is the main character is a barbarian warrior woman. Her father was killed by a wizard. She goes on a whole meandering, side-track-y quest to kill the wizard in revenge. Only to find at the end of her quest, that wizard is nothing but a sick and dying old man, bed ridden in a drafty old castle. She does kill him, but it's more of a mercy kill, so it never feels like she got true revenge. Also losing her father at a young age isn't like, used as an excuse to make her emotionally detached or an asshole to people.
Rachael Lefler That sounds pretty good! Maybe she could travel towards different countries to find the wizard but in this world it’s a mixture of fantasy and real world. For example, some of the countries will be the exact same as the ones today like France and Britain but then you have some other countries that don’t actually exist but will exist in the world of your book.
@TodayLifeIsGood I sort of did similar, though me the heroine's husband had died during a civil war 15 years prior so there wasn't really any 'revenge' she could have, so she's spent the years since trying to help others. Her subplot is more about her reconnecting with her son (the MC who had been with his father during the civil war and had grown up an orphan as she was never able to find him) and both of trying to come to terms with losing that time.
I really like that! I too have an mc with a dead wife, but he is pretty sarcastic and dry and uses humor to pull through his stuff. My novel is going to be on the scandals/malpractice in the hospital (like drug addict surgeons, purposely doing unethical procedures, violating the oath, etc..) and he wants to get to the bottom of the situation and expose the hospital for their wrongdoings
Apparently, you're in luck. This one is only about female redheads. Besides, anime characters get a free pass anyway, 'cause they know how to get away with being silly and awesome at the same time
#6 Same! I hate when the main girl is a Tomboy but has to mention how tough strong she is and how lame girly girls are every chapter, that’s what I call being conceited. Girly girls can be just as boss as you mentioned. I am a firm believer!
The "but I just wanna be normal" trope works to an extent. In my Wattpad book, my MC finds out she's a mermaid and is understandably conflicted. On one hand, she loves the sea and the freedom it affords her. On the other hand, she perceives mermaids as evil because of past events.
Please could you talk about writing angst and trauma? I see so many characters written to have the worst lives possible with no positives and it gets really grating. Seeing the same character have more and more bad things happen to them and being expected to cry every time is exhausting
Lydia Smith Hi there, Lydia Would you be able to suggest any tips about that? I have a kind of "hidden" main character of a particular story that the audience won't readily find out is the main character till damn near the end of the second half. Laughably he falls into the antihero tropes, but I've got a good path built to him growing out of these things slowly over the course of the book, without outright doing away with them, because I believe trauma tends to stick to a person for the rest of their lives. I do have specific situations from his past designed to be painful, but also as sources that reveal his character to the audience. I did at one point become excessive and toned the number of situations like this down, so as not to become toooo predictable, but would you say it's still worth the trouble if the character you followed, and sometimes those around him, were actually improving as people every time they learned something new?
@@NeoPokebonz I'm not super qualified to say, I am just a mere 14 year old girl with a Wattpad account. But if I had to give advice, I'd say don't make them talk about their deepest, darkest feelings easily. It takes a lot of digging and maybe a life or death situation to get even a few details. You said he falls into the anti-hero trope, and honestly most well-developed characters would. It doesn't necessarily mean brooding, just flawed. With that in mind, let them be funny. Let them screw up and get embarrassed and say funny things that aren't snarky. A dark, mysterious hero with a bad past is cliché, most of the time the impact is lost. However, when a comedic or light character starts angsting, people will feel it. Think of Michael Mell from BMC, Arnold Rimmer in Out Of Time and Hector from Coco. It hurts more because we as audiences are used to them providing the laughs. All of my characters have different styles of comedy and different issues to work through. I get the best results based on the comments I get from a character who is nerdy and socially inept but also very fragile and unstable. He has a fair share of jokes. To summarise, don't make the trauma their main character trait. Let them be funny and sweet and melodramatic, but foreshadow their true feelings subtly and if you pull it off right, I guarantee it'll get a good reaction. Hope this helps. Good luck! I'd love to read it.
Try writing about a character with a great life, like a fully amazing life, just a short story to refresh you, whenever I get stuck writing my novel I write a mini short story that's the opposite.
#6 made me instantly think of Tamora Pierce's writing. She has a lot of badass feminine characters, and tomboy characters learning to embrace feminine traits on their own terms.
I also thought of Tamora Pierce, specifically in Song of the Lioness when Alanna used to sneak out in her dress and wig, just enjoying being girly for a moment on her own.
But why do tomboyish characters need to constantly learn to *embrace* femininity? Shouldn't we respect masculine girls that have a "it works for you, cool, but not for me thanks" attitude towards being traditionally feminine?
follow petitelordexx I’m kinda sick of stories where the one tomboy character secretly being empty inside for not conforming to gender stereotypes. I’m sorry to say this but it’s not exactly a step forward in gender equality to frame masculine women as inherently less complete than feminine women.
I read this one book with a five man band featuring a girl with wild red hair, glorious femininity, explicit heterosexuality, and a martial arts expertise. I thought it was disgusting until I read this exchange and realized what was happening: "So, which one is your boyfriend?" "Why would any of them be my boyfriend?" "Because you're you?" "...You know I'm aromantic, right?"
Commenting to be notified if you remember the book bc I'm aromantic bisexual and there is absolutely no representation for aro characters who aren't also ace. 😭
The Iron Gauntlet book actually writes the "I want to be normal" trope well, in the form of the MC only wanting to be normal because his father doesn't want him to do magic. He says it's dangerous and what killed MC's mom, so he tries to continuously fail at getting into the magic school. He does develop away from that thought later, and it was a convincing way to use the trope.
"Hero, you must have *some* sort of natural stake in this story's conflict? Save your sister who happened to work within our very negligible company from the monsters we totally didn't purposefully unleashed onto the world ! Save the family farm from the corrupt, rival family of clowns that threaten to buy it!*Anything!* "
Morpheme-insert a shot into your character for extra cool “it’s just a scratch” moments. WARNING, SPECIAL OFFER! Buy today and get a free painkiller addiction character trait! Do not miss the opportunity!
#5 The worst part is that the book will ignore all the important responsibilities that come with being a monarch. They'll focus on a queen's need to wear fancy dresses and drink tea, while completely ignoring things like deciding on whether or not to go to war or finding ways to keep the guards loyal. Royalty is closer to the president than it is to the popular girls at school.
Heh. Well, I've been reading a series recently where the main character zig-zags quite a bit on this, but oddly it goes slightly differently than is expected. In the first series, he's pretty much heeds the call from the start since he got taken in hand and started being trained in his role from the time he was eight. It's only when he hits his early 20s after years of grinding service where he had to kill repeatedly and was nearly killed himself many times that he decided to NOPE out of there and try to live a life where he doesn't have to kill anyone or have people trying to kill him. He does come back eventually when his family needs him and realizes what standing back and refusing to be a part of that life has cost him and them over the time he was gone. After that, he tries to fulfill his family obligations faithfully from then on, albeit in a slightly different way than previously.
To be fair, I'd also be upset if someone asked me to cancel all my fun plans and go save the world instead. If I just had powers without the responsibility, I'd be fine with it though. It's just that these "chosen ones" never seem to have anything else to do anyway, so they have nothing to complain about. Most often they start out in some horrible situation, and then someone saves them from it to help them fulfill their destiny.
Same...I had so many of these tropes in my manuscripts as a teen. I'm currently reworking old ideas because I like the good stuff, but the rest of it has to go.
*snicker* I'm currently writing (what I consider) a terrible self-insert fic. I have curly, Scottish red hair. Gave my character the same. Decided to digitally draw the character, and color picked from a picture of myself. The first 5 colors I snagged were 10-12 shades off pure white. It wasn't until I started picking from the skin sitting in shadows that I finally got a color I could see without putting it against a black background. 🤣🤣😭
I don't think so. I have black hair too. Black is the most common hair color. So there is little to nothing to assume. It is like some kind of default. Brown is like that too, except it is more focused on white people. Brown hair is associated with intellegence though. Maybe that is like how Jenna is smart enough to write books, make videos and even teach Skillshare classes.
Lol, yeah. I can't help but think how Disney's first version of Elsa was evil and had black hair, but when they decided to make her a heroine they changed her design and made her blonde.
**watches this then applies it to my characters** Hm. I have some work to do. But I love the wild red hair tropeee. My best friend in real life has wild red curly hair and I love it. To be fair though the character I made actually looks like a redhead with freckles and pale skin and everything instead of just having red hair.
