What makes a story element feel 'forced'?

DokiDokiTsuna 2025-10-20 03:57:44 UTC #1

When you're a fan of media criticism, you hear the word "forced" tossed around a lot...but what does it actually mean for a character or event to come across that way...?

I'm sure there are a lot of potential answers to this one, so I'm gonna try not to ramble too much: my #1 answer is a lack of setup, or any appropriate context.
Like I always say, anything can work if you make it work--> the 'make' half of that phrase is what I'm referring to here. Something a lot of writers either forget, ignore, or misunderstand...which leads to the 'anythings' not working.

To give a recent example: Knights of Guinevere, the hot new indie animation sensation. ^^ I enjoyed the pilot episode, but I would be hard pressed to call it 'good'...I feel like its concepts, intrigue, and visual storytelling are hard carrying a surprisingly weak script.

Andi's lines in particular really frustrated me-- besides the poor vocal direction and the mismatched animation (it genuinely feels like the storyboarders were working with a much darker, more intense voice in mind, rather than the high-pitched Anxious Girl(TM) voice we actually got...did they start production with a placeholder VA or something...?) it seems like everything out of her mouth is some kind of thinly-veiled worldbuilding/exposition.
When Frankie talks, I know why she says what she says; I have a solid idea of her personality and values. When Andi talks? Nada. She's always either explaining something, getting someone else to explain something, or keeping her mouth shut despite clearly wanting to say something that might actually give insight to her character.

I get that she's supposed to be a secretive person, someone who keeps her problems to herself, probably doesn't want to burden her best friend...but can't she even get ONE good line?? Or better yet, one good action: if she refuses to talk about what bothers her, have her express herself through acts of violence. Or being overly caring and doting on people, overcompensating for her anger. Or being a sneak, who always finds a way to take what she wants, knowing that people will never give it to her.
But no, instead she just gets nothing...she rants and raves about being labeled a 'Crownie', yet actively stops herself from saying or doing anything more personal (i.e. INTERESTING) than that.

And we're expected to be invested in this half-a-character from now until 2027 or 2028 when the next episode's supposed to come out, "bcuz mystery" or whatever...it's lowkey insulting...

...Anyway, let's just focus on the exposition. ^^; This is the "forced" element in this case...and the shallowness of Andi's character is the 'lack of context' that makes it feel forced. To be honest, it took me an embarrassingly long time to realize that I was supposed to see her as someone being discriminated against; that her 'ranting' is simply a natural consequence of constantly being criticized and excluded and insulted for things that are outside her control...because it annoyed me so much, I couldn't see past the meta-intention of delivering that information to the viewer. =/ I felt no impulse to look beyond it to the character underneath, because there didn't seem to be one.

So what kind of context could you include to fix that, and make it feel less forced? Two routes immediately suggest themselves to me...the first is external context: basically, let Andi respond directly to something in her environment that actually provokes her to speak or act. Something a little more pressing than someone refusing to give her change...

Like, say we started that part of the episode establishing the girls eager to buy something, having their own change all ready to go, only to be shut down when the shop owner outright refuses to serve Andi. Just that little bit of setup-payoff introduces a clear element of unfairness that could get us on Andi's side, make us want to root for her. But they had no setup, only payoff...for all we know, Andi is an annoying freeloader and the guy could be justified in kicking her out, using the 'No Crownies' policy as a socially-acceptable excuse.
Honestly, her overdramatic insistence kinda gives off that vibe...she could be using social commentary to try to force him to sympathize with her, claiming she's "bottom of the ladder" to paint herself as an underdog despite her privilege. People like that exist; we don't know. ¯_(ツ)_/¯ And because we don't know, whether or not we feel for her is up to the viewer's personal taste; there is no story reason to take her seriously.

Similarly, if we had gotten to SEE Andi getting fired, SEE how her superiors treat her as expendable and how all the abuse she put up with ended up being for nothing...suddenly the exposition-rants start feeling more justified. Let us actually see what she's talking about, and we will be more inclined to listen to her.

