Jul 2016
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Jul 2016
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Cherry_sama
Jul '16

One major pet peev is that whenever a characters come up with a plan. I've noticed that whenever the plan is said on screen, before the character execute it, the plan will always fail in some "unexpected" way. On the flipside, if they come up with a plan and they don't reveal it until after or during the execution of said plan, then the plan will always succeed. All for the name of drama. (Though, granted, I have no idea how to write around this cliche. XD)

I have plenty more pet peevs, but they're escaping me right now, so I might come back to this post later to vent a bit more.

joannekwan(ง ˙o˙)ว here to help~
Jul '16

Oh, info dump, not in the prologue, not in a separate glossary, but IN THE MIDDLE of a story! Like you have normal comic pages, then the next episode is a bulleted list of notes about how aspects of the world works, then back to normal comic pages.

AnnaLandin
Jul '16
KSlinger

I won't lie - I love One Piece to the point where it's ridiculous - but I can see why this would annoy you, yeah. Luffy rarely gets to make mistakes, and when he does, they're hardly ever the kind he suffers permanent consequences for.

Usually that would annoy me too, but I think One Piece just has me so busy punching the air and cheering him on to be bothered by it in this particular instance. Which might partly have to do with the fact that I started watching it as a teenager; nostalgia makes me forgive a lot of stuff.

El_Psy_Congroo
Jul '16
1

UGH Snow Villiers from FFXIII was the worst example of this character for me. Dumb as a brick, and ought to be hit by one too.

Romances without chemistry - added in usually just for the reason that the "hero always gets the girl/guy".

Unless your main character is truly fascinating, I might suggest not really having a main at all. I'm so tired of characters simply having "main character personality". Usually a naive or unwitting person thrust into larger than life events to finds that they are braver than they thought. I think even Harry Potter falls into this. Even though I loved the books as a kid, looking back the only character really given a lot of depth was Snape. I mean, I get it, its the journey of Campbell's Hero with a Thousand Faces but our culture is so inundated with these kinds of stories that to really appeal to one's attention you have to make characters as much if not more interesting than the "stuff that happens to them".
I think if you have several well developed characters whom you bounce off each other and whom drive the plot (so not in a Hermione and Ron sidekick kind of way, but where each is developed and equally shares the role of main characters) then both the story and characters become engaging.

joannekwan(ง ˙o˙)ว here to help~
Jul '16

I think this is why I enjoy ensemble super hero movies and shows more than ones focused solely on one or two heroes.

aswling
Jul '16

Yes to all of these (esp forced couples/rushed romance uGH)

I think in a similar vein to the "pity me" MC is the "evil" antagonist. I'm thinking in terms of the "mean girl" trope where the popular character is mercilessly nasty and basically serves as a foil to show what a saint the MC is. I think when you have recurring characters in a comic, you should like...flesh them out a bit? Obviously you focus most on the main cast, but I find that it's lazy writing to just pass off other character(s) as "so-and-so is bad and MC is good peace out bye." I mean if you want a flat and boring bad guy you might as well just have an angry looking cardboard cutout??

Obviously though, typically cringey pet peeves can be used effectively! I guess it ultimately comes down to context 0-:

Cherry_sama
Jul '16

Oh my gosh, yes! There was this one show on Netflix I found (which I picked up because it looks hilariously bad and it was) where the story was too afraid to give the antagonists any depth. There was one henceman who was thhhiiiiiiisss close to getting character development, but the story would either veer out of the way just before it happened, or forget about it entirely by the next episode.

There's also a comic I read here recently (won't name names) where the main character was put through so much crap in the attempt to make the audience pity him, but they laid it on waaayyy too thick. Like, every single person who made the MC's life crap was on Uncle Larry levels of "evil". It was both hilariously bad and super annoying.

They say a story is only as good as its villains are. This show and comic are fine examples of that.

demthorshie
Jul '16

I don't have that many writing pet peeves to be honest. The one thing that kind of does get on my nerves whenever I see it though are orphan characters. The kind of characters that always seem to have this tragic childhood where they lost both of the parents and now have no one, not even other family members to live with., I just think it's been so overdone and it's weird to me that so many characters would have not even one parent, let alone both. sweat_smile

Reraser
Jul '16

I've been scanning this thread, and as usual with threads that have over 15 replies, I've really strained my brain to come up with something not obvious/popular opinion, or something someone already covered. But even if someone covered this, my issue...

...is with comedic relief characters. Not all of them, which makes this kind of a specific critique, and it would be wrong of me to criticize the ENTIRETY of comic relief given that my comic's entire cast is one big comedic relief.