It's fine to have a character with red hair, just as long as their personality is different than "wild, free, unique" or goes deeper than those traits usually associated with red hair. As long as they have a personality, you'll be fine.
ManiaMac1613 That sounds like an interesting character. I’m no Jenna Moreci, just some rando who writes sci-fi books on the internet, so take my advice with a grain of salt.
not the same thing though. "I don't want power" and "I want a normal life" are different things. The second is only really justified if your hero is a teenager who hasn't realized that there's no such thing as "normal life" yet. And part of the story should be the character learning to embrace their powers and the responsibilities that come with them. Modesty is an essential heroic trait, especially in a potential ruler or in someone with powers approaching god-levels. Jon explicitly rejects the kind of life he grew up with (i.e. "normal life"), *because* he does not want power. He was always ill at ease in castles and courts, and it was only after going beyond the Wall that he found his true home. He has realized and accepted that he is a natural leader. He is a person who deserves other peoples' trust and loyalty: because he is honest and committed to the greater good. However, he does not want to play the games of political power: because he has realized that even those people who play with noble goals, end up hurting a lot of people.
#7 - There is an explanation for a person to keep fighting through a really nasty wound. It's called adrenalin. Ask a few paramedics or other EMS people. A person goes through high adrenaline trauma and even though their body has sustained injuries that have effectively killed them, they are walking around interacting with people, talking, and even helping EMS personnel. Thing is - when the adrenaline wears off, they are dead. #8 - do a little research on trauma bonding and narcissistic abuse. You might amend your opinion about this one a little.
1- John Wick made me appreciate that trope again 2- definitely overused 3- like that trope; it's easy to fuck up but when done right it's one of my favourite trope 4 to 10 agreed.
#6 "Girly Stuff Sucks!" Thank. You. 😭 I wonder why are there so many authors nowadays who claim to be feminist (you know, feminism = not belittling women) yet literally glorify all the manly shit while mocking all the feminine things. "She's Not LiKe oTheR GirlS because she hates skirts which makes her superior to all those other stupid bimbos", that's usually the gist of it, which is ironically misogynistic as hell. I want to read about tomboys, girly girls, people in the middle. I want both Dimple Shah and Elain Archeron. I want variety!!
@@kinduvabigdeal Or, you could stop shaming people for enjoying what they enjoy. What's with the constant gatekeeping? I'm sure there are some things you enjoy that I don't like, but does that mean that I can make fun of you for it and call you names? You aren't better than everyone else just because you have a self-proclaimed sense of decency, which seems really unlikely considering you are here making fun of others for liking what they like, and labeling all of those that enjoy such fiction as having "egg shell egos."
my MC learns that she has powers to rival even the man who overthrew an entire kingdom and took control of the continent, and literally she just goes "cool."
"I want to be normal."🤣 I remember being a kid I hear people say that. I was like, " I want to be the opposite of normal. Why wouldn't you want to have really cool powers like breath underwater, fly, levitate or turn invisible? If you don't want your superpower I'll take it. I'll have lots of fun with it." My normal life is boring and there are so many superpowers I wish I could have while doing every day stuff. For example I have had to lift some really heavy stuff and i would wish i could levitate those big boxes and put them all in the shelves that are too high for me to reach. My life would have been much easier.
I have a character called Lucida Blackshell, and she is a very feminine woman, with lots of makeup, and a love for dresses, nail polish, and jewelry. She is also the ultra-powerful leader of a rebellion.
People can actually continue to fight after getting shot or stabbed. You can’t continue to fight if you lose a limb. You’ll likely be dead from blood loss. Actually: look up what it feels like to get shot. Accounts vary, but usually it’s either just sudden pressure and then nothing, sudden intense heat and then nothing, or they don’t even notice until they look down at it. It’s the recovery that hurts.
We have the same thoughts. People who are sat in their bedrooms reading the books and getting annoyed at it who have no medical or science qualifications or even bothered to look into it obviously know better.
I'm so tired of Wattpad writing that has an abusive 'Alpha' that r@pes or beats or rejects his mate because ew she's not my type. But later regrets it when she comes back as a chosen one, badass or just more sexy because she changed her wardrobe. And almost every freaking time, she takes him back. Because she just can't deny the 'mate' bond.
My least favorite trope would be the hero that's as dumb as a box of rocks, but either A. everyone ignores it or B. everyone acts like their super smart anyway
Oh my god! This is the first EVER writing channel that has acknowledged the red hair trope. I thought I was going nuts. Thank you for validating my annoyance 👍
I think I found out how the "douche bag boyfriend" trope became a trope in the first place. It goes down to a recent theory I had about the three elements of the logic in a fictionally written story. 1: What's made up in the author's imagination, 2: what is actually real, and 3: (The one highlighted for this trope) the author's individual perception on the real world. My theory as to why most of the characters already dating the love interest instead of the protagonist are horrible people is sometimes because of the author who created those characters actually think that dating the person they're "in love" with are "jerks"; which is something I don't agree with but I have a feeling and I may be wrong that some of the writers that are using the trope believe that just because someone is dating a person they "love" automatically makes them "horrible". It might also how generically evil villains originated. Maybe because back then, people thought their enemies were nothing but evil with no complexity. My views on the trope: I don't like it either because along with making the "love interest" okay with being with someone who's personality is nothing but being evil, I find it illogical for someone to be "deserving" of the love interest just because they are in love with them and for the "bad romantic partner" to have no real character development. I can think of some ideas to "twist" the trope. what if the romantic partner of the "love interest" was more complex, kind, or neutral and the protagonist who's in love with the love interest was a horrible person. Maybe the story could be about the "love interest" and their journey on leaving the bad partner. or perhaps, the protagonist wasn't in love with the person that has a "terrible" romantic partner but the protagonist fears that this person is in a bad relationship until they finally get to know this person.
Werther from Goethe fills man of the points you suggested, no wonder is a classic. The "rival" is a good, decent man, the main girl loves the main dude only as a good friend, and in the end, well... you'll see that what the main character needed was indeed some urgent mental health treatment :')
I’m glad you brought up the injury thing, I wanted to establish early on that injuries are actually dangerous, so a few chapters in when the MC dislocates her arm, it basically incapacitates her for the next several weeks. I was wondering if her inability to fight effectively would be boring to the reader but hearing what you had to say about it helped clear things up~
My main character has wild red hair and I wasn't even aware of the wild red hair trope, and she is shocked to find out about her powers because I've always felt like most fictional characters are too accepting when it comes to finding things out when any normal teenager would lose their sanity if they found out they were related to the gods...
Once at school my friend fainted and so they put her in like a wheelchair for a bit and then the school nurse just left her to roll into a wall so that she could check her phone. It was a bit funnier than it should have been tbh XD
To be fair, 90% of what kids go to the nurse for is absolute BS. Most kids just need a calm down, or an Advil (which they can't give out any more, how stupid).
I have read some stories about hair color being metaphors. This girl is blonde because she brightens everyone's day like the sun. She's a red head because she's like fire that cannot be tamed. Her hair is black because she's mysterious like the night sky. Her hair is brown because... she's basic?🤷♀️ How about hair being brown because she's sweet like chocolate. Or just stop using hair color for metaphors for character traits.
Take notes everyone, this what not to do when writing (or making cause I draw alot) a hero. P.s. I may not be a writer that much since I like to do comics and, but your videos are really helpful when doing that.
*Thank you* for Point 6; there are *different* kinds of strength, different kinds of leadership etc. - & I've often thought that the 'Princess who is bad at princessing' should have some *real* consequences to it- I actually started a story a fair few years ago now with this concept (I was in primary school, lol)- you've made me realise I should revisit it!
The only time the first trope worked is in American Gods, and if you've seen American Gods, you'll know why. It takes this trope and flips it on its head, and it's openly acknowledged and (sort of) mocked within the show.
I think there's room for nuance with people dating others whom they didn't know were jerks, and then they fall in love and they become abusive. It's a real life trope.
Theres only one single good example of the "has a dead wife" trope, and his name is magnus burnsides. Edit: the only good "i just wanna be normal" is also Duck Newton.
While we're on modern superhero movies, why can't there be more super-HEROINE movies? We got Wonder Woman and Captain Marvel and the dude-bro internet mafia threw a fit. Those are like 2 female-led blockbuster superhero films to more than 20 with male leads in the last couple of years. I WANT A GOOD CATWOMAN MOVIE TOO.