Now, the second route is internal context: basically, make Andi rant even more. Make her someone who broods and seethes all the time, imply that her frustration over her job and her place in the world is slowly taking over her brain (either in a comic-relief way, or a this-girl-is-seriously-mentally-unwell way. Or both, heck).
Based on the promotional material, it seems like she's supposed to be the 'moody/angry one'...at the very least, in an ironic way, with her actually being a classic 'girl-failure' underneath the cool exterior. So...lean into that, maybe?? The way she's actually written is depressingly non-committal and "normal", despite the fact that a more psychotic, edgy, or eccentric approach would elevate her character by MILES.
Show us that what she's talking about is deeply, unusually important to her, and we will ALSO be more inclined to listen to her. Just having her yell in the street while a friend drags her away (like billions of other quirky MCs before her...) is not enough; you gotta work for it.

...I think I failed at "trying not to ramble too much". ^^;;; But hopefully you see my point-- anything can work if you make it work, even a main character who clearly and obviously exists for worldbuilding. But you have to remember the 'make' half and actually put the effort in...otherwise they're going to feel forced, and your storytelling overall is going to feel incompetent, rushed, and/or lazy.

Zhengo 2025-10-20 05:40:43 UTC #2

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Lensing 2025-10-20 08:23:06 UTC #3

The more serious a story is, the more carefully you need to handle forced elements imo.

Forced elements can be funny in cartoons and comedy.

Zhengo 2025-10-20 10:56:20 UTC #4

To address the title - 'forced' is a critique term that belongs in the vague bin along with terms such as 'having heart', `fleshed out', and 'manipulative'. It's mostly a vibes-based term that shouldn't be taken seriously unless further elaborated upon with more tangible and actionable points. That's why usually when someone crits an element as "forced" and that's it, you will also have plenty of people disagreeing and pulling up their reasons why so-and-so is not forced, because everyone's idea on a vague term is predictably different. For this reason I try not to use this type of vocabulary during crits, much better vocab would point out whether this 'forced' feeling is a character, setting, or plot issue, and to what aspect of those parts. For example, instead of saying "character doing this is forced", use "character's personality as shown in x,y,z does not indicate that they are the type of person who would do this, and feels like the writer needed them to do this to move the plot along".

To address the content of the post (which I feel like the title was just a segue for you to critique Knights of Guinevere and not the other way around of giving an example of your 'forced' definition). I will have to break this response in parts. As a preface, I watched the pilot and I was invested enough in the mystery hook, though I have my own crits that majority I won't elaborate here due to irrelevancy, but feel free to inquire and I will expand upon them. I'll only state the points that are relevant. I did rewatch the pilot so I can properly assess your crit

1 - While I do agree Andi's character is weak, I feel like your crit and suggestions missed the mark. It hinges on knowing exactly what the writers have in mind with the characters just from one episode. Are there certain character establishing moments in the episode that could've been executed better? Yes and I will elaborate further down in point 2. But I think you're focusing too much on the "Andi is a victim facing discrimination for something outside of her control".

It's not yet immediately clear by the narrative that Andi is someone who should have 100% sympathy from the audience. That depends on certain consequences or elaborations that'll be needed in future episodes that would hopefully reveal more of the writer's intent. We see very clearly the park disregards the people below to the point of dumping trash on them, and messing up the environment where many become ill. We know Andi works for them, Andi would've likely made a conscious choice to apply for a job and then accept the job offer. How is this something that is completely out of her control? Based off one episode where we only see Andi and Frankie's pov, we are somehow supposed to immediately know the writers want to portray Andi purely as this sympathetic abused-by-the-system corporate slave, all this while knowing she works for a corp that actively makes the people's lives worse. Her ranting is reminiscent of many STEM grads trying to soothe their conscience while working for ethically questionable industries such as defense. "Oh I'm just doing a job, I'm not the one calling the shots making the weapons" "oh well we all have to pay rent so I have no choice but to take this job". Your suggestions to either a) try really hard in adding external scenarios to make her this poor oppressed girl or b) make her complain even more about people who may have understandable (not necessarily justifiable) reasons to dislike her would show clearly the writer's intention of wanting us to sympathize with her from episode 1...at the cost of making it clear the writers are going for a protagonist-based morality show.

