What is a trope that you dislike that's rarely talked about?

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I for one heavily dislike antagonists that don't seem to have a fixed location and just appear everywhere the protags are, cause damage and then teleport away.
It's really annoying to read, if I'm honest.
 
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"I'm going to take responsability" troupe in all genres and not only for male protagonists regrettably. They were, are and keep being irresponsible and naïvely stupid despite their words and everything is solved with a deus ex machina. It's basically the same as someone who always talks using "for real" and "not gonna lie".
 
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Evil guys with a backstory.
The fishmen saga in One Piece was boring but at least Hody had no bullshit: "I'm evil because adults taught me to be evil" is miles better than: "I'm evil because I was bullied and forced to take action which spiralled me into bad company of other bullied people who rebelled until all of us grew accustomed to crime and now I'm doing what I do as revenge against people who don't care about me anymore even if it won't make me feel accomplished and I will forever be a tormented soul".
Like, nobody cares, you are the antagonist and your role is to lose, just be evil and don't waste my time with flashbacks.

I'm aware "flat" enemies can be as boring as your run-of-the-mill bullied antagonist, but authors are adding more and more contrieved excuses and unnatural misunderstandings to turn the final boss into a victim and a good guy when its role is to be the opposite of the main character, and I'd prefer to go back to when these "bosses with backstory" were more of a rarity.
 
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"No one see the real me", "What do you really want", "Finding your true self", sometimes coupled with "Follow your dreams", and other ultra-individualist bullshit like that. It's a set of moral tropes i see very often in manga, especially romance manga. It's sometimes explicitly stated, sometimes more in the background, but in both cases, I fucking hate it !
 
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Evil guys with a backstory.
The fishmen saga in One Piece was boring but at least Hody had no bullshit: "I'm evil because adults taught me to be evil" is miles better than: "I'm evil because I was bullied and forced to take action which spiralled me into bad company of other bullied people who rebelled until all of us grew accustomed to crime and now I'm doing what I do as revenge against people who don't care about me anymore even if it won't make me feel accomplished and I will forever be a tormented soul".
Like, nobody cares, you are the antagonist and your role is to lose, just be evil and don't waste my time with flashbacks.

I'm aware "flat" enemies can be as boring as your run-of-the-mill bullied antagonist, but authors are adding more and more contrieved excuses and unnatural misunderstandings to turn the final boss into a victim and a good guy when its role is to be the opposite of the main character, and I'd prefer to go back to when these "bosses with backstory" were more of a rarity.
Let's add then "entire volumes made to add backstory to a secondary character just to sell more books", either if they die or they're abandoned short after.
 
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I for one heavily dislike antagonists that don't seem to have a fixed location and just appear everywhere the protags are, cause damage and then teleport away.
It's really annoying to read, if I'm honest.
I like that Reincarnated as a Sword actually had this be a skill with a specific name: "evil teleport"

a free instantaneous teleportation skill to anywhere that you can only use if you're evil. brilliant. ship it.
 
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Evil guys with a backstory.
I have felt more recently like it isn't necessarily that it's bad and more that the way it is presented is bad, like the moment writers began to feel like it was the norm to give every villain a backstory you ended up with people who didn't know how to write a backstory or really didn't need to give them one. Give villains a backstory, but make sure that regardless of their backstory they still are irredeemable; ideally they have both crossed a line and believe they were entirely in the right to cross the line. Writers are better off not broaching "grey area" morality if they can't go 100% in on it.
I for one heavily dislike antagonists that don't seem to have a fixed location and just appear everywhere the protags are, cause damage and then teleport away.
It's really annoying to read, if I'm honest.
I have seen some good examples of the trope recently, but the trick is that it has to be explicitly stated; you as the reader need to know that they could pop out of nowhere and kill the entire cast at any time, but balance it with not having it happen too much to lull them into a sense of security. Makes it much less annoying and a lot more tense.


A trope I dislike...rarely talked about...I hate it when a protagonist just accepts collateral damage will or has happened like "well, nothing we can do"; usually in the case of side characters or mobs, not supporting or main characters because people will get pissy if the protag just watches an important character have or almost have [horrific thing] happen to them. The worst examples are when they clearly could have done something to reduce damage or save people, but they just...don't for some reason.

I specifically dislike this when the protagonist is framed as being a hero because it's like a ploy of the writing to make the villains look more dangerous or more evil but makes the protagonist look callous, inept, etc. it's not even a problem as long as the protagonist is trying to help. But just staring is a terrible way to do it.
 
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I specifically dislike this when the protagonist is framed as being a hero because it's like a ploy of the writing to make the villains look more dangerous or more evil but makes the protagonist look callous, inept, etc. it's not even a problem as long as the protagonist is trying to help. But just staring is a terrible way to do it.
When it's like that at least it's recognized. There was that one comic where they memory-holed a monster eating a baby from a pregnant woman's womb, woman who was introduced as an occasional support a few chapters earlier, after the main characters discovered the mastermind and confronted him.
Wish I still had the title to link it but in retrospective it's probably better if the title was memory-holed too.
 
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The annoying ultra jealous possessive lesbian side character in romance stories. Its not cute, its just a different version of the old "EVIL GAY VILLAIN" trope.
Which romance stories, i didn't see it very often nowadays ? No, i'm not saying i like this trope a lot and want recommendations.
 