@@TheRachaelLefler Supposedly a Black Widow solo film is finally coming, which....better late than never, I guess, but the timing seems off in the franchise.
I think the only wife in the fridge trope I've seen and respected is from the T.V series Monk. At least in that show he's going to therapy and trying to move on.
@@kimifw58 nah 😑 the series starts off 5 or so years after she's been dead, when the detective Monk has recovered enough from his breakdown in order to start trying to get his badge back. Flash backs of her follows, as well as pictures, stories of her career, and people who have known her before she met her husband show up every so often. It's not played up for angst. And the character Monk had anxiety, phobias, depression, and OCD even before he met his wife (he wasn't "cured" by his wife either) but her murder triggered a psychological break with him and it took him like 5 years to start recovering. This was part due to the fact that there was no reason (he could see) why anyone would want to murder his wife so for a good few seasons he thought the bomb was intended for him as he was the best detective and made enemies. Sorry for the long explanation. Despite the wife in the fridge trope I really admire the series. (The creator has OCD and anxiety so the writing of these illnesses actually feels authentic)
*Bad at Princessing* (glares at Anna from Frozen and Merida from Brave). So true! Anna and Merida made me think, "This girl is not capable of ruling her kingdom because she sucks at princessing!" I know Elinor tried with Merida but now that they understand each other, maybe Merida will take her princess lessons a little seriously. But someone should have taught Anna how to get over her clumsiness (don't ride bikes in the house!). The other Disney girls were better. They made me think, "This girl has potential to be a good ruler!" Thank goodness for Moana and Pocahontas! I agree with you said about feminity. Whether your heroine is a girly-girl or a tomboy, she still has to be a likeable and can still be strong. Actually, I like to see a heroine who is part girly and part tomboy. For instance, likes wearing jeans for horseback riding but also enjoys putting on dresses to go dancing. That way, it would show girls that it is okay to be a girly-girly and a tomboy.
i used the first trope without knowing it's a bad trope but rather than on my hero it's on my antagonist who's an anti-villain. And now I'm reconsidering it. Perhaps I should get rid of his dead wife and use something else as his motivation...
![[LIVE] : ONE ลุมพินี 88 | คู่เอก "ป้อมเพชร vs อัสลามจอน"](http://i.ytimg.com/vi/1ZqTVVbMgbo/mqdefault.jpg)
"That sounded sexual."
"Pretend it didn't!"
Suddenly turned into a Screen Rant Pitch meeting.
I can't tell you just how many times this has happened to me or the people in my group.
That part killed me.
You have 666 likes and I’m not changing it 😂
*insert careless whisper earrape*
I... have wild red hair... when will my hero's journey begin
Are you indomitable?
Learn archery. It might speed up the process.
It's cool, I have/do all of these things and I am still awaiting my arch nemesis.
Life's an adventure soo..
Find your own Call To Adventure
"Tis but a scratch!"
"A scratch? Your arm's torn off!"
"No it isn't"
"Then what's that on the ground?"
"... It's just a flesh wound"
Jacq Fruit
Your mother is a hamster and your father smelt of elderberries.
"what are you going to do, bleed on me?"
"Well, I say I'd call it a draw. Come on then!"
"HEY! GET BACK HERE! I AIN'T DONE WITH YOU! I'LL BITE YOUR LEGS OFF!"
😂😂😂
yay Monty Python!!
"I'm not like other girls. I have snake arms."
Nice
Lmao
Zavier is that you?
Now I unironically want a fantasy novel about Snake Arms.
Just. A Hero's Journey. About a girl who's not like other girls. Because she has Snake Arms.
@@SomeBlokeOrWhatever I'd read that.
I used the "it's just a scratch" line as a joke, my character said it then instantly fell to the ground and needed surgery and recovery for 4 months.
ngl, this is the funniest trope
Up is the perfect embodiment of the dead wife trope. Carl isn't just grieving, he is unable to move on and there is a real feeling that he hasn't just lost his wife but also all of their shared plans and dreams. His entire story is about moving on and accepting the responsibility of being a father figure.
Oxtocoatl actually,the ‘dead wife’ trope is frustrating because the hero NEVER moves on.In Up we are shown they lived a whole life togheter,and Carl does move on which makes for a sweet and satisfying ending.
Also once the death happens you change FOREVER.
I mean, I'm not going to claim that trauma like that would not effect you heavily, but when it effects every hero and changes them in THE EXACT SAME WAY EVERY TIME, Theeeen we got a problem.
@@ChasehaWing Really it just boils down to execution coupled with a lack of actual growth on the Hero's part... (The gender of the "Woman in the fridge" isn't even a key part of the trope itself but the trope name seems to have excluded other examples of this trope in practice, such as Uncle Ben, Mays Hughes, and the dog that John Wick got after his Wife died...)
i literally had no idea that his name was Carl
I think Carl would be the antithesis of the woman in the fridge. He's paralyzed by his grief, not driven to be the hero of the story. And it takes a little boy and a dog to drag him out of it. In fact, we're probably only shown his relationship with his wife to keep us from hating him for being a grumpy old jerk. On the far other side of the spectrum would be Charlie Burns from Rescue Bots; he's totally functional and well adjusted, and the utter lack of mention of his wife in a kids show implies that she's dead. But she's not in the fridge motivating him to be a hero, she's *just* dead.
I like the widower trope when the character expresses ACTUAL grief and overcomes it along the story. Grief is not often portrayed in fiction and I wish more authors would write about it.
I think writers tend to assume the "becoming hardened" is the same as grief, but they never seem to try and get over it because people really like being miserable all the time.
LadyEtihw Magnus Burnsides is the only one I like
I remember writing a book where the protagonist lost her boyfriend, who was her best friend of 15 yrs. I struggled with portraying it cause grief is such an intense and lingering feeling. I 100% agree with you. Characters don't feel human to me if they don't experience effects of losing someone dear
A character losing a loved one is almost always a good source of character development. When it's used as the inciting incident for the entire story it can lead to some problems.
@@hazeltade3679 same here! He actually shows emotion, is really funny and can actually display kindess. Sometimes grief and loss doesn't equal reclusive asshole
No one:
Jenna: but first we've got some bitchin to do
Everyone: This is why I came here. Where's the popcorn?
More like
Everyone: Jenna, please make a video complaining!
Jenna: Okay!
Jenna's bitching is my favorite
Lol hell yeah!!
"It's just a scratch."
I actually wrote a character that got his arm cut off and does the whole screaming in pain and passing out. He spends a good chunk of time going through emotional trauma and quitting the main character group(even tho he was the mc). The poor thing about modern writers is that they ignore realism and often don't expand on trauma and break down moments that would otherwise completely change a character to the core
Did you finish the story and can it be read somewhere?
@@jh.4761 Unfortunately, I haven't finished from having work and the occasional writers block. I do have a few chapters(12 or so) on wattpad. I only put it on the site to see the reception from people. However, I haven't gotten to that part I was referring to cause it doesn't happen until the second to last story arc. If your still willing to check it out, it's called 'The Black Edge' on wattpad by my other name 'TheBeastInUs'. Beware plot holes cause its not the most updated version. Hope you enjoy if you look at it. Feel free to comment
@@notthebeastinus2786 I'll check it out, thank your very much and I hope you can overcome your writer's block. Good luck with everything else too! :)
Edit: I can't find it, do you maybe have a link?
@@jh.4761 www.wattpad.com/story/163345592-the-black-edge
That's it. Got no idea why it was all teh way down. Hope you enjoy
NotTheBeastInUs I have a character that can only die of old age. They’re not that over powered. Well I mean they are but they hate everything and don’t care so they just don’t do anything...
"At that point he's just asking for syphilis."
I actually responded out loud, "At that point, I'm usually pretty sure the entire story is the protagonist's syphilis induced hallucination."
Check out Wen Spencer's book "A Brother's Price". Syphilis is considered a slow acting but lethal threat
YES to all, but ESPECIALLY to the "kickass" woman who "don't need no man" and then proceeds to need a man throughout the entire book....
*cough* sjmass
thats actually pretty logical if based on irl as females are let in lower standarts than males locical example in fiction is on shannara where prinses basicly cheated her way into guard unit
Miri Cosette I want a kickass woman who doesn’t need a man because she’s gay. Or ace. That’d be funny
@@TheJarric
That just a society needing people to actual function.
@@Ninjaananas false as men do it better
A small modification to the useless princess trope to make it better:
Instead of making her terrible at manners and socializing, how about making her unaware of how running a kingdom works and see her struggle through the tasks of meeting up with other diplomats, dealing with problems in her country and all that.
