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Post by omega on Sept 11, 2018 9:09:08 GMT
What in a story makes you groan like "they're really doing this"?
One thing I find annoying is when someone needs money but refuses a loan from a friend out of pride, forcing them to eventually break down, swallow their pride or find the money by other means that land them in deeper trouble. If money is really an issue that will divide a strong friendship or relationship like this than someone needs to reexamine what it means to them. Sometimes there are underlying reasons for why they won't take the money, like previous lending having strings attached (Lorelei in Gilmore Girls, where practically any gesture made by her mother has strings attached due to their past issues). Other times it's purely for drama.
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Post by aussiedoctorwhofan on Sept 11, 2018 10:34:33 GMT
When someone needs to say something vitally important, and the other person butts in and talks over them- it's sooo frustrating. They just stand/sit there and take it. I personally would never do that, just let someone talk over me.
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Post by omega on Sept 11, 2018 10:45:35 GMT
When someone needs to say something vitally important, and the other person butts in and talks over them- it's sooo frustrating. They just stand/sit there and take it. I personally would never do that, just let someone talk over me. That is a classic spy/police trope, when the informant will only give the information at a specific time and place, and even then the protagonists only get barely enough to facilitate the rest of the plot. One that gets me groaning is when Person A has news for Person B, but when they go to tell Person B something comes up that makes their news a whole lot worse. Usually it's Person B having something to say that changes everything. They ask Person A what they had to say, and A has to grasp for something that comes off relatively trivial or a lie that eventually spins out of control. A deferred confession always ages dramatically.
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Post by whiskeybrewer on Sept 11, 2018 12:47:04 GMT
Tripping over nothing
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Post by omega on Sept 11, 2018 22:13:22 GMT
The last of a species, or the Adam and Eve plot. Unless there's a genetic repository or a previously unknown group that survives there's no genetic diversity to build the race back up again to what it used to be. The problem with the Adam and Eve plot is that the later generations need to come from incest, which such plot lines tend to ignore. Further issues strike later down the line when inbreeding from limited genetic stock kicks in.
Another problem is that genetic defects would become the norm. In one X-Files a town of cannibals inherited a condition from someone they ate (the rarity of the condition and the fact it was appearing in a large population is what brought it attention as an X-File). Natural selection might only go so far.
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melkur
Chancellery Guard
Likes: 3,961
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Post by melkur on Sept 11, 2018 22:32:21 GMT
One of the tropes I currently loathe is "pair the spares"...
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Post by muckypup on Sept 12, 2018 0:26:49 GMT
Big world and universe ending scenarios, that are solved by someone on a tiny level with just a few tweaks
Where they don’t just shoot the problem away, walking dead does this so often it drives me bonkers........
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Post by charlesuirdhein on Sept 12, 2018 1:16:30 GMT
Sci-fi? Evolving into energy beings. I can just about deal with energy beings existing in their own plane or whatever, but evolutionary processes move towards complexity not simplicity and energy beings simply cannot evolve.
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Post by glutamodo on Sept 12, 2018 1:42:11 GMT
Along the lines of "energy beings" - long term, well you make a point but in some cases I'm not too bothered by it. On the other hand, a sudden, spontaneous shift of a character into some energy creature that is pawned off as "evolution" has never sat well with me.
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Post by Jeedai on Sept 12, 2018 2:10:07 GMT
Sitcoms where the wacky next door neighbor is given the run of the main characters' house. Double yuck points if the said neighbor is being allowed unfettered access to a family member that they are effectively stalking everywhere else (ie: Steve Urkel in Family Matters).
Someone being told "You should come see this!" just so everyone can be in the same shit whole they talk about whatever 'this' is. Especially bad in Star Trek, where there's two-way communication screens and the someone (usually the Captain) could just be shown the 'this' without wasting time in the turbolift.
Genetic manipulation or mutation causing immediate or speedy transformation into another kind of creature (up to an including energy beings), metabolizing organic compounds to build new organs and structures out of nowhere, with no ill effects or weird leftover vestigial bits, and the end result being just as stable as the original. And of course faultless and fast reversion back to the original form once the proper DNA switches are flipped.
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Post by glutamodo on Sept 12, 2018 2:49:00 GMT
That brings to mine: instant sci-fi/fantasy transformations that later get the "reset button" without ramifications, I never quite buy it in either direction.
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Deleted
Deleted Member
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Post by Deleted on Sept 12, 2018 9:44:12 GMT
The episode where a character wakes up in a life they don't recognise and keeps being told that the other life was all in their head.
