5 Worst Fantasy Cliches (Writing Advice)

[@jongrover8763]

A major ability that gets used once, and is then forgotten about forever after

[@CoveWeaverStudios]

@@jongrover8763 I was gonna say in the phantom menace when qui gon and obi wan used super speed to get away from the droids, yet in the climax obi wan doesn’t do it. But then I realized that it works because when he jumped he used some energy which meant he didn’t have enough to ran that quickly.

[@NarinDeliah]

Especially when it’s so helpful in so many situations.

[@gretasnipe7631]

A James Bond gadget which would be useful in all future missions is used once and never again.

[@drachefly]

@@CoveWeaverStudios Plus, Luke did crazy jumps in both ESB and RotJ - it's the same thing, not a new ability.

[@hkgcgsdhjgd]

The time turner in Harry Potter comes to mind.

[@Evil0tto]

Dammit, and here I was about to name my main character Hmmrgr'KRoff Skelbaehhkor.

[@WriterBrandonMcNulty]

Don't you dare.

[@ticijevish]

What the heck?!? That's the name of MY fantasy protagonist! I need to type faster and publish first...

[@benjaminwatt2436]

and his sidekick hisa bikdik

[@errantwinds-up8uu]

Best comment!

[@ludovico6890]

It works if he's the only one name like that.

[@MrPleers]

The farmboy who gets lessons from a experienced master swordsman or wizard. And is so talented that he surpasses him after just a few weeks of training.

[@sammcarthur864]

It's the second part of this trope that is the main problem.

[@Disgruntled_Grunt]

@@sammcarthur864 IMO that's the _only_ part that's a problem. A commoner rising to greatness is a storyline we can all understand and relate (or even aspire) to. It's how the commoner reaches that destination that makes the story interesting. One example of this that everybody likes to criticize is The Inheritance Cycle (Eragon), but the main character of that story struggles every step of the way, and every time he becomes proficient at a skill, he encounters a different type of opponent/obstacle that challenges him in new ways. I think this trope is wonderful, so long as the "normie-turned-hero" is forced to continue developing their skills and growing as a person throughout the story.

[@lindildeev5721]

And when the student is ready to battle evil, the mentor conveniently dies. Why can't we see a mentor battling alongside his former apprentice from time to time or even facing the danger alone because the apprentice is clearly not ready and has enough humility to accept it?

[@Rolltonini]

It`s Luke Skywalker.

[@greatwavefan397]

I read "The femboy" fsr 😅

[@Redeye308350]

The big bad villain is killed and so the followers immediately stop being a threat. Surely some of the followers believed in their boss's goals and would continue the fight.

[@MrPleers]

Or take revenge.

[@wynautwarrior2161]

It's actually funny you mention that. I'm writing a story where exactly that happens, but your comment actually makes me want to change that. Thank you.

[@adrianainespena5654]

Also, as they explained in Wiseguy "every tyrant has a hungry right hand"

[@milestrombley1466]

The remaining Imperial forces in Star Wars continued to fight until they went into hiding to become the New Order.

[@kayceeisonfire]

That's literally what happens in my book series, the villain gets defeated in book 1 but book 2 is all about tracking down and dismantling the underground society of his followers that are still carrying on his mission, which is actually now being led by one of his closest followers (like how a hydra comes back with more heads once one is cut off). So I'm glad to hear someone else validate that plot element lol

[@IkeMastree]

Now we need top 5 hated SCI-FI cliches.

[@WriterBrandonMcNulty]

Good call. I'll get on it

[@lailabanu2469]

​@@WriterBrandonMcNultyI think Top 5 Best Fantasy Cliches is also Should be in the list of Upcoming Videos.

[@fuindes_batwings]

Ooo! Ooo! I have some of those: 1. The "Born Sexy Yesterday" Alien Being that is legitimately a baby, but she looks like a gorgeous adult princess. 2. A jaded ungrateful cyberpunk future that is no different than the one we are already in, but because there are flying cars it's supposed to somehow be something we've never seen or experienced before. 3. Colonizing other planets. This requires completely rehashing Star Trek or the Alien franchise fifty million times, yet we're not supposed to notice. 4. Aliens that just look human, but they live on another planet. This is just Star Wars or Dune. 5. Taking classism and problematic issues we hate in humans and putting it somewhere else. Because that is fine. Not.

[@lailabanu2469]

@@fuindes_batwings It's a Some kind of Spoiler, Because I don't care, You'r really Smart.

[@fiktivhistoriker345]

I would say, for example, 1. A dystopian future, where people have lots of fuel and ammunition, where there is enough leather to make armour for the men (but not enough for the women), despite the fact that they are not producing anything. 2. Spaceships and -fighters that behave like planes, and fights in space that sound like in WW2. 3. Human looking aliens as stand ins for anything the author wants to critcize or praise. 4. Planets with only one environment, only one city or village and only one spokesperson. 5. Scientifically advanced aliens who are to dumb to use other resources, try to plunder the earth and get defeated by less skilled humans.

[@rikk319]

The cliche that has bothered me most since I first recognized it: The villain's base inevitably collapsing after their demise, leading to the most overused line in sci-fi/fantasy: "Let's get out of here...the place is gonna blow!"

[@SuburbanFox]

Ah yes, the "load bearing villain" trope! :D

[@dezopenguin9649]

One of the things I love about _Castlevania: Symphony of the Night_ is that it took the time to explain why Dracula's castle keeps falling down every time Dracula is killed, reappears every time he comes back, and is different every time: the castle isn't a building at all, but an incarnated creature of chaos, so taking down its master results in the castle vanishing.

[@nowthatsjustducky]

Even the death of Palpatine had that...from a particular point of view. One of these days though, I am going to have an old retired evil wizard die peacefully in his bed, blasting out his entire wing of the nursing home he was in.

[@faultyfilter5747]

For me, with medieval fantasy one thing that drives me nuts is how useless plate armor is against swords. There’s an ironclad big bad barreling down on the protagonist and all they have is a sword that isn’t established to be magically capable of cutting metal, yet every slash is devastating on our juggernaut. Armor doesn’t make people immortal but it definitely keeps them safer

[@IkeMastree]

Yeah... swords in fantasy are OP. I've dreamt up a story where there is a reason for that, though.

[@ROMANTIKILLER2]

As someone who loves history and historical martial arts, I feel and share your pain.

[@reyga3285]

Ironically, swords defeating plate armor is perfectly doable (albeit not easy) by half-swording with the right kind of sword, but Hollywood doesn't know a thing about historical arms & armor. To them, armor is merely a fashion statement and every sword is an unwieldy crowbar that cuts like a lightsaber.

[@taragnor]

Yeah armor in general is tissue paper in fantasy, especially any fantasy movie.

[@blshouse]

I miss chainmail bikinis.

[@michaelnielsen7827]

The protagonist is a "kid" and to make him/her seems smart, all adults in the world are now idiots...

[@KenMasters.]

South Park basically.

[@MrFox-rf3cu]

...Or do the same for the "Strong Female Character", making all the men useless, spineless, and stupid.

[@Valkanna.Nublet]

A worse example for the Game of Throne one is final season battle at Winterfell. We see several characters getting swamped, literally buried under the zombies, playing hide and seek with the horde, etc, yet there's not a single major death. Made even worse by the fact that for some of them a heroic death there would be a perfect culmination of their story, but they just stagger on.

