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dolorosa_12) wrote2020-04-25 02:07 pm
dolorosa_12) wrote2020-04-25 02:07 pm
Entry tags:
More narrative dealbreakers
The sun is shining, I'm completely exhausted, and it's time for Day Twenty-Three of the fandom meme:
W: A trope which you are virtually certain to hate in any fandom.
I think we've established from previous posts that I particularly dislike stories which 'reward' characters who spend the narrative drawing closer to other people, finding family and community and closeness and saving the(ir) world and each other by separating them forever from those connections, that community, and indeed the very world that they have saved. I think the only time it works is in The Lord of the Rings.
Other tropes which I really despise: characters being pressured by the other characters around them into forgiving or rebuilding a relationship with people who have abused or hurt them, and painted by the narrative as being unreasonable or heartless for not wanting to do so. (This happens frequently with teenage or adult children being pressured by other characters to restore contact with abusive parents who they previously cut out of their lives.) 'It was all a dream/hallucination/"just a story"' cop outs also irritate me, as well as situations which have characters doubting their own reality, or being disbelieved by everyone in their lives.
Generally you see these tropes in original works rather than fanfic (in fact fanfic often seems to be written as a deliberate effort to overturn a lot of these tropes).
Fanfic tropes I dislike include 'shovel talk' situations, any scenario in which friends and family members seem overly pushy or invested in other characters' potential love lives (I really hate when other characters just appear in the fic to be a sort of cheer squad of shippers to the main pairing), and making a character's canon love interest abusive (if they aren't abusive in canon) as a way to justify breaking them up for the fic's preferred pairing.
Due to tagging, the fanfic ones are generally pretty easy to avoid, but the tropes in original fiction can sometimes appear out of nowhere, souring me on stories that I'd previously enjoyed.
Do any of you have similar narrative dealbreakers, whether in original works or fanfic?
X: A trope which you are almost certain to love in any fandom.
Y: What are your secondhand fandoms (i.e., fandoms you aren’t in personally but are tangentially familiar with because your friends/people on your dash are in them)?
Z: Just ramble about something fan-related, go go go!
W: A trope which you are virtually certain to hate in any fandom.
I think we've established from previous posts that I particularly dislike stories which 'reward' characters who spend the narrative drawing closer to other people, finding family and community and closeness and saving the(ir) world and each other by separating them forever from those connections, that community, and indeed the very world that they have saved. I think the only time it works is in The Lord of the Rings.
Other tropes which I really despise: characters being pressured by the other characters around them into forgiving or rebuilding a relationship with people who have abused or hurt them, and painted by the narrative as being unreasonable or heartless for not wanting to do so. (This happens frequently with teenage or adult children being pressured by other characters to restore contact with abusive parents who they previously cut out of their lives.) 'It was all a dream/hallucination/"just a story"' cop outs also irritate me, as well as situations which have characters doubting their own reality, or being disbelieved by everyone in their lives.
Generally you see these tropes in original works rather than fanfic (in fact fanfic often seems to be written as a deliberate effort to overturn a lot of these tropes).
Fanfic tropes I dislike include 'shovel talk' situations, any scenario in which friends and family members seem overly pushy or invested in other characters' potential love lives (I really hate when other characters just appear in the fic to be a sort of cheer squad of shippers to the main pairing), and making a character's canon love interest abusive (if they aren't abusive in canon) as a way to justify breaking them up for the fic's preferred pairing.
Due to tagging, the fanfic ones are generally pretty easy to avoid, but the tropes in original fiction can sometimes appear out of nowhere, souring me on stories that I'd previously enjoyed.
Do any of you have similar narrative dealbreakers, whether in original works or fanfic?
X: A trope which you are almost certain to love in any fandom.
Y: What are your secondhand fandoms (i.e., fandoms you aren’t in personally but are tangentially familiar with because your friends/people on your dash are in them)?
Z: Just ramble about something fan-related, go go go!
no subject
Other tropes which I really despise: characters being pressured by the other characters around them into forgiving or rebuilding a relationship with people who have abused or hurt them, and painted by the narrative as being unreasonable or heartless for not wanting to do so. (This happens frequently with teenage or adult children being pressured by other characters to restore contact with abusive parents who they previously cut out of their lives.)
YES. Sometimes it's healthier to just walk away, or to at least approach that relationship very differently. It's a very dangerous trope too, because it reinforces the idea that you're supposed to forgive family at all costs. If one comes to that decision for their own reasons, but they shouldn't have to.
And look, I'm an incredibly family-oriented person, but I'm also lucky to come from a mostly loving, caring family. Not everybody does, or they come from the sort of families that seem really close and loving until you realize there's an expectation of "payment" for being "close and loving."
I've also noticed friendships get similar treatment. The bottom line is that no one is owed your forgiveness for the big stuff, and it should come from you, not from other people dictating how you respond.
no subject
Yes, exactly. Like you I come from a very close and caring family, but not everyone does, as you say. Narratives of forgiveness at all cost seem to push the line that refusing to forgive people is more unforgivable and damaging than the damage those people did in the first place.