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Deleted
Deleted Member
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Post by Deleted on Sept 12, 2018 9:44:26 GMT
Women in refrigerators and bury your gays are both incredibly annoying and overdone.
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Deleted
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Post by Deleted on Sept 12, 2018 9:58:02 GMT
When the characters with stun guns forget they have stun guns. It's happened so often it's actually inspired a trope of my own -- stun settings on weapons can produce an allergic reaction depending on how and who it's used on. It's safer than wounding someone certainly, but it still has its risks.
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Deleted
Deleted Member
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Post by Deleted on Sept 12, 2018 10:01:32 GMT
Universal domination being a motive of the villain. Characters who cannot die/immortality-just plain lacking in dramatic tension. Invasions of Earth-and so very many and so many organisations to deal with them. Dalek motives-pretty much always the same Time Wars-rewriting time. Homoerotic undertones written in-its over done I used to be a woman/man time lord jokes-getting over done
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Post by mark687 on Sept 12, 2018 10:27:28 GMT
When couples/ family are parted by coma, time travel, prison, or other Dimension, then get reunited to find one sides moved on but they spend the rest of the time pining for each other, or the new partner/family is quickly written out of the story, so the original set up can be restored.
Regards
mark687
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Post by number13 on Sept 12, 2018 10:42:03 GMT
I found myself agreeing with many of these 'Annoying tropes and cliches' - and then realised I'd recently heard BF stories which do two of them and yet were excellent stories which didn't feel cliched at all. So perhaps lazy writing of annoying tropes and cliches is the real problem, because the stories I'm thinking of had top writing and were excellent! For example: "The episode where a character wakes up in a life they don't recognise and keeps being told that the other life was all in their head." One of the best ever 4DAs does exactly this. {Spoiler}'The Crowmarsh Experiment' "instant sci-fi/fantasy transformations that later get the "reset button" without ramifications" A very recent BF series presses a huge 'reset button' and I thought it was excellent. I loved that the writers had the nerve to do it (when the 'rules' of sci-fi say you shouldn't) and it felt exactly right for that story. {Spoilers...}I said spoilers, sweetie!
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Post by Timelord007 on Sept 12, 2018 10:47:29 GMT
Cop out endings to movies or games usually wind me up.
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Post by omega on Sept 12, 2018 11:57:51 GMT
I found myself agreeing with many of these 'Annoying tropes and cliches' - and then realised I'd recently heard BF stories which do two of them and yet were excellent stories which didn't feel cliched at all. So perhaps lazy writing of annoying tropes and cliches is the real problem, because the stories I'm thinking of had top writing and were excellent! For example: "The episode where a character wakes up in a life they don't recognise and keeps being told that the other life was all in their head." One of the best ever 4DAs does exactly this. {Spoiler}'The Crowmarsh Experiment' "instant sci-fi/fantasy transformations that later get the "reset button" without ramifications" A very recent BF series presses a huge 'reset button' and I thought it was excellent. I loved that the writers had the nerve to do it (when the 'rules' of sci-fi say you shouldn't) and it felt exactly right for that story. {Spoilers...}I said spoilers, sweetie! That’s how I feel about reset buttons. You need to feel like you’ve lost something for it to be effective. The final Stargate SG-1 episode, where one of the things we lose is the Daniel and Vala relationship played out beyond the teasing the show had already done. That is a relationship they will never know as far as we know. If there’s no emotional impact or satisfying angle beyond easy plot resolution, it’s lazily written. Rick and Morty is a great example of how escaping to a different world can affect people. The first time in the show Rick says it’s a last resort and they only have limited uses. When they do escape the Cronenberged Earth Morty is freaked out, and in the Interdimensional Cable episode vents this to Summer to give her perspective on her own issues. It could be partly why Rick is in general apathetic, who knows how many worlds he’s lived in, how many Beths, Jerry’s, Mortys and Summmers he’s lived with. A pretty depressing deconstruction when you think of it. Is Rick avoiding getting attached since he knows he might need to leave for another Universe?
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lidar2
Castellan
You know, now that you mention it, I actually do rather like Attack of the Cybermen ...
Likes: 5,788
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Post by lidar2 on Sept 12, 2018 15:06:34 GMT
Starting something at the most dramatic moment in the whole story as a teaser, then going back "48 hours earlier" to tell the whole story from the beginning and explain how the teaser came about
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