[@taragnor]

Yeah that one is by far the worst, because they have so many characters there, so it's not just one character luckily surviving, it's a ton of them which makes the plot armor all the more apparent. In battle of the Bastards I can begrudgingly buy into the fact that Jon Snow was able to get lucky, but seriously all the main characters present at the battle against the Night King it's just silly to imagine they all found a way out, especially given a lot of them just aren't good fighters, Jamie with his missing hand, Sam and Tyrion for instance. And yeah the story would have been a lot more interesting if some of them had died. Jamie could have completed his redemption arc, Jon's death could have started to set off Danerys' bitter insane streak, Danerys dying could have led to Jon having to take up the mantle of Targaryen and dragon rider against Cersei, and so forth.

[@Valkanna.Nublet]

@@taragnor Jaime is top of my list for 'perfect culmination'. I could even add Brienne. Her ark is about being taken serious as a knight, which she got when she was knighted to rapturous cheering. However, I wouldn't have her and Jaime dying, Jaime's culmination would be dying not only as a selfless act fighting for the greater good but also to defend his worthy love. Brienne also dying would blunt that.

[@tomasramirez2914]

I believe the issue with the final season was that there was no continuation in the novels. So they had to make up a story for GoT

[@justinsellers9402]

Melisandra, Jorah, Theon, Beric, and Leanna Mormont all died at the battle of Winterfell.

[@jesusromanpadro3853]

​​​@@tomasramirez2914I think they have that problem for more than one season. Also, way to few episodes for the story they were telling.

[@errantwinds-up8uu]

I agree that "we're just here to have fun" doesn't excuse consequence-free writing. I mean it doesn't all have to be dark and heavy, but it throws the audience (book or film) off if there are no practical reactions to serious events.

[@xavierthomas5835]

Defiance has taken the place of sincerity. Defy logic, defy order, defy expectations, defy conceptions, etc. Everyone wants to be the new Jesus, reshaping the world in their image. Or in this case, the story world.

[@intergalactic92]

There are ways to add weight without killing people. You can have weight and consequence without killing someone important. You don’t have to constantly show people getting blown up for a battle to be good. Did anyone of consequence die at the battle of Helm's Deep? Do we still consider that to be a good battle scene?

[@greatwavefan397]

​@@intergalactic92 I agree. You shouldn't kill characters because you have to, but sparing them needs to make literary sense, much like finding someone to kill.

[@lancenwokeji6349]

Legendary’s MonsterVerse could use this tip.

[@enonknives5449]

The poor, struggling orphan is actually the savior of the world.

[@andrewmclellan1623]

I like that one but yes overused

[@errantwinds-up8uu]

I don't mind this if it's done well, it's just done poorly a lot.

[@enonknives5449]

@@errantwinds-up8uu -- True.

[@Achieme]

It maybe similar but worst one for me personally is the chosen one

[@rikk319]

Luke Skywalker, Harry Potter, Frodo Baggins, Dorothy from Wizard of Oz, Oliver Twist, Cinderella...the orphan hero is an archetype, not a trope.

[@JackKirbyFan]

Love your channel. You find a positive way to point out flaws without a negative tone. That's not easy to do. You do it to perfection. As far as your fun question -> power fluctuation drives me insane. I've been watching Buffy the Vampire slayer TV show and I love it. Still as fun as always but Buffy's abilities drive me crazy. She can kick down a door and jump over a fence - but can't break ropes when she's tied up - until, of course she has to to get out of a situation. Angel can jump off buildings and leap high into the air - unless the plot requires him to forget he can do that. Grrr.

[@WriterBrandonMcNulty]

Thanks for the kind words! And I like that term "power fluctuation." Spot on.

[@wabba67]

Hear hear. Regards to Buffy, the writers do address this fluctuation in some of the behind-the-scenes documentaries and commentaries, especially in Season 7.

[@whistlingbadger]

Rae's budding Jedi powers. HISHE has a brilliant video on "The Force Awakens" where they're all stuck in the quick sand, and one of them says, "If only one of us had the power to lift heavy objects with her mind!"

[@ProdigyEraNetwork]

One cliche that’s annoying to me is when the villain in a movie or show is super powerful, but either struggles to defeat the less powerful hero or just flat out doesn’t kill them when they have all the power to, like Cassandra Nova not killing Deadpool and Wolverine and Kang not being able to beat an army of ants

[@davidanderson9103]

Yes. Particularly if the villain has been shown to quickly and efficiently kill people early on, but then, for some reason, when the hero is involved, they hesitate, or go into the villain monologue, or some such nonsense.

[@maxpeterson3178]

The Kang one bugs me for sure. Cassandra Nova less so as she liked to be theatrical and it was her fatal flaw. Kang losing to Antman though? Just plot armor. Full stop

[@thebiologist8662]

Nah, Cassandra's justified because she enjoys playing villain. She's not evil for the sake of evil. She's comic book villain because she loves acting like that. She loves the theatrics.

[@andrewmclellan1623]

I do love it when a villain is beaten by a clever weakness. The Elves born series highlighted how Elven women's magic could not perform highly destructive feats, but only small reshaping of matter. So they are seen as weak. However, in the climax one of the protagonists is cornered by her abusive father who tries to kill her. She reaches out to the armored elf, touches him, and reshapes his heart. Instant heart attack and with an ability already established early on and dismissed as decorative.

[@ProdigyEraNetwork]

@@thebiologist8662 still tho she straight up stripped Johnny’s flesh off his bones but left Deadpool and Wolverine alive, I get it was for the sake of showing her power, but it’s so convenient

[@thywordistruth2720]

One of my hated cliches is when some random prophecy spoken or written by some random person we don't know or care about, HAS to be fulfilled for no other reason than because the plot said so. Tim Burton's Alice in Wonderland did this, for example. It erases any chance of genuine character development or intrigue because the plot already "wrote out the script about what you're going to do."

[@hgman3920]

It rhymes, so it must be true

[@jesusromanpadro3853]

She just pick up a magical sword and become and expert with it. I mean, if it looked like the sword was doing the fight for her it wouldn't have being so bad, but I don't recall her using even a stick to attack someone before in the movie.

[@KatieAliceGamer]

I hate the “Magical being gives up magical powers for love” 🤢 absolutely hate that tripe.

[@lisaonthemargins]

I felt like this when Fiona became an ogre so that she and Shrek could conceivably be a couple

[@KatieAliceGamer]

@ technically Fiona didn’t have any magical powers, but good point nonetheless.

[@visnoga5054]

Hmm I feel that one can be done well. If the consequences make things even worse, for instance. I don't know, maybe I've been too much into dark fantasy to see that trope used often.

[@KatieAliceGamer]

@ it can be done well if done right.

[@mrshade810]

I'm curious why you hate it? I have mixed feelings about it. I usually have two reactions at the same time - I think "aw that's cute" and "that's disapppointing". But in my case it's because it's unrealistic. I believe 99% of people would not give up magic to be with someone. But at the same time, I feel it's riskier not to do it in stories Imagine two characters who fall in love deeply and in order for them to be together, one of them has to give up their powers for some reason, and they don't. I think the majority of the audience wouldn't like that, especially if the end is supposed to be happy and this character that has powers is not supposed to be selfish/power hungry. One example I think would've worked both ways is Arwen from LOTR. In the end she gives up her immortality for Aragorn, which I thought was admirable, but would've worked just the same if she hadn't, because it would've been realistic. However one example that bothered me was Damon from the vampire diaries - when he takes the cure to be with Elena. Imagine giving up immortality because Elena is stubborn and chooses old age and diseases instead of living forever with the man she loves. And mind you no matter her choice, she would've been with Damon anyway, but instead of forever, she chooses just a few decades, and dooms him to the same short life as well. I may be biased because I'd never do that, but it doesn't feel realistic. Again, just my opinion, but I never understood this "wanting to be a normal human" trope in fantasy/sci-fi. Who would choose to grow old and very possibly ill, instead of being young and healthy forever, especially in stories where this immortality/power can be granted to your loved ones as well, so you'll never lose them. I really don't buy the "one lifetime is enough if it's great" crap. But like I said, I also think it's admirable, but mostly disappointing

[@lotharrenz4621]

I saw a critic of a fantasy movie from last year named "Damsel" that ticks off almost all of your cliches like it was a bingo card... popup-powers, conveniences and coincidences, no consequences neither suffered nor considered, and motivations all over the chart... but a book that stayed in my mind for totally abusing the main character was "The Dragon Bone Throne". the boy who was supposed to eventually save the world was just dragged along, had no say in anything, and all the important things were done by side characters. at first I didn't notice, but there was a feeling coming up towards the end, and then the boy gets explained why he never had a saying in anything, and all he had to do was to be there at the right time and place... I really felt for the character; I know I would have left and changed my name and sought a new life on the other side of the world just to get away from those manipulative, impassionate people.