Realism. Love it.
Because that would imply that the princess is traditionally supposed to actually run a country, not only getting married off to a prince and being impregnated by him to continue the royal lineage while in between biding her time by drinking tea and stitching and doing other women things and let the men rule the country. Of course there are historical examples of great stateswomen who did take the reigns and took an active role in ruling their country (both in the subtle way of using female influence and diplomacy behind the scenes as well as actually and officially being the ruler in charge), but writers who use that inept princess trope usually wouldn't want to portray a princess as being expected to be a strongminded intelligent politician, they want to portray her as the free spirited girl in the golden cage that breaks free from those bonds and proves herself as an individual who subverts the traditional expectations.
Akatsuki no yona
Yuri from Red River. A little bit Usagi from Sailor Moon. Yona from Yona of the Dawn.
I had the similar idea of this for my book. Although the princess would have terrible manners from the start, since she was raised as a commoner, she would be to sole ruler of her kingdom. This would allow her to be focused on foreign affairs and issues running in her country by herself.
I died at the “at this point he’s just asking for syphilis”
LOL TELL ME I'M WRONG!
@@JennaMoreci you are decidedly not wrong. I've been watching your videos for like 2+ years and still you surprise me. I am not sure why. i should expect this by now.
@@Trinsicity I sure hope sticking their soft organs into alien biochemical systems isn't going to backfire at some point!
@@Trinsicity Who needs regular STIs when you can have exotic space STIs that cause you to turn blue and cough up all your internal organs? And forget about getting pregnant with a boring human baby, get yourself a fancy alien parasite injected straight into your uterus and watch it develop a symbiotic relationship with your body as it slowly takes over your mind and transforms you into a nightmarish killing machine!
Sex with aliens: for those moments when your bad decisions aren't nearly disastrous enough!
@@Healermain15 I really hope it does. That sounds hilarious and I want to read it.
I died at "my hairs brown so I'm a piece of sh*t*"
my hairs black, like my soul.
I'm a red-head. I have no soul. 🤣
My hair's flaxen, cause I like flax.
My hairs bottle-red, I’m a YA protagonist
My hairs dark brown, I’m a rotting tree
my hair is blonde, guess i am bimbo or a mean girl in process
"Wild red hair"
*remembers my red haired characters are physically weak and are paranoid 24/7 (they're father and daughter)* Phew
I didn’t even know wild red hair was a thing...
But the brown hair shit is a mood
ArtWithBex
It really is. Even for black girls. They have to have red hair.
I mean my MCs in my new story have blonde and black hair sooo...
@@nerdyempress6745 idk if ive ever seen a black girl in a book described with red har lol
@ArtWithBex I guess you never met black widow...
Idk if it's still a thing or not but when I was a kid all the villains had "stringy black hair" and I naturally have yardstick straight jet black hair. IDK why that was a thing, but it was, especially for witches.
"Or she knows he's an a-hole and she's perfectly fine with it..."
When you call out Twilight without actually saying the title.
Emily McCosh BAHAHAHAHAHAHA! So much yes...that’s exactly what I thought too.
@Bayman Hayabusa That's more on the abusive side tho.
[to the tune of Supercalifrajulisticexpialidocious]
🎶 _OHHHHHHHHHHH..._
Grizzled thirty-something brown-haired white male alcoholic
His wife and kids were murdered so his mood is vitriolic
To say this guy's in everything is not that hyperbolic
Grizzled thirty-something brown-haired white male alcoholic!
(From Tumblr xP)
lol
Heracles
The Punisher who??
@@hannahwicks7197 well to be fair. He did kill them himself.
I’m actually crying this is sooo good
_"No one wants to live a normal life."_
Welp, guess I'll just fade into nonexistence.
LOL
Yoshikage Kira has joined the chat
Talking Controller Kira: Why can’t I just live a normal quiet life?!
Also Kira: I require your Za Handos
@@lindales3959 in the story i'm writing being a chosen one doesn't even comes with extra powers, just a ton of responsability and danger, the mc's main goal is literally going back home and living a normal life
When I was younger the "I want to be normal" was a big hook. Then it could happen to me.
8:29 This trope reminds me of a quote in Predator.
"You bleeding man."
"I ain't got time to bleed."
Still one of my favorite quotes despite the 80s cheese.
'80s cheese is the best kind of cheese.
I have a fiery, sardonic blond and a naïve, kind red head in my story, and then I looked back and was like "wait a minute, I mixed up the tropes."
I love it already
I always imagine blondes being the sassy badass women anyway, something about blonde hair I guess.
NebuLucid I mean yeah all my redhead friends are so sweet and I’m over here like being just a lot to deal with 24/7 lol 😂
"Just a scratch" I can now only think if Monty python and the holy grail! 😂 "tis but a scratch"
"Tis no larger than a church door."-Shakespeare
Tis but a flesh wound
@@lukasnovella9001 yup
A scratch? Your arm fell off
“I’m invincible”
"Can we stop vilifying femininity?"
Thank you! The leading lady in my WIP learns that exact lesson in her character arc. When we meet her, she's 17 and has grown up disconnecting herself from her femininity as a defense mechanism, but as the novel progresses, she realizes there can and must be a balance of both masculine and feminine.
Also, anyone who thinks badass female figures can't be feminine, I refer you to Freya, Norse goddess of love and sensuality and the awesome leader of the Valkyries (female warrior spirits who collect the souls of the dead to bring them to the afterlife).
You are doing it right, because so many are having to relearn loving femininity
@@mimzy1921 Thank you! It's a lesson I myself learned, and am still learning. I was a tomboy growing up. It wasn't until I hit my teenage years (and started to notice boys) that I finally started acting and dressing more "feminine". And, years later, when I was in my late 20s (I'm 31 as of 2019) and discovered my spiritual path of eclectic Paganism, I really started to understand what being feminine and the energy of femininity meant. It's not something you can dress in with a skirt or shoes or put on your face out of a bottle. In short, to use Pagan terms, femininity is about recognizing and showing the Goddess within, in all Her aspects: Maiden, Mother, and Crone, light and shadow.
Plus Aphrodite (she has an epithet of 'Warlike' among a few others), Artemis (she is described as 'beautiful in several hymns to her). Also kudos on having that arc in the book. So many girls are being taught that being feminine = weak and bad and that's not true at ALL.
That's cool! Some people act like putting on mascara takes away IQ piints or something.
@@IceQueen975 Thanks! And yes, femininity can be badass. There's a reason that, in so many stories and in real life, people are terrified of women who find and embrace their own personal femininity, femininity that isn't tied to the patriarchal definition of it. Rubis, my leading lady, grew up with the idea that femininity was weak or meant subservience. It isn't until she meets Charles, a painter struggling with survivor's guilt from having not fought in WWI, and falls in love with him that she realizes being feminine, both for her own sake and as a partner in a romantic relationship, takes a lot of strength.
“Then there are writers who cut off a human character arm and they keep fighting the battle...”
Anime shows/mangas *sweating intensifies*
Yo I was thinking that exact same thing!
-deku-
Raiden from Metal Gear Rising: "S**t! Not again!"
But it can also happen in real life. You’d be surprised what humans can do when their life is at stake and they have no choice, sometimes the body goes into survival mode.
@@MyGamer125 yeah but like Raiden is a mega advanced cyborg David Bowie doppel supersoldier. 90% of his body is basically just a human sized mech
6:54 "I love the feeling of the wind in my hair."
Don't you mean "I love the feeling of the wind in my red, wild hair"?
Llllĺĺĺĺl
I love when you start playing dress up. It's how I know you're serious!😼
lol why thank you!
hahaha! Yes!
I couldn't tell if the beard was a snapchat filter or not. Was it??
@@newguy7209 It was a stick-on.
#1: Man with Dead Wife
*Remembers about hero having a "dead" wife*
Oh no...
"He's incapable of human emotion"
*hero is literally the sweetest person imaginable*
Phew...
Who was she talking about?
And then you killed his dog and he's out for blood.
ReasyRandom Keanu Reeves
ReasyRandom THEY DID THIS WITH BRUCE BANNER. THEY'VE DONE ALL OF THESE TROPES WITH BRUCE BANNER
@@sunnysside6709 Even the wild redhead?