Weak dialogue and unclear personality are just symptom's of the reason why Andi isn't compelling. It's simply that unlike Frankie, who has clear goals of wanting to work in the Park to increase proximity to Guinevere to relive some childhood memory, Andi just doesn't have any interesting goals in comparison. As far as we know currently, her only goal is just to "make money". Before we even consider flanderizing her character or creating the external conflicts she has to face, we should know what this character even wants. Then you can build the external obstacles and personality around that. We see this with Frankie. She desires reliving something with Guinevere, that drives her to sneak the android, and causes the conflicts in the latter half of the show.

2 - Your suggestion to show Andi's firing disregards the possibility that that scene may have been not shown on purpose. I initially thought that scene was a case of telling instead of showing that she lost her job, but then I realized the show did setup things before the "I got fired" dialogue to indicate that something bad happened at her job. So the dialogue scene seems to be more of a "big reveal" instead of just exposition of what happened. Except the scene was poorly directed where it's presented very mundane, as if the viewer is supposed to already know she got fired before this scene, and although we did get the foreshadowing, we should've had a proper buildup of maybe Frankie noticing something bad happened at the job and Andi not saying it until it explodes out of her, so the firing feels more "big reveal-like". This would also still add to the mystery with the viewer wondering what exactly happened at the job that got her fired. And be able to build up to a further reveal of the firing cause in later episodes. The stilted way it's presented instead is probably why you thought this aspect of Andi felt 'forced'

3 - Regarding the dialogue, I agree it is weak and heavyhanded. I suppose if I was using surface level descriptions I would describe this dialogue as 'forced', but not in the way you defined it of "payoff with no setup" (see how 'forced' is so vague?) I would define the 'forced' feeling more like the dialogue is clearly being made to try to make things clear to the viewer, even though a character wouldn't naturally say said dialogue because they're saying info they should already know, and the writing doesn't rely on subtext enough.

For example the scene with the vendor - Andi goes "I went to school with you! You know me!", then the vendor goes "thought I did until you put on that uniform, crownie". Not only is this dialogue stiff in delivering the exposition, it's actually inefficient. Why would Andi be telling the vendor they went to the same school and knew each other? The vendor would already know that. I know the intention is that Andi is trying to imply "we had some kind of relation so you should know I'm not like [the crownies]", but first of all, "went to school together" is unclear what the relation between the two were. I assume they would be close, if Andi is willing to assume the vendor knows her deeply, but if so, why would your declaration of relation be "schoolmates" then, and not dialogue that would indicate more closeness? In addition, why do we need 3 times emphasis that the vendor sees Andi as a crownie? He already pointed at the giant "no crownie" sign in front of her, say she "put on the uniform", and then topped it off with another "crownie". This line would be much better replaced with something that would better show exactly how close the two were before Andi became a "crownie". It's inefficient in that these two lines of dialogue is used only to deliver 2.5 piece of info - the two went to school together and had some kind of relation, and that being a crownie is a hard moral line that is more important than their past relation. However, because we don't know the nature of that relation, it's hard to gauge exactly HOW hard the vendor's moral line is. I'll present a dialogue that uses a similar timing and delivers more info (and possibly feel more natural with better use of subtext). Due note I add some "custom info" to better illustrate how much more information you can actually fit in subtext rather than explicit statement like the og.

Andi: "how could you say that after everything we've been through?! After I helped you get through x and y classes?" (Indicates they went to school together, more hint at what nature of the relation is, indicates she may either have a or perceive herself to have a helpful personality that would contradict the perceived notion of "crownie")
Vendor: "yeah and that was before you turned your back on us to join those terraformers" (indicates betrayal, and fit in the "terraform planet" info part of Andi's rant in there)

DokiDokiTsuna 2025-10-20 12:14:05 UTC #5

Actually, it was the exact opposite: I brought up the topic, and then tried to come up with some new media to criticize to illustrate my point (instead of falling back on RWBY for the millionth time...) and landed on KoG...which is why I ended up writing so much more than I initially thought I would. I had no idea I had so much to say about Andi until I started...

...You know you don't have to keep doing that, right? Trying to figure out people's intent...you can just argue against their points, you don't have to guess at the "real reason" why they're speaking before you make a counter-argument. Especially when you're so often wrong (at least about me)...