[@Craxus]

I can't stand the tired old fantasy trope where the main character suddenly inherits or unlocks their full power and immediately masters it. It's like they've been using it their whole lives! For example, Captain Marvel fully unlocks her powers and starts zooming around, flying with ease, and defeating enemies without breaking a sweat. Or in Blue Beetle, the family inherits cool gadgets, and the grandmother effortlessly wields a minigun. Where's the training? The practice? I prefer when movies show characters struggling to control their newfound powers, accidentally causing destruction, and taking the time to learn how to use them effectively.

[@conradrosgaard3481]

I personally love how The Incredibles does this with Dash. It’s a short scene, his life his on the line, but he still makes mistakes and learns through them.

[@spectralight8412]

Never seen Captain Marvel, but Blue Beetle was 100% a disaster. It was basically a low tier spy kids movie, and I liked Spy Kids 1-3 when I was a kid. Jaime’s heroics are diminished and his civilian fam has to come save his ass. A spy kids comparison is not something a hero movie should have.

[@icedriver2207]

Dark City has a setup and payoff where you get to see how the character learns to use their powers so quickly.

[@jasonamigo023]

That's one thing I appreciate about My Hero Academia. Midoriya, the protagonist, literally trained a whole year prior to inheriting the special powers. Yet still, he broke his own bones the first time he tried using it. It took him a while to get control over it, let alone become competent, and further still become a formidable hero.

[@PatrickAshe41]

@@icedriver2207 yep. I totally thought of Dark City. Because there's an in-universe reason for the newfound power (i.e., basically a condensed Training From Hell sequence that fits the "tuning" logic, and delivered by an established master of it), it works.

[@racheltheradiant4675]

"The girl that's the key to everything." I've grown to dislike that trope. It was great in Willow, because it was more about the people protecting her. But now it seems to be done poorly. (Logan, new Terminator, Rebel Moon, every YA novel in existence....)

[@Dreamfox-df6bg]

And with Willow it does look like one it's of those self-fulfilling prophecies. Had Queen Bavmorda ignored it, nothing might have happened and she would not have been destroyed. So was the girl really the key to everything? That's what I like about Game of Thrones. Not all prophecies come true, but some do and you'll never know which is which until it is too late.

[@username.exenotfound2943]

the trope itself isnt bad its the execution

[@intergalactic92]

@@Dreamfox-df6bgit’s one of those where everyone's hyperfixation on her, as a result of the prophecy, causes all the events that lead to her downfall. Whilst she technically defeats herself, with a little trickery from Willow (so arguably it’s Willow who defeats her), it is all ultimately down to the baby. No baby, no army of rebels, no dark ritual and no Willow.

[@AnotherDuck]

@@intergalactic92 I think that bit of trickery is one of the best things about that film. It's in his character, rather than ending with a more typical battle, and it was Willow who pulled a fast one, not the writer. I find that prophesies often work better if they're of the self-fulfilling kind. That makes them feel less like destiny and more like the characters' choices actually matter.

[@THOREnT-o3k]

​@@username.exenotfound2943 such a basic rule is foreign to these people.

[@danielcordoba7745]

Loved the video man, I thought about a cool idea for another one. "5 ways to write great team stories". (Sons of anarchy, The Avengers, Guardians of the galaxy, Stranger Things, etc...)

[@fiktivhistoriker345]

I support that idea.

[@Dolugar1]

Omg, I just learned that ff8 is Brandon’s fav videogame. Now THAT was a twist! It’s my fav too, believe it or not, I’m now considering buying one of Brandon’s books, it’s too much of a coincidence.

[@WriterBrandonMcNulty]

Love FF8 to death. Squall's character arc is simply amazing, and although the story was rushed, I love how wildly creative and original it is. Also, the soundtrack is untouchable. If you end up checking out one of my books, I hope you enjoy it!

[@TheZetaKai]

FF8 has some of the deepest, most understated lore in the franchise, and that's really saying something.

[@tomarnold7284]

THANK YOU! Finally someone speaks out the confusing names in HOD! 👏👏👏

[@candidk2544]

I don't mind clichés so much. Anything done well is forgivable. It is just when the cliche becomes some off-hand derp added because the formula demands it, not because it was particularly useful to the story.

[@joshuaa6988]

#4 Tacked on destiny: This is exactly what has bugged me for years about The Mummy Returns (2001). In the first film, Evelyn is a library nerd and Rick is a gun for hire. Then in the second movie, Evelyn discovers that she is the reincarnated ancient Egyptian princess Nefertiri. Meanwhile, Rick suddenly realizes that he has a tattoo that did not exist in the first film, making him a member of the ancient order of the Medjai. Too contrived!

[@psycake1310]

Literally like two of my biggest grievances in fantasy writing. 😂 Rick didn't need to be some prophesized demon slayer to fight Imhotep or Anubis. He probably would've done it, if someone paid him to do it.. or maybe even for free, if his wife and kid were in danger. Oh wait. 😳 Rick O'Connell was fine enough on his own, but the magical tattoo which appeared between movies did more harm to his character progression than good. He was already a husband, a father, and a man who clashed with the undead before. But what bothers me more is that this reincarnation element doesn't really make sense. Evelyn doesn't really benefit from this plot point, except maybe for clunky exposition. Reincarnation stories fall apart quickly if there isn't a strong rhyme or reason to them being written into the story.

[@to819]

The worst fantasy cliché is me thinking that a woman will actually like me someday.

[@WriterBrandonMcNulty]

Hahaha don't give up hope though. That's a cliche worth keeping around

[@DIDYOUSEETHAT172]

LMAO! My brothers are the ladies men, I'm a stoic individual. Girls, women are strange, at my brothers house I discovered my method at 16, I sit observe, sip a beer, don't talk, just there for the beer actually, my brothers group of friends around dancing the usual. After about half an hour or longer this cute blonde sits in my lap and puts her arms around my neck. My brothers eyes bulge out, "I just wanted to see if I could get a rise out of you!" I replied, "Keep wiggling around like that and you will for sure!" Still happens, some years later we have a co-ed bar pool league, same thing sitting at the table sipping a beer with my brother waiting our turn, this girl on our team starts asking me something, I replied then she says "Are you always this cold and distant?" I replied "Pretty much!" next thing I know she is in my lap French kissing me. My brothers eyes bulged out a lot in our lives. 😂😂

[@dama2545]

🤣🤣🤣

[@KackachHajar]

I am a woman, and I’m telling you: if you want a woman to want you, be persistent and funny like the guy in The Notebook when he wanted the girl to go out with him on a date

[@OrangeHand]

​@@KackachHajar The same Notebook where the guy was persistent to the point of harassment and abuse?