*writing a book with a redheaded heroine*
*watches this video*
AND I OOP--
I think that it's okay to have one. The problem comes along if you're trying to use hair colors as shorthand for personality and that means using red hair to say she's unique, quirky, fun, free-spirited, independent, etc. as a lazy way of not actually showing her BE any of those things. I see it more in movies than books because movies, with their shorter time limit, use visuals as shorthand and so personality is often coded into character design. Like with 'Brave', Rose in 'Titanic', Anna in 'Frozen', Satine in 'Moulin Rouge', Clementine's red-head phase in 'Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind' (although she's more of a deconstruction/subversion), etc.
@@TheRachaelLefler I was just thinking that "red haired and set in medieval England".....so they trying to make Merida from Brave?
@@matthewroberts198 B-but Merida is from Scotland.
@@midnight8341 oof honestly I think it's fine XD I said it more as a joke than anything, especially because my character is just really determined and fiery, but honestly I only gave her red hair because it's unique and it's a trait that connects her to her disappeared father, if that makes any sense. Also YEAHHH I think you're safe it's like saying: "I'm smart and I have glasses, but I'm not smart because I have glasses" y'know?
@@mattywren I also said it more like a joke... ^^"
But yeah, you're right, if it's not the only defining feature, we're probably fine.
So many of these relate to Merida from Brave.
Red hair, check. Rides horses, check. Bad at princessing, check.
Shes actually badass though so its a pass
Good at archery?
Ok that’s actually pretty cool......now if people wouldn’t think she’s the first princess to fight.....
She’s a good hero, though, so it’s a pass.
Exactly what I was thinking when she described the red head.
My main problem is that all those female MCs who scorn femininity and "aren't like other girls".... still manage to fit into the ideal of femininity. This is more obvious in TV and movies - yeah, she laughs at girls who do makeup and are afraid of getting dirty, but she always looks like a supermodel and the only way she ever gets messy somehow makes her look even hotter. She would never, ever diet, but it's a moot point because she's a size zero anyway. She works on bikes and cars, and yet her hands are always soft and her nails are long and perfectly manicured.
YESSS SAY IT LOUDER
MC: *finding out they have amazing powers and are expected to save the world* Me??? But I’m so normal and boring and USELESS
Me finding out: yeahhhh I always felt like I was destined for greatness so that sounds right....where do I begin?
I'd probably misuse my powers tbh 😅
Liam L.E. Me too 😂😂😂
Wizard guy: Ok, you have been endowed with incredible magic powers. Now, I know what you’re going to say. You just want a normal life, you don’t want-
Me: I’m in!
Wizard guy: See? Now- wait what?
Me: Mate, I’ve been waiting for something extraordinarily cool like this to happen to me all my life! Why would I want a normal life when I can have one filled with magic and adventure?! Now come on! Tell me who’s ass I’ve gotta kick with my awesome powers!
Wizard guy: Wait... So, you’re NOT going to go on about how you don’t want to be the chosen one? How you want to just be a normal highschooler?
Me: Hmm... Nope! Now come on! Teach me how to blow stuff up!
Me: Oh, damn... This is real? I ain't hallucinating or something? In that case then shit, just give me the god damn powers.
Cheetahgirl Studios but actually!! Like so what I gotta do to get these powers i was promised?? 😂😂😂
Honestly, there's nothing wrong with using any of these tropes. Just make them unique in some way. If you keep watching trope and cliche videos looking for what to avoid, you'll run out of things to write.
Agreed. It's important to learn exactly why certain tropes are hated before deciding what to do with them.
I mean you can include cliches in your story. But having 90% of the cliches make one's story way way way too predicatable. A bit of creativity with a little of cliche is fine
True
Speaking of which, the story of Victor and Nora Fries in “Batman: The Animated Series” is arguably an example of how even a literal “woman in a fridge” trope can be used well to make a heartfelt story for a morally grey villain.
As an autistic woman--diagnosed ten years ago--I'd be ruling out an awful lot of my own lived experience as fictional material if I had to avoid the "princess sucks at princessing" trope. Not that I am or ever have been a princess--I'm just saying that what society as deemed as the female role is frequently inaccessible to me because I have poor social skills, little interest in fashion, and wouldn't want to wear a lot of things that are in style for sensory reasons anyway.
On a related note, if I had seen this video when I was in my teens, I would have immediately assumed that this TH-camr must be a superficial air headed bimbo and clicked off as soon as she started trashing the "hating on femininity" trope, because back then I pretty much thought that that the conventional model of womanhood *was* being a superficial air headed bimbo, and I had nothing but scorn for women like that.
But now I'm forty and I have a much more nuanced view of femininity. I realize that femininity comes in many different forms other than the "air headed bimbo" kind (which I think is just a creation of the patriarchy rather than a genuine manifestation of femininity) and I no longer think of femininity as being a bad thing in and of itself.
Nowadays I have respect for pretty much everyone who is committed to being authentic, respecting boundaries, and allowing as much autonomy as possible in relationships. And if being their authentic self means that a woman has more conventionally feminine interests than I do, that's great. It might or might not mean that we have less in common or less to talk about, depending on her specific interests, but diversity is what makes the human race interesting.
8:27 “‘Tis but a scratch!”
“A scratch? Your arm’s off!”
“I’ve had worse!”
Worse? Like a brain injury? That explains this.
Ella Hayes+ “Look, you stupid bastard, you’ve got no arms left!”
I like to imagine he simply has prosthetic limbs
Oh my...
People in YA: OH MY GOOOODDDD!!!! I don’t want magical powers! I just want my crush to notice me!! What would I do with amazing water powers anyway?!
Me: ... IF YOU DON’T WANT IT, I’LL FRICKEN TAKE IT YOU UNGRATEFUL JERK!
I’d literally just be like “yay!I got superpowers!Now I can do what I want!”
Related to the 'Bad at Princessing' trope:
Could we please get a male character in a position of power who is expected to be tough, lead his own army and conquer and colonize other lands, but is terrible at fighting and would rather do community work, take care of his citizens, make art and arrange flowers and shit?
No? Just me? Oh.
Omg one of my current manuscripts has that character as the MC (it's not the manuscript I'm working on right now though so um yeah it'll take a wHiLe XD)
Have you watched the Dragon Prince? I know it's not a book but it meets those guidelines.
That's my heir to the throne. He's intelligent but genuinely horrible with any martial skill. This king isn't running into an army of orcs. He'll think of a way to win on his terms.
That’s literally my oc
I mean
Kinda
It’s a fanfic in the mcu where the oc is the prince of Vanaheim, sucks at combat, and would rather tend to a garden.
But like
It’s the mcu so that ain’t gonna happen for the poor god of summer.
Oh yeah, he’s also the god of lust-
in the story im writing, which is told in two books, after the first book's story, the mc pretty much does exactly that. he settles down and does most of the more community based roles in the kingdom hes a part of, while his fiancee handles the more combative parts of ruling. hes always been a very gentle soul, and the downtime between the two stories allows that part of his personality to thrive.
One of my main character's wife is dead, but her murder has long been avenged and it didn't make the widower any happier and his main subplot is actually finding new meaning and new love again. His dead wife is one of the few subjects he usually doesn't talk about by his own initiative.
Yeah I have a novel that's still in a planning phase but the idea is the main character is a barbarian warrior woman. Her father was killed by a wizard. She goes on a whole meandering, side-track-y quest to kill the wizard in revenge. Only to find at the end of her quest, that wizard is nothing but a sick and dying old man, bed ridden in a drafty old castle. She does kill him, but it's more of a mercy kill, so it never feels like she got true revenge. Also losing her father at a young age isn't like, used as an excuse to make her emotionally detached or an asshole to people.
@@TheRachaelLefler I like it!
Rachael Lefler That sounds pretty good! Maybe she could travel towards different countries to find the wizard but in this world it’s a mixture of fantasy and real world. For example, some of the countries will be the exact same as the ones today like France and Britain but then you have some other countries that don’t actually exist but will exist in the world of your book.
@TodayLifeIsGood I sort of did similar, though me the heroine's husband had died during a civil war 15 years prior so there wasn't really any 'revenge' she could have, so she's spent the years since trying to help others. Her subplot is more about her reconnecting with her son (the MC who had been with his father during the civil war and had grown up an orphan as she was never able to find him) and both of trying to come to terms with losing that time.
I really like that! I too have an mc with a dead wife, but he is pretty sarcastic and dry and uses humor to pull through his stuff. My novel is going to be on the scandals/malpractice in the hospital (like drug addict surgeons, purposely doing unethical procedures, violating the oath, etc..) and he wants to get to the bottom of the situation and expose the hospital for their wrongdoings
"wild red hair"
me: *cries because I love Kirishima
Preach it, sister!