Well, that's not what I was trying to do...when I brought up that 'we don't know' if Andi is actually a victim or just trying to garner sympathy, I didn't necessarily mean that one or the other would be a bad thing that needs to be avoided...I simply meant that we have no idea where she's coming from, and THAT is the bad thing that needs to be avoided.
I have no issue with morally-dubious protagonists; the fan-theory going around that Andi potentially stole Frankie's job is probably the main thing making me interested in this character. But it would hit a lot harder if we had * anything * in the story to actually lend credence to the idea, besides her strained silence.

a) "Making money" CAN be an interesting goal, actually, if you MAKE it interesting...which was one of my main points. I mean, apparently this is the reason we should find Sparky interesting (and his character also sucks, but he doesn't seem that important yet so I'm not writing an essay about him) so it's not as if the writers didn't see the potential with that motivation.
There are thousands of poor, struggling underdog characters in media who just want to get ahead in a cutthroat society that doesn't give them many chances...it is a staple of YA fiction; there's tons of directions you can go with it. So...I can't get on board with the idea that Andi's concept so far just "isn't enough" to be compelling yet.

b) Funny, I thought maybe it would be the writers' job to tell us what the character wants through a story, or something...silly me...
...I'm not saying we need to know everything about Andi's character immediately (despite the fact that Frankie is more transparent, we also don't truly know that much about her yet), but we shouldn't have NOTHING. She basically just exists until she "wants money" at the 11th hour...a motivation completely eclipsed by the attachment the audience has formed to Guinevere, and Frankie's much stronger, actually built-up motivation of saving and restoring the Gwen-droid.

I think a smarter way to go about it would be to give her some minor goal to work on in the meantime, something to build up "I want money" (i.e. we would be able to see how desperate her situation is, to add onto the fact that she's clearly trying to give Sparky a reason that he'll understand)...AND, y'know, give us a chance to learn about her and bond with her. It doesn't have to be all or nothing; if you can't tell us anything valuable about a character until their "big reveal", that's just mystery-boxing. Not writing. And in a pilot episode for a series that technically doesn't exist yet...I think you should probably focus on writing your main characters.

Speak of the devil.
By the way, I did disregard the possibility that the firing scene was skipped on purpose...not because I didn't see it, but because it's not a good reason, especially since (as you explained) the "big reveal" fell VERY flat, so it wasn't worth us potentially missing out on actual character development for Andi.

This is actually a very good point. Unfortunately...I gotta say, I simply expect and accept that from writing now. ^^; Especially indie shows...hamfisted exposition is just the norm; if I got upset about that every time I noticed it, I'd never make it through these pilots...

So I kinda just skipped over it, in favor of the more accessible character-focused fixes that make those flaws less noticeable. I will happily live with some "As You Know Bob" if the characters are strong enough...Frankie also does clear exposition through her dialogue, particularly when it comes to giving us context about the nature of Andi's job, but it's a lot harder to notice because it's so filled with character. Like I said, I know why she says what she says...her insistence that Andi's work is so magical and enviable is biased, yes, but that bias is what makes it interesting to listen to. It gives us insight to her character that no one else seems to have.

And tbh, when you focus on character in that way, it's not unusual to kill two birds with one stone: heavy-handed exposition tends to become more efficient when you make your characters speak from the heart, because emotional dialogue is almost always more direct. By its nature, it will force you to get more done with fewer words.

I really don't want to address this, but I know from experience that if I don't, people will just fight over it-- YES, that is the point. "Forced" is a vague criticism-adjacent term that means everything and nothing at the same time; that's why I thought it would make a good discussion topic, because you can deconstruct it from several different angles.

Zhengo 2025-10-20 13:27:41 UTC #6

Not sure where you're getting that I "keep doing this", mind pointing out the specific threads of yours where I'm guessing at your intent? In most cases I just answer the question. I only noticed in this instance you only used one example and specifically one that has one episode where it's harder to do a fuller critique instead of getting multiple examples of media (not RWBY) where it's easier to get a fuller critique where I have heard so-and-so get called 'forced' like Arcane season 2, to your eternity, demon slayer, etc. and usually all used in different ways that would illustrate your "deconstruct from several different angles" point. Using a one-episode show example is bound to cause disagreements because people have different stretching points when it comes to first impressions, and debating KoG crit itself feels like it would distract from your discussion topic of "deconstruct 'forced' from different angles", so I thought the possibility this was actually a KoG specific discussion.