[@Tomasin19]

Something I really hate in fantasy and fiction is manipulative characters because they're rarely done right Which is why we need that GOOD VS BAD MANIPULATIVE CHARACTERS VIDEO MY DUDE COME ON

[@AnujChatterjee-q5b]

I am also one of the people asking for the manipulative characters video. Most of the manipulative characters I see are just wicked sorcerers who do over the top theatrics and bring out the worst memories of the character or maybe do join me proposals and they fall flat because its predictable the hero would refuse or the hero would overcome his worst memories. For me the best manipulative characters are the ones that exploit the vulnerabilities or insecurities of the character and maybe even succeed to a great extent !!

[@ronaldbell7429]

@@AnujChatterjee-q5b I think you're just talking about well written characters though. If you're interested in well-done manipulative characters, read "The Thin Man" (the book, not the movie - which is very different)

[@LizBadura]

absolutely

[@macblink]

A manipulative character that's so good at acting that heroes really thought he was on their side at first.. is not good?

[@AnujChatterjee-q5b]

@@macblink Well it depends. Sometimes it works and sometimes it doesn't.

[@thebiologist8662]

Fantasy races, despite having different skills and physical abilities all fight the same way in a battle. Sure, elves might have more archers, but everyone, for some reason, fights in massive formations as if fireballs and area spells were not a thing. Orcs do not use their superior strength to wear more armor and tower shields with polearms for example, which would make them almost unstoppable. Elves do not use nimbleness and agility to have more effective skirmishers, guerrilla tactics or hit and run strategies. Flying creatures play almost no part in aerial warfare or aerial bombardment. Neither do races with wings.

[@visnoga5054]

But I thought the only way to fight was stacking up weapons of all kinds, form a single line, wait for the enemy do the same, then have the entirety of each army charge at each other while screaming. What is this warfare you talk about? More seriously, I'm trying to do that although I yet have to write bigger battles in my book, one of the milestone setting the world to be as it is during the story is meant to be one time the Orcs, used to skirmishes, marauding and low-number fights where they let their natural fury and superior physics do the job instead of actual strategy had, after heavy setbacks, united to fight against Humans and met them for the first time on a large battlefield without proper coordination or knowledge of needed tactics contrary to their foe, falling at every possible trap and bait because they knew only the way of "might and honor". Loosely inspired from the history of Roman warfare :)

[@JeremyHoffman]

This is one reason Mad Max Fury Road was great. Even though it's basically one long car chase battle, there were enough different types of fighting to keep it interesting.

[@samwilliams9660]

Elden Ring is another big example of the naming issue. Almost all of the important characters in the lore have their names start with G, R, and M, which leads to a mountain of names that sound super similar and are hard to keep track of. Just in the M’s category you have Miquella, Millicent, Mohg, Melina, Melenia, Mogwyn, Malakith, Marika, and Mesmer, to name a handful. The G’s have fewer but are almost worse in similarity with a family line with names like Godwyn, Godrick, Godfrey, and Godforoy

[@bunkerguard3]

Totally with you on #2. I hate battles where the good guys are outnumbered, outmatched, and outsmarted, and then win only because they're lucky and plucky. The Battle of the Bastards was terrible. It's so much more satisfying when they win with actual tactics and smarts. The best battle scene is the arena fight in Gladiator where Maximus leads his heavy infantry gladiators to win a supposedly hopeless battle against the chariots with archers by using real tactics and battlefield smarts.

[@draconusfrigidus]

A counterpart to #5: keeping the consequences of raising the stakes, but acting like it'll all somehow still work out as a happy ending, after the credits role. '9' being an example where the ending sees the world destroyed and all but three of the main cast killed, but since they defeated their nemesis and freed the souls of their slain brethren, it's treated like things are now on the mend and everything will be fine...without actually addressing how that's to be accomplished. Just a vague "Well this is our planet now, we can make it better" and that's it.

[@MadMalMan]

Not your question, but Eragon, despite its issues, has absolutely incredible magic consistency. To the point where characters are unexpectedly punished for making minor mistakes.

[@Lucifer_Abysseum]

For the first two ones, there's a movie i really like : Kingsglaive (the Final Fantasy 15 movie), and i think they did a really good job about this. Powers are consistent, and when the source of their magic disappear, the hero is really powerless and needs to think and act fast. A lot of major character die for real, too. It's great !

[@simplewrites]

Adding intelligent fantasy races and making them act 100% like humans for no reason thus making their existence pointless. *Cough* Every slice of life fantasy anime ever *cough*

[@lisaonthemargins]

Rings of Power elves be like that

[@brewster_4]

@lisaonthemargins That’s how they act in the Silmarillion though

[@blshouse]

You might want to check out Frieren: Beyond Journey's End. The main character is practically immortal, and the story really leans into it.

[@visnoga5054]

My man! Yes, yes, and 100% yes. "I've lived for centuries and unravelled great mysteries from that world, but I happen to need my coffee in the morning and I have an opinion about K-pop and pineapple pizzas for some reason".

[@simplewrites]

@@blshouse That's an outlier, I will admit. A good one. It's a great anime. More should follow it as an example

[@ZwiekszoneRyzyko]

1 - Wanda Maximoff. Don't need to say more. In every movie she has different set of powers. 5 - Multiverse. All deaths are meaningless now because we can always grab a variant from the paralell universe.

[@juliegolick]

While the "similar names" thing is definitely confusing when you're reading, it's also historically accurate. I can't tell you the number of times I've done historical research into Medieval England and it was, "John, son of John, who killed his neighbour John in a fight, and now his cousin John wants to take over neighbour John's land." (An exaggeration, but only a slight one. So, so many people in Medieval England had the same handful of names!)

[@VanchaMarch2]

The inconsistent magic system point makes me think of the Inheritance series, which had a very logical and mathematical premise, but all of a sudden the disembodied ancient Eldunari just get limitless magical energy from nowhere

[@Batman88878]

I get why Avengers: Endgame gets mentioned here in # 2, but I'm okay with only Iron Man dying here because a good amount of the heroes had died in Avengers: Infinity War & even Ant-Man & the Wasp. So it'd feel like bringing them back just to kill them again. Makes their resurrections hollow. It's like when Whistler was brought back in Blade II only to die unceremoniously in Blade: Trinity.

[@thebiologist8662]

The snap, of course. I beg to differ. In the series and subsequent movies, it's heavily addressed. In The Falcon and Winter Soldier, they deal with the issues of not enough work, not enough resources for the people who came back, the emotional trauma on everyone, and issues like, okay, this person has been living in my house for the past five years. Who does it belong to?

[@Zhavari]

that's kind of what I thought. it wasn't addressed as heavily in endgame maybe but the shows filled in a few holes imo

[@AnujChatterjee-q5b]

Thank you for the comment because I always wondered how the world would be post Blip and glad to know that "The Falcon and Winter Soldier" explores that so I might watch that show. It makes sense for such a world to be explored in TV shows rather than Endgame which had the tremendous task of wrapping up the Avengers' arcs and delivering high action spectacle.

[@LordThanathos]

Beat me to it. The Blip was surprisingly well handled in the MCU, for a superhero story.

[@Alverant]

Quan Chi mentioned it too. The main characters were having dinner with friends and one comments at how suddenly half the people were gone. Spider-Man Far From Home addressed it by having May and Spider-man run a charity for people affected by the blip and Flash Thompson tried to get booze illegally but was reminded he was blipped so he's still underage.

[@concettasorvillo3719]

Well storywise shouldn't be like see the consequences in other media, stories or narratives. You should see the consequences in the movie itself and before the act is undone like nothing happened.

[@Audiblenod]

Everyone's related. Ugh. Why did Rey need to be a Palpatine? Why did James Bond need to be raised with Blofeld?

[@Zhavari]

my mom was saying that rey being a palpatine was frustrating because the last movie had proved that rey was rey no matter what happened to her or where she came from, and she wasn't important just because of her family. I was pretty young when #3 came out but I vividly remember being confused like, why is palpatine alive and why is rey related to him? doesn't it kind of undo the message the #2 movie had?