Apparently, you're in luck. This one is only about female redheads. Besides, anime characters get a free pass anyway, 'cause they know how to get away with being silly and awesome at the same time
she's an Uzumaki she gets a pass
@@MonkeyDsire at the risk of a joke going over my head
I think you mean kushina? Lol
Who’s that?
I have wild red curly hair and I am super shy and quiet. Definitely not a wild girl who 'can't be tamed' lol.
Good point. I have never seen a wild red head.
@@anaccountmusthaveaname9110 I've seen tons of 'em; none of them were human, though.
Same
I’m a ginger with untamable hair and I definitely fit the trope.
#6 Same! I hate when the main girl is a Tomboy but has to mention how tough strong she is and how lame girly girls are every chapter, that’s what I call being conceited.
Girly girls can be just as boss as you mentioned. I am a firm believer!
I like the kind of tomboy, what struggles with how she views her own femininity.
The "but I just wanna be normal" trope works to an extent. In my Wattpad book, my MC finds out she's a mermaid and is understandably conflicted. On one hand, she loves the sea and the freedom it affords her. On the other hand, she perceives mermaids as evil because of past events.
im sorry how do you not realize you're a mermaid up until a point
@@uncroppedsoop I think she was forbidden to go in the water?? Tbh I don’t fully understand the mechanics of it
@@sunnysside6709 how does she get around on land??
@@uncroppedsoop she’s a half mermaid like cleo from h20
Please could you talk about writing angst and trauma? I see so many characters written to have the worst lives possible with no positives and it gets really grating. Seeing the same character have more and more bad things happen to them and being expected to cry every time is exhausting
Lydia Smith Hi there, Lydia
Would you be able to suggest any tips about that? I have a kind of "hidden" main character of a particular story that the audience won't readily find out is the main character till damn near the end of the second half. Laughably he falls into the antihero tropes, but I've got a good path built to him growing out of these things slowly over the course of the book, without outright doing away with them, because I believe trauma tends to stick to a person for the rest of their lives. I do have specific situations from his past designed to be painful, but also as sources that reveal his character to the audience. I did at one point become excessive and toned the number of situations like this down, so as not to become toooo predictable, but would you say it's still worth the trouble if the character you followed, and sometimes those around him, were actually improving as people every time they learned something new?
@@NeoPokebonz I'm not super qualified to say, I am just a mere 14 year old girl with a Wattpad account. But if I had to give advice, I'd say don't make them talk about their deepest, darkest feelings easily. It takes a lot of digging and maybe a life or death situation to get even a few details.
You said he falls into the anti-hero trope, and honestly most well-developed characters would. It doesn't necessarily mean brooding, just flawed. With that in mind, let them be funny. Let them screw up and get embarrassed and say funny things that aren't snarky. A dark, mysterious hero with a bad past is cliché, most of the time the impact is lost. However, when a comedic or light character starts angsting, people will feel it. Think of Michael Mell from BMC, Arnold Rimmer in Out Of Time and Hector from Coco. It hurts more because we as audiences are used to them providing the laughs.
All of my characters have different styles of comedy and different issues to work through. I get the best results based on the comments I get from a character who is nerdy and socially inept but also very fragile and unstable. He has a fair share of jokes.
To summarise, don't make the trauma their main character trait. Let them be funny and sweet and melodramatic, but foreshadow their true feelings subtly and if you pull it off right, I guarantee it'll get a good reaction.
Hope this helps. Good luck! I'd love to read it.
Lydia Smith ah! How insightful! Thank you for you time, young lady. I appreciate it.
Try writing about a character with a great life, like a fully amazing life, just a short story to refresh you, whenever I get stuck writing my novel I write a mini short story that's the opposite.
“No one wants to live a normal life.” 😂😂😂😂 This video is hilarious and I love your point on femininity. ♥️♥️ Love my heels 😂
Kira Yoshikage would like to know your location.
People who can walk on heels are so impressive to me. That's great balance and toe strength right there.
No one wants to live a normal life... until they don't
@@kingnothing915 Beautiful Duwang he is... *chew*
#6 made me instantly think of Tamora Pierce's writing. She has a lot of badass feminine characters, and tomboy characters learning to embrace feminine traits on their own terms.
I also thought of Tamora Pierce, specifically in Song of the Lioness when Alanna used to sneak out in her dress and wig, just enjoying being girly for a moment on her own.
But why do tomboyish characters need to constantly learn to *embrace* femininity? Shouldn't we respect masculine girls that have a "it works for you, cool, but not for me thanks" attitude towards being traditionally feminine?
follow petitelordexx I’m kinda sick of stories where the one tomboy character secretly being empty inside for not conforming to gender stereotypes. I’m sorry to say this but it’s not exactly a step forward in gender equality to frame masculine women as inherently less complete than feminine women.
Good to know that Disney did some of these mistakes. *CoughReycough*
@@ravenfrancis1476 I think all the embracing stuff is for the ones who aren't that self assured and stable in only being masculine
I read this one book with a five man band featuring a girl with wild red hair, glorious femininity, explicit heterosexuality, and a martial arts expertise. I thought it was disgusting until I read this exchange and realized what was happening:
"So, which one is your boyfriend?"
"Why would any of them be my boyfriend?"
"Because you're you?"
"...You know I'm aromantic, right?"
@Linda Les Aw man I don’t even remember, it was two years ago 😭 I’ll tell you if I can think of it
Commenting to be notified if you remember the book bc I'm aromantic bisexual and there is absolutely no representation for aro characters who aren't also ace. 😭
Name please
Hi! Commenting just in case you find the title of the book 🙃
Pleaaasseee find this book yo
The Iron Gauntlet book actually writes the "I want to be normal" trope well, in the form of the MC only wanting to be normal because his father doesn't want him to do magic. He says it's dangerous and what killed MC's mom, so he tries to continuously fail at getting into the magic school. He does develop away from that thought later, and it was a convincing way to use the trope.
Wasn't that the Iron Trials? Love that series
I'm literally sitting here thinking about how to make a good hero for my book, I don't know how you do it but don't stop.
*Our books need you*
LOLOL
"Hero, you must have *some* sort of natural stake in this story's conflict? Save your sister who happened to work within our very negligible company from the monsters we totally didn't purposefully unleashed onto the world ! Save the family farm from the corrupt, rival family of clowns that threaten to buy it!*Anything!* "
@@anothercub6958 the second one sounds awefully specific...?
@@midnight8341 Reading over it again, I dont see how it is.
8:26
Tis but a scratch
A scratch!? Your arm's off!
No it isn't.
Well, what's that then?
I've had worse.
i was looking for this comment
thank u
"You liar!"
Alright we'll call it a draw!
@@MsCassidy23 It's just a flesh wound.
Morpheme-insert a shot into your character for extra cool “it’s just a scratch” moments. WARNING, SPECIAL OFFER! Buy today and get a free painkiller addiction character trait! Do not miss the opportunity!
*cringes because the main character in my book is a princess who is terrible at princessing*
I’m not like other mainstream heroines
I’M BALD.
Ironically the only one of those I can think of's actress has naturally wild red hair.
ONE PUUUUUUUUUUU-
@@zmadisonz 3 2 1 *kill show*
...Ripley?
Mad max: Fury Road
#5 The worst part is that the book will ignore all the important responsibilities that come with being a monarch. They'll focus on a queen's need to wear fancy dresses and drink tea, while completely ignoring things like deciding on whether or not to go to war or finding ways to keep the guards loyal.
Royalty is closer to the president than it is to the popular girls at school.
The hero who is reluctant to be the hero for 90%+ of the story (hi Rosemary &Rue). Especially if their reluctance resets in the next book.
omg I haaate resets in books regarding character development...
@@zzdesolatezz who doesn't? It just makes another book with the exact same character development arc yet again and I'm not paying for that shit...
@@zzdesolatezz Seriously! At least have the decency to make a different character if you want to rehash the same plot again!
Heh. Well, I've been reading a series recently where the main character zig-zags quite a bit on this, but oddly it goes slightly differently than is expected. In the first series, he's pretty much heeds the call from the start since he got taken in hand and started being trained in his role from the time he was eight. It's only when he hits his early 20s after years of grinding service where he had to kill repeatedly and was nearly killed himself many times that he decided to NOPE out of there and try to live a life where he doesn't have to kill anyone or have people trying to kill him. He does come back eventually when his family needs him and realizes what standing back and refusing to be a part of that life has cost him and them over the time he was gone. After that, he tries to fulfill his family obligations faithfully from then on, albeit in a slightly different way than previously.