I actually thought Frankie's dialogue can actually be quite 'forced' too in the definition I gave (why do we need her to say to herself she's going to work when the next scene is her going to work? Could've just shown her with the sad expression and cut to next scene). I don't consume much indie shows so I can't say how commonplace this is but I actually despise this kind of dialogue work especially when you're working with a VISUAL medium. You have more tools at your disposal, come on. It grates at me to think of the possibility that non-kids media would rather pander at low reading comprehension folks who needs everything explained to them instead of writing organic dialogue and let visual storytelling do the work.

Other examples of writing that could be 'forced' but with definitions

Arcane s2 - almost every character acts in 'forced' ways that feel like a bunch of character development was skipped or straight up doesn't act like they are acting logically due to random plot contrivances. Jinx gets a 'forced' redemption arc because a random kid dropped out of the sky and somehow fixed her mental illness. Vi 'forced' to become a cop even though it goes against all her principles from s1. Caitlyn 'forced' out of any responsibility for her actions because apparently we can scapegoat all of that to another person even though she was already doing questionable things before said person came into her picture. Ekko 'forced' to fall in love with jinx despite her killing his friends because....he was in love with an AU version?

To your eternity - any interesting potential this story has about exploring humanity through the eyes of an immortal being is instead 'forced' into an over-dragged plot about non human creatures that basically become the root of everything bad that happens in this story. Any interesting threads the story has is instead shut down and the audience is put on a railroad to focus on only this one specific antagonist for hundreds of chapters.

Demon slayer - instead of Zenitsu giving any good reason to trust Tanjiro despite hiding a demon in his box, he just says Tanjiro has a "kind sound" from his super hearing. WTF is a "kind sound"? No writer, you are just 'forcing' the two characters to work together because you can't bother to write an actual interaction to show Tanjiro as trustworthy. This is major "I know x is a good person because they have kind eyes". Yeah yeah eyes are windows to the soul or whatever but that's just lazy writing

Bonus round: Frieren is really 'forcing' the "all demons are just monstrous beings and should be eradicated" when the story doesn't clearly show us of any detrimental effects if a demon doesn't eat humans, thus raising the question of why no demon has just decided to prioritize survival over eating yummy humans. And the first example shown with the demon child to "prove" demons can't coexist doesn't prove anything about demons being impossible to coexist with humanity. The demon child killing the village chief was operating off of flawed logic due to not fully understanding humans, not out of malicious intent. Before you say "demons lack emotional empathy so they can never coexist", consider that there exists real life people who also lack emotional empathy but have cognitive empathy and are also not always out there plotting someone's murder

jwabeasley 2025-10-20 14:27:54 UTC #7

I won't criticize something for being "forced" if it's just a bit stilted. I only use "forced" when concerns external to the show drive story decisions instead of them arising naturally via the logic of the show.

There's a silver age superman comic (which one I forget) where the plot is interesting and develops in curious directions, but on the last 4 pages, everything suddenly wraps up and it feels like the author suddenly realized they only had 4 pages to end the story so Superman suddenly finds his super-solutions.

As to the other examples, I thought KoG was alright. It's stilted but there's enough that the show did right that I'm willing to stay there. When I saw the first episode of Over the Garden Wall, I wasn't sold on Wort, but his character was well established and I was able to warm up to him quickly.

Man did that piss me off, don't get me started. Lady can be a brutal tyrant dictator who sleeps with her subordinates, but as long as she's a hot lesbian it's somehow okay...

NickRowler 2025-10-20 14:28:20 UTC #8

The title seems a bit misleading because most of your rant is just about Andi from Knights of Guinevere. The only thing released from the show is a 26 minute pilot. I think it's OK to theorize about what might happen, but it seems a little too soon to accuse a character who barely had any screen time as "forced".

I personally didn't care for her personality. It's OK to not like a character, and sometimes writers purposely write characters in a way that not everyone will like. That doesn't really make them forced. She sort of reminds me of Sokka at the beginning of Avatar. He was obnoxious at first but overtime he got more development.