[@venalleader2909]

I think they retconned Rey into a Palpatine to explain her incredible Mary Sue nature.

[@fiktivhistoriker345]

​@@venalleader2909Now thinking of it, i find it somehow poetic: first the supposedly "chosen one" Anakin turned evil. Then in the end the descendant of the evil one turned to be good. Besides, i never liked this "chosen one / virgin birth" thing. And the sequels were not so good anyway.

[@ShinGallon]

@@Zhavari Rise of Skywalker went out of it's way to undo all the *good* things Last Jedi did, seemingly out of spite. ib4 "what good things hur hur hur"

[@venalleader2909]

@@ShinGallon I dunno. I thought "Last Jedi" was total garbage and I told my wife (her family are massive SW fans) that Last Jedi was the last SW film I was going to waste my time on. It came after Force Awakens, which was shamelessly derivative and predictable. Maybe Rise of Skywalker was good, but Rogue One was the only new SW movie that I thought was original and good.

[@arsenicaces5825]

in avengers we already had deaths in infinity war and the characters were basically resurrected so death was not necessary. You have to remember it was not a standalone movie

[@nctpti2073]

Plus anyone who did fall *would* just be brought back at the end anyway.

[@BrettJones27]

Black Widow, and Gamora did die, both permanently

[@NarinDeliah]

Another example I have when it comes to fake stakes is miraculous ladybug. I know it’s a kids show but the way it doesn’t even have any real stakes during 95% of the whole show is baffling. When it comes to writing and execution in general, the whole show is an amazing example of what NOT to do if you want to tell a story.

[@Ghost_Text]

With fantasy naming conventions it seems like the difficulty comes from not finding a simple few syllable name that defines who a character is.

[@arten]

The one I hate the most is, "Why didn't you tell me?" "You weren't ready to know." There are stories where it kind of makes sense for the mentor (Gandalf, Obi-wan, etc.) to withhold information from the hero. Like if they're worried the hero will turn to evil and mis-use the information, or if the hero might get captured and be tortured into giving away vital secrets. But those should be RARE, and instead it gets used all the darn time.

[@Redeye308350]

Lack of consequences with injuries. The hero gets injured but shrugs it off and keeps going. It should be: The hero gets a deep cut to the hand and can no longer wield a sword effectively. The hero gets stabbed in the abdomen and needs a few week's of recovery, meanwhile the villain is progressing without opposition, making the next encounter more difficult.

[@benjaminhelton4597]

I'd go with the Deus Ex Machina device that would solve every problem the characters face, but is only used once or twice for a dumb reason. For example: like, half the magical items in Harry Potter.

[@JCGCompositions]

I hate the one where they 'train' the individual by trying to kill them. Then the individual whips a new power out of their back side and can use it thereafter. The trainer, then, never acknowledges the fact that the individual would have died if they didn't have any powers.

[@bushidotenshi]

Love Brandon being brutal in this video, listing Star Wars as Fantasy instead of sci-fi and the "plot armor". Brilliant!

[@federicopalacios7439]

Star Wars literally is fantasy, that's not an insult. Fantasy isn't defined by the setting but by the content. Star Wars starts with a farm boy who meets a princess and learns magic and sword fighting in order to defeat an evil empire. That's fantasy, the fact that it happens in space is completely irrelevant.

[@bushidotenshi]

@@federicopalacios7439 Yes, but I think it's creators and fans wolud prefer to be called SciFi

[@4shotpastas]

My least favorite cliche is a character discovering a hidden power inside themselves after either some kind of insanely stressful moment, or a tipping point for their character and then the ability goes completely unused for the rest of the story. Particularly when the ability has a downside, like it's a trump card qhere it can completely turn the tides of a fight, but the character is out of commission once they use it. It really bugs me because when they character or party is losing, they just suddenly won't use or acknowledge the power and so their failure feels forced.

[@user-nm3ug3zq1y]

@@4shotpastas, *cough* shield hero *sneeze*

[@macblink]

First 4 lines, that is called "asspull" 😅

[@cjkalandek996]

Your tangent on people complaining about the Avengers using time travel to go back in time and collect the Infinity Stones. It's like those people didn't see the first 20 minutes of that movie. Main timeline Thanos snapped his fingers again to reduce the Stones to atoms, thus making it impossible for anyone to use them and undo what he had done. So, the way I see it, they had no other option BUT to use time travel to get the Stones back.

[@andrewmclellan1623]

FfVII was always my favorite too. And yes it has wild problems with the story. Time compression is never adequately explained, Ultimecia is a wasted opportunity, the side characters are annoying, etc. But the love story was fun, Squall was great and fun to watch develop, the world building was excellent, secrets added to the story, etc.

[@KittyKatt_Luna80s]

You've put VII which is seven. One more I.

[@KittyKatt_Luna80s]

I will have to agree with you on Time Compression - instead of doing the Orphanage stuff, time could have been spent explaining the Time Compression (or Kompression if you're Ultimecia/Artemisia). 🙄

[@FCSchaefer]

You hit the nail on the head with Endgame, the effects of the snap should be devastating utterly.

[@Catratio]

I have zero tolerance for confusing character names. I was a third of the way through The Outsiders until I realized Dally and Darry weren't the same guy. My rule is to have each of my characters' names start with a different letter. The cliche I hate most though is the "chosen one." A main character is so much more interesting when they worked hard to achieve their goals, not because they were "destined" to win.

[@psycake1310]

Either A) use a different letter at the start of each character's name, or B) if their names coincidentally start with the same letter (like D for 'Dally' or 'Darry'), make sure they use names which don't sound similar. It's been ages since I've read The Outsiders, but I made that mistake a couple of times while reading. Although, I fully agree with you on in your comment is the 'Chosen one' prophecy trope. It often undermines the stakes of the protagonist, if most of their actions, or the finality caused through them, is chalked up to something that exists outside of their personal journey.

[@JediasHertz]

I think that important characters need memorable names, and nicknames are great for that, because you can use their own names to tell their prior story. Like, if you write a tale with someone called Wet Joe, for example, people will stay with this name, and they will ask themselves "why this guy is called wet? He sweat a lot? has he fallen in a river or something?" And there is when you get them to remember their names.

[@TorQueMoD]

Great video as always.I actually started writing a fantasy book the other week and I'm having a ton of fun with it. It's probably garbage, but you've been a huge inspiration for me, so thank you. I've only written 3 chapters in full, but I've got 28 chapters plotted out (a paragraph or two describing the major beats) so I'm quite happy. It's seemingly writing itself actually, so it's been an amazing experience! I originally intended for it to be a comic series, but we'll see where it goes (oh, and similar sounding names is my biggest pet peeve. I spent 5 seasons of GOT trying to figure out if Peter Dinklage was Tyrion or Tywin.

[@12345678901011213]

I think my least favorite fantasy cliche has to be resurrection. Almost every fantasy story has a character be killed and come back making whatever scene led to their death feels meaningless.

[@Ironica82]

It became big due to Superman.

[@MrPleers]

Especially in Superhero comics. At this point, each superhero has died at least once.

[@WriterBrandonMcNulty]

Yep. Would've included resurrection in this video, but I already covered it in my Worst Hero Cliches video last year

[@davidanderson9103]

Great answer! It would be cool if it was rare and unexpected, but nowadays, if a main character gets killed, I simply start trying to figure out how it is going to be undone... was it a dream, is the hero really dead, is there some magic that will reverse it... etc... knowing that most likely, they are coming back some way or another.