To be fair, I'd also be upset if someone asked me to cancel all my fun plans and go save the world instead. If I just had powers without the responsibility, I'd be fine with it though.
It's just that these "chosen ones" never seem to have anything else to do anyway, so they have nothing to complain about. Most often they start out in some horrible situation, and then someone saves them from it to help them fulfill their destiny.
I always try to apply your commentary to my writing, it's very helpful
Same...I had so many of these tropes in my manuscripts as a teen. I'm currently reworking old ideas because I like the good stuff, but the rest of it has to go.
@@Artsy_Christmouse I feel the exact same way about my old works
"NO ONE WANTS TO LIVE A NORMAL LIFE!"
omg, I'm dying, it's really the best worst trope!
This is a line in my WIP, after the MC realises & accepts they have abilities: "I want a life less ordinary."
#10: exists
Jack sparrow: but you have heard of me
I have a red haired main character...
"Wild, red *curly* hair."
Oh, mine's is straight.
"Natural redheads are too pale."
Oh, my redhead is pale.
I love red hair.
*snicker* I'm currently writing (what I consider) a terrible self-insert fic. I have curly, Scottish red hair. Gave my character the same. Decided to digitally draw the character, and color picked from a picture of myself. The first 5 colors I snagged were 10-12 shades off pure white. It wasn't until I started picking from the skin sitting in shadows that I finally got a color I could see without putting it against a black background. 🤣🤣😭
If hair color dictates personality, then I guess my black hair makes me EVIIIIIL😂
I don't think so. I have black hair too. Black is the most common hair color. So there is little to nothing to assume. It is like some kind of default. Brown is like that too, except it is more focused on white people. Brown hair is associated with intellegence though. Maybe that is like how Jenna is smart enough to write books, make videos and even teach Skillshare classes.
No, i think that just makes you indistinguishable from others.... sorry....
Does that mean grey hair equals wisdom? ;)
Lol, yeah. I can't help but think how Disney's first version of Elsa was evil and had black hair, but when they decided to make her a heroine they changed her design and made her blonde.
I have reddish-brown hair, so I don't know where I'm supposed to fit.
**watches this then applies it to my characters**
Hm. I have some work to do.
But I love the wild red hair tropeee. My best friend in real life has wild red curly hair and I love it. To be fair though the character I made actually looks like a redhead with freckles and pale skin and everything instead of just having red hair.
It's fine to have a character with red hair, just as long as their personality is different than "wild, free, unique" or goes deeper than those traits usually associated with red hair. As long as they have a personality, you'll be fine.
Merida🤣
@Rachtop I swear, Merida is both "Wild red hair" and "Useless Princess".
What about wild red hair, except she's rude, swears a lot and has a drinking problem? You know, like a proper fiery Irish lass?
ManiaMac1613 That sounds like an interesting character. I’m no Jenna Moreci, just some rando who writes sci-fi books on the internet, so take my advice with a grain of salt.
A good quote for #4:
"I don't want it."
-Jon Snow.
not the same thing though. "I don't want power" and "I want a normal life" are different things. The second is only really justified if your hero is a teenager who hasn't realized that there's no such thing as "normal life" yet. And part of the story should be the character learning to embrace their powers and the responsibilities that come with them.
Modesty is an essential heroic trait, especially in a potential ruler or in someone with powers approaching god-levels. Jon explicitly rejects the kind of life he grew up with (i.e. "normal life"), *because* he does not want power. He was always ill at ease in castles and courts, and it was only after going beyond the Wall that he found his true home. He has realized and accepted that he is a natural leader. He is a person who deserves other peoples' trust and loyalty: because he is honest and committed to the greater good. However, he does not want to play the games of political power: because he has realized that even those people who play with noble goals, end up hurting a lot of people.
Book!Jon wouldn't pussy out like that.
@@sophiejones7727 buddy, pal, bro, dude. It was a joke.
Gabby Fringette yeah, but you were making a point out of to
Okay listen
How many main character/heroine are feminine
Bc FEMININE DOESNT MEAN SHE AINT A BADASS
#7 - There is an explanation for a person to keep fighting through a really nasty wound. It's called adrenalin. Ask a few paramedics or other EMS people. A person goes through high adrenaline trauma and even though their body has sustained injuries that have effectively killed them, they are walking around interacting with people, talking, and even helping EMS personnel. Thing is - when the adrenaline wears off, they are dead.
#8 - do a little research on trauma bonding and narcissistic abuse. You might amend your opinion about this one a little.
That's the best mustache I've ever seen on a horse.
right? he's dapper!
Writing with Jenna Moreci I had to enter a drawing into a contest and it was a drawing of a horse titled “Dapper Derby” 😂
On horseback riding:I love the feeling of wind in my hair and a powerful force between my legs"
Me:slow head turn
Mama is definitely going to ban her from riding horses now.
1- John Wick made me appreciate that trope again
2- definitely overused
3- like that trope; it's easy to fuck up but when done right it's one of my favourite trope
4 to 10 agreed.
#6 "Girly Stuff Sucks!" Thank. You. 😭 I wonder why are there so many authors nowadays who claim to be feminist (you know, feminism = not belittling women) yet literally glorify all the manly shit while mocking all the feminine things. "She's Not LiKe oTheR GirlS because she hates skirts which makes her superior to all those other stupid bimbos", that's usually the gist of it, which is ironically misogynistic as hell. I want to read about tomboys, girly girls, people in the middle. I want both Dimple Shah and Elain Archeron. I want variety!!
“ character continues to fight the battle with their arm lopped off”
Me: *sweats in Erwin Smith*
Me: *pats myself on the back*
My thoughts: congratulations you have successfully avoided these bad troops in your mc
BUT MAMA!
but jennna....
"The only people this appeals to are old egg shell ego men. And they're gonna die soon. Who are you gonna market these books to then?"
Dead. ☠☠☠😂🤣😂
I think you're being a bit optimistic. I keep bumping into young guys raised that way.
@@TheBronzeDog that makes sense and that's the scary part. Egg shell ego men can only give their sons egg shell egos.
@@kinduvabigdeal Or, you could stop shaming people for enjoying what they enjoy. What's with the constant gatekeeping? I'm sure there are some things you enjoy that I don't like, but does that mean that I can make fun of you for it and call you names? You aren't better than everyone else just because you have a self-proclaimed sense of decency, which seems really unlikely considering you are here making fun of others for liking what they like, and labeling all of those that enjoy such fiction as having "egg shell egos."
@@Percival917 tentacle monster protagonist (who is chased by many)
my MC learns that she has powers to rival even the man who overthrew an entire kingdom and took control of the continent, and literally she just goes "cool."
"I want to be normal."🤣 I remember being a kid I hear people say that. I was like, " I want to be the opposite of normal. Why wouldn't you want to have really cool powers like breath underwater, fly, levitate or turn invisible? If you don't want your superpower I'll take it. I'll have lots of fun with it." My normal life is boring and there are so many superpowers I wish I could have while doing every day stuff. For example I have had to lift some really heavy stuff and i would wish i could levitate those big boxes and put them all in the shelves that are too high for me to reach. My life would have been much easier.
Me too man me too
I have a character called Lucida Blackshell, and she is a very feminine woman, with lots of makeup, and a love for dresses, nail polish, and jewelry.
She is also the ultra-powerful leader of a rebellion.
Nice name. I like it.
Feminine asskickers are literally the best thing ever.
"Oh, looks like I chipped a nail... Eh, worth it."
I love these kinds of female leads. Like kim possible
Bless. I already love her.
does she like guns?
Number 9 is one of my biggest frustrations with anime.
Mine as well. They keep ruining their characters.
That moment when none of Jenna's tropes apply to any characters in your WIP and you get a little ego boost :D
People can actually continue to fight after getting shot or stabbed. You can’t continue to fight if you lose a limb. You’ll likely be dead from blood loss.
Actually: look up what it feels like to get shot. Accounts vary, but usually it’s either just sudden pressure and then nothing, sudden intense heat and then nothing, or they don’t even notice until they look down at it.
It’s the recovery that hurts.
We have the same thoughts. People who are sat in their bedrooms reading the books and getting annoyed at it who have no medical or science qualifications or even bothered to look into it obviously know better.
I don't have any experience with being shot or whatever, but I'd imagine it to be because of the adrenaline rush, which can numb pain.