When it comes to thing that I find forced, I think of that scene for Captain Marvel when they played "I'm Just a Girl" while she was fighting. It felt so forced by the girlboss message that it came off a bit patronizing towards an adult woman.

Zhengo 2025-10-20 14:54:19 UTC #9

Man I could go on and on about Caitlyn. The writing in the season is pretty egregious in general but Caitlyn had my biggest gripes because she managed to drag multiple characters down with her (Vi, Ambessa, even Jayce to an extent) and the plot bended backwards to make her sleeping with Maddie okay because she was a bad person anyway, and Vi just didn't care for some reason. Also, they really tried to make her into a "Jinx parallel" with Ambessa being the Silco figure for Caitlyn. Except...Jinx was a child and basically lost everyone she loved (and also had to grapple the guilt of her responsibility), and Caitlyn was a grown-ass adult when she lost her mom and still had her father and friends to grieve with her. Plus she was still rich Plus like I said you can't say Ambessa was manipulating her to gas the undercity.

Not to play trauma olympics but trying to parallel her with Jinx was doomed to fail. The writers shouldn't have tried to 'force' it, heh.

ButterflyEmpress 2025-10-21 05:16:38 UTC #10

Were you talking about the knockers? I didn't care for them either. Or Hayashi (I think that was her name) returning. I wonder if the creators had no faith in the story being interesting without some sort of recurring monster/antagonist.

faisalhussein394 2025-10-21 06:21:09 UTC #11

Its obviously had something to do with critics feeling dissatisfied with how things go without enough reasons as to why this scene happen.

And each critics have different taste on whether the story feel forced or not, Some may. think it is enough while others feel it is rushed and forced. You can't satisfy all of them.

But I believe what will satisfy most critics is showing rather than telling so that they won't think it is forced.

kyupol 2025-10-21 07:51:45 UTC #12

When it feels "mass produced" and lacks depth. Gotta rush that deadline you know... Crank em out.

DokiDokiTsuna 2025-10-21 12:01:41 UTC #13

I mean, if you really want...
https://forums.tapas.io/t/how-do-you-break-it-to-someone-that-theyre-just-not-good-enough/86447/21?u=dokidokitsuna

Disclaimer-- I don't really want to have a debate about this; your behavior is your business. But of course, in this instance it affects me, so...just a weird thing I noticed.

I mean, I get it...but also I don't get it, tbh...

Like, I understand that it may feel weird that I spent that much time talking about one character in one show...but also, is it not clear that that just happened to be the example I chose...?? Why are you (and others, not just you) assuming that I need the entire discussion to be about that one example, when the title is much more broad, and the first few sentences EXPLICITLY invite people to give their own examples...?

I'm not saying you're reading that cue wrong; the assumption isn't unfounded. But it goes extremely far out of its way to ignore...literally every other cue that says "btw, this isn't just a KoG thread". Odd choice there...

The last paragraph is written like a TLDR that refers back to the title and explains why I feel my example was relevant-- that's on purpose. It is a clear signal about my intent with the thread...that I guess doesn't count because I "wrote too much" beforehand. ¯_(ツ)_/¯ But as I've said before, that's just how I am. I like to deconstruct things...I would much rather deep-dive into one good example of a topic than hastily list off 5 OK examples.

And as I've also said before...if you're concerned about something like that, you can just ask??? I promise, if I somehow forgot to mention that I only want replies about the thing I'm mad about that day, I'll let you know. Tbph, the way I write topics should be obvious by now to anyone who's been here for more than 6 months...these comments would be a lot easier to take coming from people who just got here, but strangely they're always from people who have been on the forum for years.

DokiDokiTsuna 2025-10-21 12:14:55 UTC #14

...That's actually a really unique way of looking at it that I never considered. '_'

I mean, I know the feeling (I think...I tend not to even engage with media with the 'mass produced' feel)...maybe I think of it as something other than 'forced'. I need to let that marinate in my brain for a bit...

adamjtitus1 2025-10-21 12:24:35 UTC #15

When the suspension of disbelief gets lost because of it.