[@benjaminwatt2436]

@@davidanderson9103 Aslan: hold my beer

[@joannfuhrer3114]

I hate when a character has been presented as a villain and you spend 99% of the movie hating him or her and then at the last minute they become the hero with no consequences.

[@satyrosphilbrucato9140]

"In the days of my father's farther, it was prophesied that a Chosen One would arise..." I hate this one so badly that I near-inevitably shitcan media that introduce it. The only reason I stuck with the Mistborn saga was because Brandon Sanderson began flipping tropes on their heads... including this one... before I shitcanned the first book.

[@onthewingsofadragon]

One cliche that irks me is the "hidden royalty" trope, but I'm trying to challenge my view on this by making one of the main characters in my book go through this cliche . . . sort of. Instead of having it dropped on them a moment after they meet their royal family, I'm going to have it revealed to them beforehand and explore how they cope with this information BEFORE they meet their family. Personally, I think this could be a lot more interesting and a better tension builder than the shock factor of "Hey, you're royalty, welcome home" sort of thing.

[@josephkemphaus5058]

Yes! Finally someone who hates the Leia is a Skywalker reveal. I felt like I was the only one

[@psycake1310]

Not a fan of that either. Felt like a tacked on twist, as much as I love the Star Wars OT, this wasn't necessary.

[@andrewparnell5566]

"Give yourself to the Dark Side. It is the only way you can save your friends. Yes, your thoughts betray you. Your feelings for them are strong. Especially for... sister. So, you have a twin sister. Your feelings have now betrayed her, too. Obi-Wan was wise to hide her from me. Now his failure is complete. If you will not turn to the Dark Side... then perhaps she will!" It became the trigger for Luke to snap. It could have been achieved some other way but got to admit, that was effective. The Force moves in mysterious ways. lol.

[@geoffchurchill5492]

by that stage of Game of Thrones, is that too many major characters had been killed off already

[@CoveWeaverStudios]

I must say you have made me better at writing stories. Thanks for the advice.

[@WriterBrandonMcNulty]

Thrilled to hear it. Keep at it!

[@rockbert99]

I freaking love this channel. You are awesome Brandon!!

[@lisaonthemargins]

The young scrawny girl is somehow miraculously an amazing fighter with minimal training or muscle gain, killing huge and powerful men. Sure honey.

[@martinepstein9826]

Girl is swarmed by 5 henchmen twice her size. Boy is about to run over to help, then comically stops and stares while she dispatches them with ease. Later, girl is easily overpowered and taken captive so boy can stage heroic rescue.

[@Killjoy2071]

There’s actually a name for that: “Waif-fu”

[@macblink]

I feel the same about skinny male teens in anime, having the strength of a titan or a freaking dragon 😒

[@legionarybooks13]

They need to go back to the 80s to see how writing powerful women was done correctly. Case in point: Sandahl Bergman as Valeria in Conan the Barbarian. She was muscular and very athletic (which is why she was cast). She wasn't as strong as the men, but she was nimble like a cat and established as a trained fighter. Her cutting down Thulsa Doom's henchmen, relying on her speed and agility, was believable.

[@hkgcgsdhjgd]

Even though the guys are bigger and stronger, she's able to dodge their attacks and take them out with spinning kicks, or maybe she's wielding a staff. And the big, strong guys crumble after just one or two hits, instead of absorbing them and countering with a full body tackle.

[@Pirelli913]

I was so confused when you started going off on the Game of Thrones names. It began sounding like you were reciting a Dr. Seuss book. 😂

[@siegfriedmordrake3229]

Evil witch / dark lord who wants to conquer the world because they are just evil. Worked in LOTR (and even there it is a bit deeper than that) but we're not in 1954 anymore

[@psycake1310]

I get what you mean, Sauron wants to conquer Middle-Earth because of his obsession with the notion of perfect order. Even when he was known as Mairon, his desire was to keep things bound together, following one strict rulership. A classic case of being 'Lawful evil'. Conquering for the sake of conquering, and not desiring to impose real change to the world is in fact, a tiring fantasy trope.

[@Tabletopcloud20]

I would rather have that than a villain who's supposed to be "sympathetic," especially when said villain is doing the worst things imaginable. Yet I'm supposed to feel bad for them? This sometimes works, and other times, it feels like a cop out to seem "deep" when it's as deep as a puddle.

[@psycake1310]

@@Tabletopcloud20 I do grow tired of the Anti villain archetype, a little bit. When done well, it's great. Operatic, even. But since Avengers Infinity War, people just latched onto the idea in recreating Thanos, without the creative charm. The best way to write them (Anti villains), in my opinion, is have them be an established hero who is corrupted, or loses faith in the very system they vowed to protect. That way, we can still relate to them, and understand their reasoning on committing atrocities. Even if we disagree with their ambitions, we get a better understanding to why they're doing it.

[@siegfriedmordrake3229]

@Tabletopcloud20 that's right, villains you can understand and sympathise with are tricky to write. Usually the best course is for them to have noble goals but terrible means to achieve them

[@tonyjanney1654]

@@Tabletopcloud20 One of the things I 've noticed about, reading history is that nobody thinks they're the "villain." Everyone feels they are justified in doing what they do. Rather they blame their antagonists for pushing them to far. They claim the "good guys" are actually responsible for the cause of the strife, or flat out convince their side the the other side is the truly evil actors. Everyone in most nations/tribes/organizations in history likes to claim that right is on their side.

[@TedMattos]

Great video, Brandon - as always! I'd love to see a video on horror/thriller cliches (unless you've already done one)

[@songoku7715]

I m glad you've started including game plots, please include more in your future videos

[@WriterBrandonMcNulty]

Glad you enjoyed it! Probably gonna discuss FFX in next week's video. Also, you've probably love this video from last year: kzbin.info/www/bejne/pKKsdJeLZsuppJI

[@crimsonmoon8649]

The cliche I dislike the most is the lack of power balance on human - monsters line. Humans are usually portrayed here as the weak ones, mostly without magic, with only few chosen ones with power, and the monsters are magical and overpowered and no humans can harm them (except the chosen one). I don't like this because because of this fights are extremely uneven and it's hard to engage in them when everyone but the MC breaks like dolls and dies; and also because of this, the MC defeating the overpowered monster seems like plot armor, because he has to win. I'm planning to write a book with human protagonists fighting demons and angels, but there the chances would be much more even and all sides would have the same potential.

[@changlongwang9898]

this I what I don't like about the witcher

[@crimsonmoon8649]

@changlongwang9898 actually, in the Witcher books is quite the opposite - the monsters are slowly dying out, and it's really easy for any trained warrior to kill them. That's why the games are more popular than books - because they expand the world and beastiary

[@changlongwang9898]

@@crimsonmoon8649 but in the games the only ones getting hired to deal with them are witchers.

[@crimsonmoon8649]

@@changlongwang9898 yeah... But trust me, it's better to have this cliche in the game. It actually makes it better than the books

[@justanotherchannelonyoutub126]

This is a great video and I like the points you brought up, but the things you said about Leia are wrong. Leia was always meant to be an important piece of the puzzle. I mean she is called *Princess* Leia after all, which means not only is she an important political figure, but she was *born* into royalty. Ultimately, the twist about her being a Skywalker is a bad twist, but it’s bad because it adds nothing to the story, it doesn’t change how we see Leia at all (except for the fact that she kissed Luke in Empire strikes back)

[@IAmVentoAC]

The last 200 episodes of Naruto have all 5 of the cliches talked about in this video. There is a scene where the good guys are in a tough spot, and literally god comes down to give Naruto a power up. He also tells him he’s the reincarnation of Jesus and is destined to save the world. Up until this point, the story has been an underdog story. Naruto is trying to beat the odds, but now he’s literally the chosen one. This plot twist happens like 500 episodes into the story too. On top of this, there are countless other problems that trample the well established worldbuilding

[@kalstonii]

I hate the Jon Snow “hero dies but is magically brought to life so we know hes now the “good guy” trope

[@mikespangler98]

"I hate the Jon Snow “hero dies but is magically brought to life" But at least there was a cost to that magic.