I'm so tired of Wattpad writing that has an abusive 'Alpha' that r@pes or beats or rejects his mate because ew she's not my type. But later regrets it when she comes back as a chosen one, badass or just more sexy because she changed her wardrobe. And almost every freaking time, she takes him back. Because she just can't deny the 'mate' bond.
#7 - Tis but a flesh wound!
Quonton A flesh wound? Your arm fell off
GOOD VIDEO BY A NICE AND LOVELY LADY
How was this uploaded 2 days ago
@@madcircle7311 early access! Check out Jenna's patreon page!
My least favorite trope would be the hero that's as dumb as a box of rocks, but either A. everyone ignores it or B. everyone acts like their super smart anyway
*Cough* Holmes and Watson *cough*
I just realised. The *hair*oine.
I'll see myself out.
Oh my god! This is the first EVER writing channel that has acknowledged the red hair trope. I thought I was going nuts. Thank you for validating my annoyance 👍
"Wild Red Hair" Oh you must mean Merida.😂
Yes. The just wanting to be normal trope got old as soon as the last season of Buffy ended.
I literally have wild red hair, my mum's co workers compare me with Merida XD
Same! And I'm a bit partial to it for my characters.
Damn lucky
I get compared to Belle all the time. But I don't mind it, she is my favorite princess anyway XD. I love smart/leader-like characters :) xx
@@princessluckystrikerbrook7066 belle is my dads favorite
@@cringemeister04 that's cool! My second is Rapunzel, then it'd be Mulan.
I think I found out how the "douche bag boyfriend" trope became a trope in the first place. It goes down to a recent theory I had about the three elements of the logic in a fictionally written story. 1: What's made up in the author's imagination, 2: what is actually real, and 3: (The one highlighted for this trope) the author's individual perception on the real world.
My theory as to why most of the characters already dating the love interest instead of the protagonist are horrible people is sometimes because of the author who created those characters actually think that dating the person they're "in love" with are "jerks"; which is something I don't agree with but I have a feeling and I may be wrong that some of the writers that are using the trope believe that just because someone is dating a person they "love" automatically makes them "horrible". It might also how generically evil villains originated. Maybe because back then, people thought their enemies were nothing but evil with no complexity.
My views on the trope: I don't like it either because along with making the "love interest" okay with being with someone who's personality is nothing but being evil, I find it illogical for someone to be "deserving" of the love interest just because they are in love with them and for the "bad romantic partner" to have no real character development.
I can think of some ideas to "twist" the trope. what if the romantic partner of the "love interest" was more complex, kind, or neutral and the protagonist who's in love with the love interest was a horrible person. Maybe the story could be about the "love interest" and their journey on leaving the bad partner. or perhaps, the protagonist wasn't in love with the person that has a "terrible" romantic partner but the protagonist fears that this person is in a bad relationship until they finally get to know this person.
Werther from Goethe fills man of the points you suggested, no wonder is a classic. The "rival" is a good, decent man, the main girl loves the main dude only as a good friend, and in the end, well... you'll see that what the main character needed was indeed some urgent mental health treatment :')
I’m glad you brought up the injury thing, I wanted to establish early on that injuries are actually dangerous, so a few chapters in when the MC dislocates her arm, it basically incapacitates her for the next several weeks. I was wondering if her inability to fight effectively would be boring to the reader but hearing what you had to say about it helped clear things up~
My main character has wild red hair and I wasn't even aware of the wild red hair trope, and she is shocked to find out about her powers because I've always felt like most fictional characters are too accepting when it comes to finding things out when any normal teenager would lose their sanity if they found out they were related to the gods...
#10: This is at you Zeus.
I always like to apply the tropes to my current wip and it seems like I'm doing okay with avoiding the tropes.
He's a God but go off.
There's literally no reason to avoid tropes.
That princess trope had me dead!! :)
School nurses
* kid breaks arm*
Nurse: here’s a mint
I didn't even get a mint.. Just a wet paper towel
Once at school my friend fainted and so they put her in like a wheelchair for a bit and then the school nurse just left her to roll into a wall so that she could check her phone. It was a bit funnier than it should have been tbh XD
To be fair, 90% of what kids go to the nurse for is absolute BS. Most kids just need a calm down, or an Advil (which they can't give out any more, how stupid).
I have read some stories about hair color being metaphors. This girl is blonde because she brightens everyone's day like the sun. She's a red head because she's like fire that cannot be tamed. Her hair is black because she's mysterious like the night sky. Her hair is brown because... she's basic?🤷♀️ How about hair being brown because she's sweet like chocolate. Or just stop using hair color for metaphors for character traits.
Take notes everyone, this what not to do when writing (or making cause I draw alot) a hero.
P.s. I may not be a writer that much since I like to do comics and, but your videos are really helpful when doing that.
Same.I'n doing a comic but this works too
*Thank you* for Point 6; there are *different* kinds of strength, different kinds of leadership etc. - & I've often thought that the 'Princess who is bad at princessing' should have some *real* consequences to it- I actually started a story a fair few years ago now with this concept (I was in primary school, lol)- you've made me realise I should revisit it!
The only time the first trope worked is in American Gods, and if you've seen American Gods, you'll know why. It takes this trope and flips it on its head, and it's openly acknowledged and (sort of) mocked within the show.
I think there's room for nuance with people dating others whom they didn't know were jerks, and then they fall in love and they become abusive. It's a real life trope.
Theres only one single good example of the "has a dead wife" trope, and his name is magnus burnsides.
Edit: the only good "i just wanna be normal" is also Duck Newton.
Huzzah! A person of culture!
YOUR LIPSTICK LOOKS LIKE THE SHADE I ALWAYS WEAR. I love it! Also, I am so, so sick of women getting fridged in modern superhero movies. LET HER LIVE!
While we're on modern superhero movies, why can't there be more super-HEROINE movies? We got Wonder Woman and Captain Marvel and the dude-bro internet mafia threw a fit. Those are like 2 female-led blockbuster superhero films to more than 20 with male leads in the last couple of years. I WANT A GOOD CATWOMAN MOVIE TOO.
@@TheRachaelLefler Right??? WE DESERVE MORE
@@TheRachaelLefler Supposedly a Black Widow solo film is finally coming, which....better late than never, I guess, but the timing seems off in the franchise.
The best man with a dead wife is John Wick! xD
I literally said that in the Discord server 😂
I would argue he's more a man with a dead dog, though. That's what ultimately cracked him up.
I think the only wife in the fridge trope I've seen and respected is from the T.V series Monk. At least in that show he's going to therapy and trying to move on.
Was she a fully established character we got to know before she was killed off just to give the hero angst?
@@kimifw58 nah 😑 the series starts off 5 or so years after she's been dead, when the detective Monk has recovered enough from his breakdown in order to start trying to get his badge back. Flash backs of her follows, as well as pictures, stories of her career, and people who have known her before she met her husband show up every so often. It's not played up for angst. And the character Monk had anxiety, phobias, depression, and OCD even before he met his wife (he wasn't "cured" by his wife either) but her murder triggered a psychological break with him and it took him like 5 years to start recovering. This was part due to the fact that there was no reason (he could see) why anyone would want to murder his wife so for a good few seasons he thought the bomb was intended for him as he was the best detective and made enemies.
Sorry for the long explanation. Despite the wife in the fridge trope I really admire the series. (The creator has OCD and anxiety so the writing of these illnesses actually feels authentic)
*Bad at Princessing* (glares at Anna from Frozen and Merida from Brave). So true! Anna and Merida made me think, "This girl is not capable of ruling her kingdom because she sucks at princessing!" I know Elinor tried with Merida but now that they understand each other, maybe Merida will take her princess lessons a little seriously. But someone should have taught Anna how to get over her clumsiness (don't ride bikes in the house!). The other Disney girls were better. They made me think, "This girl has potential to be a good ruler!" Thank goodness for Moana and Pocahontas!
I agree with you said about feminity. Whether your heroine is a girly-girl or a tomboy, she still has to be a likeable and can still be strong. Actually, I like to see a heroine who is part girly and part tomboy. For instance, likes wearing jeans for horseback riding but also enjoys putting on dresses to go dancing. That way, it would show girls that it is okay to be a girly-girly and a tomboy.
i used the first trope without knowing it's a bad trope but rather than on my hero it's on my antagonist who's an anti-villain. And now I'm reconsidering it. Perhaps I should get rid of his dead wife and use something else as his motivation...