But I hate the idea of one person just dedicated to it that gets no real character development, ESPEEEEECIALLY when they're not written well. I'm annoyed with the character that is thrown in and sits in the "Funny Guy" chair, rather than finding their way to that role organically. I don't believe that this is a trope that is rampantly destructive in all of our media, it's a seriously nuanced one given the number of examples of good ones, bad ones, and mixed ones.

I'll end on two nuanced examples from the same show (but different series): Avatar's Sokka and Bolin. Now just personally, the way I view it, they kind of bugged the shit out of me when introduced, being nothing more than joke-throwers. But both Avatar series do incredible character growth and send the both of them on really incredible journeys.

Zanreo
Jul '16
NickRowler

Let's not forget how all too often she's also a killjoy who always complains...

Cherry_sama
Jul '16

Yes, yes, and yes. The worst example of the designated comic relief character was Cade in a fanservice comic called The Chronicles of Loth (I am going to name names here because I think this comic is absolutely abhorrent). Not only was he nothing more than comic relief, but none of his jokes were funny. I just wanted to strangle him after just a few pages.

Oh, and another one I remembered is amnesia, especially in fantasy comics. I mean it IS possible to make a character that introduces the audience to the world around them without the character forgetting everything except how to walk and talk. It really is just a lazy trope.

WakaXO
Jul '16

I have a few but the one that really kills me on the inside is in superhero comics after a person decides to become a hero they automatically have a costume or super-suit, like in that instant! Where did they get all the material and the sewing know-how?! Or the money for that matter, because most of these would-be hero's are not rolling in the dough! The worst example of this was in Marvels Inhumans, where a character was undecided if he would even be a hero\vigilante\whatever, got in a fight, ripped his cloths off and had a costume read to go underneath, like what????!!!!!

oh also catch phrases, they get old fast, believe it. T__T

sorrelma
Jul '16

i actually think this is really interesting characterization because it's such a classic archetype and honestly it's so common for a reason. for the most part, people find the narrative relatable. similar but not exactly the same: i hate stories where the main character is oh so special that no matter what they do, they're more valuable or powerful than trained professionals in their field/etc. esp when the mc is a male character and the competent supporting characters are female. it's a really harmful storyline imo

one of my biggest pet peeves though is issue stories by people who haven't experienced the issues they're writing about. i've seen really good advice that goes like "if you aren't x, you can write a story featuring x, but don't write a story about what it's like to be x" obviously i think social issues should be explored in fiction but there's a fine line there

AnnaLandin
Jul '16

IMHO, the "main character personality" @El_Psy_Congroo is talking about is often one that is empty. It's the equivalent to the archetypical farmboy-turned-hero, and we've a.) seen it before so many times that we know how this goes, thus removing the suspense, and b.) when a character is too bland, it stops being relatable. There's nothing there to relate to. There's just a blank slate.

It's like trying to get emotionally engaged in a mannequin. It looks like a person, but it isn't one. It's just a collection of things.

I believe this is an entirely separate issue: you can have a main character who isn't a blank slate without it turning into one of these super-special-MCs (usually referred to as "Mary Sue", though I dislike the term since it's usually used to unfairly criticize female characters for stuff male characters get away with scot free). Special!MCs are bland for a different reason than the Main-Character-Syndrom!MCs are bland.

With the Special!MCs, there's no tension in the story. You don't worry about if they're going to make it or not, because of course they will; they're special. Anyone opposing them isn't someone who might have a fair point; they're evil and terrible (or jealous) because everyone must love Special!MC, because they're special.

There's a wide range between Main Character Blandness-Syndrome and Special!MCs, though. It's where characters with actual personalities, believable flaws, and actual character development live; you know, the kind of people who make mistakes, who learn and change, who aren't always right, and whose powers aren't acquired solely because the author liked the sound of it.

Kaykeactual fraggle
Jul '16

That bothers me too! In my comic I made sure to show the one character making the suits and using a sewing machine hahaha

Cherry_sama
Jul '16

The term Mary-Sue is used for the female variety of this archetype. The male equivalent is a Gary-Stu.

AnnaLandin
Jul '16

There is no actual set name for the male equivalent - some people use Marty-Stu too.

Cherry_sama
Jul '16

I thought of bringing that up too, but I didn't think it was relevant, seeing as the only place I've seen "Marty-Stu" used is on the Wikipedia article.

AnnaLandin
Jul '16

Yes this. This so very, very much.

Batman is the Mary-Suest.