[@elivanto1673]

You should have mentioned Rey Palpatine. Where the heck did she learn how to become more powerful than Luke in less than 2 days? Mary Sue Level 2000.

[@LizBadura]

For real, like... you're telling me a random 19 yr old (no matter her background and Midi-Chlorians) can fly any spaceship and fight the evil guy without hesitation, while others who are similarly gifted had to go through decades of hard, non-stop training?

[@BigD307]

Earliest I’ve been to a video😂 great work ima check out entry wounds soon!

[@visnoga5054]

I plead guilty for the complicated/confusing names. I'm writing a story centered around Orcs and I try to always get out of my way when I introduce new ones to get a harsh sounding name I didn't use yet, and of course the same goes for their pantheon of 8/9 gods. I also make fun of myself with it sometimes, by having a character named Grimmsa, mother of five daughters: Rakksa, Takksa, Aggsa, Unnsa, Kaksa. And one son: Vogarek.

[@Valkanna.Nublet]

The two worst ones for me are: A villain who's far too easily beaten for the the threat it's claimed they are. Voldemort is this huge threat, so powerful and nasty that people won't even speak his name. Gets repeatedly defeated by half trained teenagers. (Global threats should be faced with powerful heroes, school kids should be dealing with school level threats) Unearned skills. Whether it's simply a backstory that doesn't match their skills or discovering they're and suddenly being able to use all the powers as well as people who've done it for years. Rey in Star Wars is guilty of both.

[@j2art]

I would say at the very least in "philosophers stone" it's understandable. Voldermort is reduced to being a parasite having to drain the essence from unicorns just to stay alive. In Chamber of secrets they are not so much fighting him as they are fighting a underdeveloped memory of Voldermort. I totally understand where you are coming from but I do think those two put Voldemort at enough of a disadvantage that the kids actually do stand a chance.

[@mrshade810]

​@@j2artand don't forget that in most cases Harry had help. In the goblet of fire he was helped by the spirits of those voldemort had previously killed, otherwise he would've lost to voldy's curse. In order of the phoenix dumbledore fought him instead of harry, and then they had to chase and destroy horocruxes to weaken voldemort considerably. Then when Harry fought him again, voldemort was using a wand that wasn't loyal to him. It was a lot of help and a lot of team work. I really don't think it was easy at all, but that's just my opinion

[@j2art]

@@mrshade810 100% agree. it was never a band of kids taking on evil alone.

[@Tim_the_Enchanter]

That's most Stephen King stories.

[@AntipaladinPedigri]

The memory loss is caused by using giardian forces. Also Kitase retracted his debunk of the time loop theory, saying other writers worked on the plot and might have slipped in the plotline and he missed it. This explains why they were chosen to be in the same orphanage. Edea picked them to kill her to prevent Ultimecia from fulfilling her plan.

[@civwar64bob77]

I hate the huge (usually final) battles between basically indestructible beings that are just long special effects sequences where neither gets hurt. Wonder Woman v. Ares, Neo v. Smith in Matrix Revolutions, Superman v. (I think it was Zod). How many times do I have to see the hero and villian go flying backwards, smashing into something, then getting up like nothing happened (well, maybe a brief shaking it off first)?

[@username.exenotfound2943]

superman vs zod shouldnt have even caused that much damage, ack snyder just didnt understand superman

[@dezopenguin9649]

Yeah, I hate those kind of fights because 95% of the time, you could just skip to the last couple of minutes and you'd miss nothing but special effects, and the only element of suspense is when you ARE supposed to start caring. I want to see fights where the intermediate stages matter. Where something that happens one minute in (say, one fighter suffering a minor injury) affects what happens next, which affects what happens next, and so on--an actual narrative of the encounter where each step actually matters in getting to the end of the engagement.

[@kevinwhittaker5364]

Love the channel, love the layout of your videos and love the great writing advice you impart each week. But after learning your favourite game OF ALL TIME is FF8, I think I love you all the way to a fantasy cliche and back again.

[@WriterBrandonMcNulty]

What fantasy cliche do you hate most? Let us know!

[@rslashwooosh4964]

definitely overpowered protagonists. no struggles for them is just too boring.

[@A-The-Great]

Confusing character names by far

[@crimsonmoon8649]

​@@rslashwooosh4964or overpowered antagonists; the hero's purpose is to win, but with him being weaker than the villain and winning looks like plot armor and luck

[@JosephSchneider26]

​@@A-The-Great As a writer, I am curious: Would you consider the names Etran, Fa'el, Kotol, Duthul, Getel, Pearl, Karluf or Firthuk confusing? Asking for a friend 😇

[@Army_Dog]

​@@JosephSchneider26Pearl? That's an everyday name, ofc it's not

[@kevinogill6726]

Great list. I am also a writer/published author and your "stakes" cliche reminded me of something I'd forgotten. It mostly applies to film and TV but I hate when the villain is so monumentally evil as to go well "past the close" where the hero can no longer serve justice. As, say, an investigator slowly realizing the bad guy he's chasing is Reinhard Heydrich

[@rafaelpaiva82]

One thing I appreciate about endgame is the timeskip. It makes it so that the people that died in the movie returning doesn't erase the impact of the deaths. People still suffered because of it. Cassie Lang grew up without her father, Thor became a depressive drunkard, and so on. However I think that perhaps establishing the state of dissaray of the world more would've been nice

[@davidheckjr]

They do address that a little when Captain Marvel shows up. She has been gone so long because other worlds didn’t have a team like the Avengers to help stabilize things. So, Earth was lucky in that regard. Also, 2 of the original 6 Avengers end up dying in the movie. That seems like pretty high stakes.

[@xavierthomas5835]

​@davidheckjr Only at the very end, after the entire battle is over, and only because of personal choice.

[@zengram]

Number 5 reminds me of some games who close a trilogy with a plot solution that solves everything in the third game: crysis,dead space and resistance as examples

[@Army_Dog]

Starwars is packed with inconsistant magic

[@AScreenwritersJourney]

This was great. Thank you for uploading!

[@Gabriel-no6wv]

8:24 What? Yes, it's answered, a lot, on winter soldier and the falcon, eternals, secret invasion, ms marvel, spider man, guardians of the galaxy, wanda vision, etc. All of those movies/shows, show people dealing with the snap, some lost people, it shows the economy changing, it shows the destruction, it shows that society changed, etc..... It wasn't "ignored", yes, people came back, but the destruction and change wasn't unmade, society changed forever....

[@michaelpowers6551]

So people need to watch a ton of other things outside the movies for those half ass answers lol…great.

[@leigh-anjohnson]

​@@michaelpowers6551 That's what happens when you watch something that's part of an ongoing series

[@arthurfrayn7619]

Stating an action is off the table and doing it without major repercussions bugs me. Dune does this: House Atreides walks into a trap knowingly, gets attacked by surprise despite spice, Mentats and Bene Gesserit having forms future site. They get away with it despite the book saying it would cause a major war and other issues (that don't happen).

[@warlawds7007]

100% agree with the first two. I hate plot magic and plot armor.

[@Sidera17]

I think the entire collapse of the MCU in Phase 4 was built on the fact that The Snap was never addressed (whether or not they were able to reverse it). The universe cleaned up too neatly and left no room for further exploration of characters bc the stakes could never be replicated and reversed again and again with each subsequent threat. Thinking on it now, they would have done better to not kill Thanos off at the beginning of Endgame, but still have some reason to face him at the end and defeat him but WITHOUT being able to bring everyone Snapped back.