Zhengo 2025-10-21 16:40:04 UTC #16

Yeah I'm talking about them and Hayashi as well. I think it really degraded the story since they weren't that interesting compared to the early episodes of fushi just learning through his encounters. It did feel like the writer couldn't figure out how to continue once the protagonist gained a normal sense of sapience so just decided to throw a recurring antagonist instead. Said recurring antagonist is not even that interesting since one of them is just some hivemind-esque creatures that lack much personality and the other is just your stock yandere

EncryptedWriting 2025-10-21 17:14:07 UTC #17

For me, lore dumps often feel incredibly forced. Its basically saying "here's the entirety of the system the main characters are going through and there are so many aspects here that you need to remember." I mean, so many webcomics and novels have that HUGE lore dump.

It has been my goal to avoid doing a massive lore thing until it calls for the right time. Kind of like when you arrive at a tutortial of the game. I want to set our bread crumbs so people dont feel overwhelmed by a lot of information. If a creator is able to work in a lore dump but make it fill in at the right place(s) then they get major bonus points. It actually makes me very intrigued and impressed if an author can do that.

Another story element that is forced is the idea that there always has to be a damsel in distress. I feel like there always is one. It is completely okay to have a damsel in distress, but I highly dislike when their entire point of being there is to be a damsel. They have no other purpose in the story besides that one action.

Esemerri 2025-10-21 17:53:17 UTC #18

When plot events and actions go against previously established character and personality.

This is different from someone doing something unexpected or surprising. It's when a character does something just because the plot needed it to happen or the author wanted it to happen.

I think this is a tricky thing because a lot of the time authors will not realise things feel 'forced' either because they're sticking to an old plot outline after their characters have changed and developed significantly or because they just so very much want to write this specific thing.

So, though forced things in stories are super noticeable to readers writers don't always see them until they're too late. Also, if you like something but it's implemented awkwardly, you might be less likely to call it forced. E.g, I'm not a big romance fan, so if it's written badly I won't like it. But, if I really liked romantic elements in stories I might not care so much if it felt 'forced.'

My thoughts on this anyways...!

luminosityyy 2025-10-21 18:19:56 UTC #19

I'd say it'd feel forced if
1. It was never relevant to the plot, but you added it either for fanservice or self service. Like two characters getting together at the end even though there was no prior romantic or emotional connection between them. I'd say lots of shonen manga writers do this. They feel like their main cast should at least end up with partners at the end so towards the final arc, they randomly start building moments with them so it won't seem sooo forced. But it just ends up being even more forced because you could have done all that from the start of the series. The desperation becomes tangible. There are ways you could present any form of service while still having a reasonable and logical explanation for it. For example, a fan favourite coming back to the series after dying would not feel forced if there was already established systems of reincarnation.

It was relevant to the plot but you had no way of stringing it together. Take two characters that are meant to hate each other for the sake of a deeper arc ahead in the story. You, as the writer, know that their complete distrust for each other must be deep enough to affect later events. But you don't have any reason to make them hate each other, so you think up some dumb, avoidable argument that could have been resolved in three minutes. Eventually, their entire relationship seems forced, like they're just trying to fit into roles the author has already prescribed for them. My advice for this would be to let their characters shape the plot and not the other way around. The decisions of your characters will not feel forced if they are a complete reflection of their psychological state and worldview.

All in all, let the story unfold not because there's a destination you're heading for, but because your characters are real and organic and their unique thoughts and actions are responsible for the course your plot took

That's my take.
Bye!

Zhengo 2025-10-21 18:59:13 UTC #20

I know you don't want to debate this, and neither do I, but like...one example from a year ago out of all the other threads of yours I've commented on? Not sure how this is indicative of a frequent behavior. You call me out for trying to assume intent but you yourself assume my intent in your example is to "guess" at your true meaning but I said myself down the thread that the opening post made me uncomfortable and so my "guessing" comment was just snark and I later apologized for it.

I'm not even on the forums that frequently, nor am I commenting or reading all of your threads, so I'm not sure why you have this idea of me being super familiar with your posting habits. Even if I was super familiar, that doesn't mean I can't make meta-comments on the post structure itself. If you don't like the meta-comments, then I'll make a note to stop making them on your threads specifically...