The Glade 4.0

After reading a few books, and playing back through some games, I encountered certain themes that I realized were overdone in popular media:

Dysfunctional Family/Parent -- This one is probably my biggest gripe. Seriously . . . how many times do we have to encounter a character that has had a crappy set of parents or (more often) a bad father? I know it adds instant depth and drama to a character, but I think harmonious families (if written correctly) can be interesting as well. Much as I hate to say it, Mass Effect is particularly guilty of this. Wonder if the programmers/writers of that game had RL daddy issues.

Amnesia -- A repeat offender and often staple plot impetus of RPGs. OMG, our hero/heroine wakes up with no memory and must piece it back together via a dangerous, world-spanning quest. /Yawn

Hero/Heroine Is In a High-Profile Career/Role -- Okay, I'm guilty of this in some of my writings, but extraordinary things can happen to ordinary people, too.

Over-Describing Actions/Sounds That Would Otherwise Escape Notice -- Some may argue for this one, but much of it seems like filler to me. "John waited with silent anticipation, as the soft swishing of the mysterious man's trench coat broke the stillness of the room. There was a quick wooshing as the intruder whipped his gun from side to side, the barely audible clanking sound of the mechanical parts inside the weapon echoing off the walls; the incessant ticking of the wristwatch on the opposite side of the room rang out like the thunderous gunfire the intruder was about to unleash." Get real . . .

Those are the ones that come immediately to mind. What are some of yours?

The bumbling, incapable and slightly stupid father/husband/boyfriend with the capable, smart, and somewhat condescending wife cliche is probably the most annoying one to me right now.

HA! I am guilty of a couple of those...hehe.

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Raell Kromwell

Expanding on this, I'd say the overly-strong, borderline tough ***** female persona is tiring as well. As much as I love Terry Pratchett's work, he has a habit of making his women (and to a lesser degree, his men) a little too strong.

Yeah, very much this.

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"It is true that democracy undermines freedom when voters believe they can live off of others' productivity, when they modify the commandment: 'Thou shalt not steal, except by majority vote.' The politics of plunder is no doubt destructive of both morality and the division of labor."

Drizzt Do'urden

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Chapters that end with the POV character being knocked unconcious/falling asleep.

Nice guys who are wimps. This is throughout books and media and the mindset has set-in. Women always equate niceness to not being able to stand up for yourself. These two ideas can be mutually exclusive.

Chicks getting "rescued" romantically by some guy that always seems to know more about what she really wants than she does.

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"Therefore do not worry about tomorrow, for tomorrow will worry about itself. Each day has enough trouble of its own." Jesus of Nazareth

Oh and don't get me started on how southern people are portrayed on TV and the movies 99.9 % of the time.

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"It is true that democracy undermines freedom when voters believe they can live off of others' productivity, when they modify the commandment: 'Thou shalt not steal, except by majority vote.' The politics of plunder is no doubt destructive of both morality and the division of labor."

I can see how that'd be frustrating. A quarter of the US is commonly represented as simpletons. Automatically made me think of the "God Warrior" lady from Trading Spouses.

Win.

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I hate when people say that something is a "slap in the face".

Thread title made me think of Blazing Saddles:

"Head em off at the pass??? I HATE that cliche!" *blam*

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“Strong people are harder to kill than weak people, and more useful in general”. - Mark Rippetoe

Unfortunately, that's underrepresented

Its closer to 70%

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Holy shitsnacks!

I'll put another vote in for this one. Also, almost every time there's a commercial with a black person and a white person the white person is bumbling, incapable and/or stupid and the black person is the opposite.

Or there's only a white guy (or guys) trying to act Black and making fizzools out of themselves.

It's more a stylistic thing, but I can't stand how some authors will bore you to DEATH with descriptions of details no one cares about, and then when you hit an action sequence it gets a paragraph, tops. If you're lucky, and it's usually cut off before it's over anyway.

I'm looking at your corpse, Robert Jordan. Seriously, did that guy get some sort of penny a word kind of deal like Charles Dickens?

Wasn't this basically the entire premise for the Wayans' "In Living Color" show?

Thank you! I thought I was the only one who couldn't stand RJ.

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Basically. I think Jim Carrey was the only White cast member whose career survived that show, simply because he DIDN'T try to act Black.

Hmmm. Then again, wasn't Jim Carrey the ONLY White cast member of that show?

There was the annoying white chick.

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The geek who needs a make over from the queen bee/blond cheer leader/prince type person to realise she's actually beautiful. Come on if she's smart enough to be geeky, she would be smart enough to work out she could use her beauty in RL for evil too.. /facepalm

Oh, but she doesn't need a makeover...she just takes off her glasses, and >voila!< suddenly the boys are falling all over her.