[@cosmicspacething3474]

5:54 I mean giving all the heroes personal ties to the main villain is a great thing in concept, but it gets completely goofy when they all have the EXACT SAME RELATIONSHIP

[@vanessaprado4013]

Not sure here. If everyone it's somehow related because “oh, such a coincidence!”, it's awful to me 😅😅 (but if it comes from some kind of strategy, then that's different)

[@cosmicspacething3474]

@ I mean it doesn’t have to be closely related, it just has to be personal enough to create a strong motive

[@solbringer2483]

My least favorite cliche is “fantasy speak.” People seem to think when they write high fantasy they have to copy J.R.R. Tolkien’s writing style

[@alyssapowell1799]

With House of the Dragon, you haven't gotten to the most confusing part - Rhaenyra's young son is named Aegon. So, you have Aegon the Elder (the character played by Tom Glynn-Caney) and Aegon the Younger. It was sort of a slap in the face to Alicent that Rhaenerya and Daemon named their son Aegon, ignoring Alicent's son's name. Rhaenyra and Daemon's younger son is named Viserys. He's really important to the greater story. GRRM is modeling his stories after a medieval society where the same names are used over and over. If Jon Snow is really named Aegon (and has an older half-brother also named Aegon), that historically did happen where the same name got recycled after a baby died. But on tv, it is confusing. I think nicknames could have been used since that's what happened in the past and why there was Rob, Bob, Hob and Dob as nicknames for Robert. In GOT, there's King Robert, Robb and Robin, so they avoid it being quite as confusing but still having characters named after each other and using last names like Jon Snow and Jon Arryn to differentiate characters.

[@WriterBrandonMcNulty]

Oh no... I'm gonna have to draw up a list of all these people

[@alyssapowell1799]

@@WriterBrandonMcNulty It might be easier if you've seen the family tree. But it makes it worse that they barely showed Aegon the Younger who should be 9 but he's 3 years old in HOTD and has been played various extras. The end of the show is going to be really unfulfilling without actually setting up who he is since he could randomly die off camera and no one would even notice. There should be plots like with Bran, Rickon and Arya in HOTD with Rhaenyra's kids, but they've been turned into toddlers and made irrelevant. What George RR Martin was complaining about is more than just removing Maelor. Everything with all the child characters have been utterly destroyed since Ryan Condal doesn't want to deal with working with kids.

[@Beastlango]

FF8 is my favorite FF game and one of my all time favorites too

[@legometaworld2728]

Titty armor, it’s ineffective as hell. And if realism doesn’t matter than give us cock and ball armor too.

[@deckardcanine]

How about armor that exposes plenty of skin, like metal bikinis?

[@ROMANTIKILLER2]

Fun fact, a sort of cock-armour existed historically, if we look at the codpieces of some sets of full plate armour. 😅 Bikini armour, on the other hand...

[@julietardos5044]

Jill Bearup has a bunch of videos on this, tier lists. She calls that titty armor "just stab me now".

[@d4red3v1l8]

0:47 The writers should just plan out how the characters powers work before they actually get into the story, otherwise it’ll start to make 0 sense.

[@KauanHenrique-ie7nu]

I hate it when the protagonist who has spent his whole life in a certain house or in a certain village is suddenly asked to go away to another place and suddenly he forgets all the people, friends, family, school, work, everyone who loved him and just goes although, he simply accepts the invitation and leaves, without doubts or anything like that, I hate when that happens.

[@tatalsaba]

I was surprised to see stuff from Star Wars and Avengers Endgame, but I can understand the points.

[@johnchastain7890]

Farm boy or farm girl discovers they're a long-awaited messiah, according to some ancient prophecy they just heard about.

[@jacindaellison3363]

Also, the No Shit Sherlock Prophecies. We know the protagonist is the Chosen One, so why are we wasting time building up to it?

[@LizBadura]

so basically the plot of the top three fantasy franchises :D

[@johnchastain7890]

@@LizBadura Hey, some writers can make it work! ....but others, not so much. 😂

[@RobertAlberti]

I've read two books where I needed to make notes to keep track of character names: War and Peace, and The Silmarillion. The latter is the WORST offender, with EVERBODY named Finarfin, Fingolfin, Fingol, Findar, Feomer, Eomer, Neomer, Zeomer, Eofin, Findolfin, etc.

[@deckardcanine]

Your second cliche is why I didn't care for the battle between Yoda and Palpatine. We already knew that neither would die or even suffer a lasting injury.

[@ronaldbell7429]

True, but it's the problem with prequels. You know so many of the outcomes. But if there hadn't been a confrontation that also would have been problematic. You couldn't really have either of them chicken out of a confrontation, and the confrontation was basically inevitable. So the only thing you can do as a writer is entertain the viewer while you're showing them how the later events came to be.

[@reubenmanzo2054]

You don't consider being exiled in shame to be a lasting injury?

[@deckardcanine]

@@reubenmanzo2054 Well, it's not exactly an upshot of the fight.

[@reubenmanzo2054]

@@deckardcanine Perhaps not in the traditional sense.

[@chairmanm3ow]

Infinity war also sucked for snapping away all the new characters and just leaving the original lineup. It felt very insincere to me. I wanted the original lineup to die in battle and leave an opening for the new recruits to take over. To forge ahead in their absense. That would have been compelling.

[@psionicsknight6651]

For me, I have a few fantasy clichés: 1. Age of Non-Humans ending so Age of Humans can begin. While I get this was started by Tolkien, and I still love Lord of the Rings, I really hate how a lot of stories seem to insist humans can share or coexist peacefully with non-human races, and thus for humans to survive and thrive, non-humans need to go. It just makes extinction/exile/etc. look bad only if it happens to *humans* specifically (everything else is expendable). 2. Fair Folk are dangerous misanthropes. While I get this is part of the original folklore behind fairies, I also think that it not only misses the main point-the Fair Folk are *strange* and even deadly, but they don’t innately hate humans or want to see us suffer-and I feel it’s been done to death. Like, I’d really like to see (and even have planned) stories where a plot point is characters trying to understand the Fair Folk from a psychological and/or sociological perspective, and try to bring understanding between the two. It would be more interesting, and could reflect how we were wrong about a lot of people, animals, natural forces, etc. in the real world and are better educated now. 3. All gods are abusive monsters. While I get the reason for this in some stories, especially those based on Classical Mythology, I find it’s become a tiresome cliché, and it makes me wonder; why would there be people who would want to *worship* the gods if they are so cruel? Especially if the gods need worship to survive? Plus, it makes gods look like they can’t be third-dimensional characters in the stories they appear in. As an honorable mention, no other governments besides monarchies. I mean, I love me fantasy kingdoms, but I would like to see other forms of government. Thankfully, it seems some more modern fantasy is showing variety, which is nice!

[@fiktivhistoriker345]

I guess that is based mostly on european history. The indoeuropeans seemed to have pushed away the former inhabitants of europe and india, forcing them to hide and calling them demons, dwarfs, little people or magical creatures like elves. And their leaders and heroes were possibly abusive monsters, concerning the greek and the nordic myths.

[@lotharrenz4621]

3. In some stories abusive gods are worshipped in order to keep them from wreaking even more havoc in the realm of mortals, like to keep them calm, asleep, or occupied, or something. But this makes only sense in worlds where gods won't die when they run out of worshipers.

[@markkumanninen6524]

As to your honorable mention, I've always wondered about lords and kings ruling fantasy worlds. The only alternative seems to be an Star Wars empire type of dictatorship, where individuals are worthless.

[@jahredcr916]

As soon as the topic switched to confusing character names I was immediately thinking of HOD😭