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The one that pops off the top of my head at the moment would be that brunette girl in Noa-Senpai, and that rapey girl from Komi-san. I have seen it many more times but I can't remember more now.
Please Marry Me With Divorce in Mind is another one. Any example I can think of feels relatively recent; prior to that maybe you had like, the friend of the female lead who is really touchy. Weirdly enough, it shows up more often in those sort of more like...I can draw similarities between those three manga in that they have a bit more of a...modern vibe to them? Like they have representation of these sorts of archetypes of person you would never see before, in particular representations of male characters that you wouldn't really see as a lead or maybe important character prior in the role that they're in. Yet they still have the crazy lesbian. I guess because they are supposed to be funny? Is this like the thing where a producer really wanted a giant robot spider and kept asking for it until they put it in Wild Wild West except the editors keep suggesting a crazy lesbian character? Because to note; they never are that important to the plot. You could remove them and it would barely if at all change the story.
When it's like that at least it's recognized. There was that one comic where they memory-holed a monster eating a baby from a pregnant woman's womb, woman who was introduced as an occasional support a few chapters earlier, after the main characters discovered the mastermind and confronted him.
Wish I still had the title to link it but in retrospective it's probably better if the title was memory-holed too.
I had to look up memory hole; ah so they just made the woman completely forget they were pregnant I guess? Yeah that's kinda wack and exemplifies what I have a problem with. Like the author could have just had the main characters prevent that from happening, but if they did, how could they not give us that scene of a monster giving a free non-consensual abortion? And of course they have to wipe the woman's memories, or the cast would have to grapple with you know, what happened and the trauma related to that.
 
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I had to look up memory hole; ah so they just made the woman completely forget they were pregnant I guess? Yeah that's kinda wack and exemplifies what I have a problem with. Like the author could have just had the main characters prevent that from happening, but if they did, how could they not give us that scene of a monster giving a free non-consensual abortion? And of course they have to wipe the woman's memories, or the cast would have to grapple with you know, what happened and the trauma related to that.
When it's like that at least it's recognized. There was that one comic where they memory-holed a monster eating a baby from a pregnant woman's womb, woman who was introduced as an occasional support a few chapters earlier, after the main characters discovered the mastermind and confronted him.
Wish I still had the title to link it but in retrospective it's probably better if the title was memory-holed too.
Ok now you 2 have me curious as to what the hell that story is, that sounds crazy and vile and I need my nightly nightmare quota.
Could either of you perhaps remember the name?
 
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Ok now you 2 have me curious as to what the hell that story is, that sounds crazy and vile and I need my nightly nightmare quota.
Could either of you perhaps remember the name?
Ah...obviously I'm not the first one to bring it up but to kick it off a premise like that gives me like...pre-2010s vibes, possibly pre 2000s, like it has that feel of a gritty, gory 90s or 80s manga with grotesque monsters that would show up on an episode of Anime Abandon as an anime ova. I did try looking for it, but no dice.
 
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I assume "rarely talked about" as in people usually don't complain about it?

well I got one
Because most people really like it, I think?
I mean, I like it too, to be perfectly honest.
But my logical mind screams every time I see it.

Clothing that defies gravity and physics to accentuate the shape of the boobs (boob bag)
and the belly button line (what is it called? abs line? liena alba?) that can be seen through all types of fabric.
There's even a manga where the line is visible through a thick sweater.
 
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I assume "rarely talked about" as in people usually don't complain about it?

well I got one
Because most people really like it, I think?
I mean, I like it too, to be perfectly honest.
But my logical mind screams every time I see it.

Clothing that defies gravity and physics to accentuate the shape of the boobs (boob bag)
and the belly button line (what is it called? abs line? liena alba?) that can be seen through all types of fabric.
There's even a manga where the line is visible through a thick sweater.
on almost related note, i think boob armor is cool and all but i draw the line when the armor also jiggles
 
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"I am in another world and have completely and suddenly stopped caring about any and all loved ones, responsibilities, regrets, goals, cultural events and traditions I may have had prior to my migration, even though said events still shape my personality, skill, morals, ethics, knowledge, taste in food and virtually everything about me."

Just make your character a natural resident of the world at that point. Overpowered fantasy protagonists are a thing and their own market, just go for it. I promise it won't hurt you, Author-san.
 
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The annoying ultra jealous possessive lesbian side character in romance stories. Its not cute, its just a different version of the old "EVIL GAY VILLAIN" trope.
Clothing that defies gravity and physics to accentuate the shape of the boobs (boob bag)
and the belly button line (what is it called? abs line? liena alba?) that can be seen through all types of fabric.
There's even a manga where the line is visible through a thick sweater.
Pretty sure those are all pretty often complained about.
Psycho Lesbians are justifiably despised whenever they are forced into a work, heck, that has an entire tvtropes article.
Anime Clothes also get a lot of flack, though that one is more of a controversial topic
 
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I had to look up memory hole; ah so they just made the woman completely forget they were pregnant I guess?
No, the woman is dead. Also in the author's defense he actually set up a reason why the main characters could not prevent the whole ordeal even though some furious handwaving was still required to make it make sense.

Ok now you 2 have me curious as to what the hell that story is, that sounds crazy and vile and I need my nightly nightmare quota.
Could either of you perhaps remember the name?
It was an isekai from a couple of years ago, I don't even know if it's still ongoing as I stopped reading around 10 chapters after the events I described.
In general the work was like all other isekai (main character is transferred, shows unparalleled strength, travels around doing missions for the guild, etc.) but then there's this invasion of a city by monsters and really the whiplash of monsters eating people followed by "and then they lived happily after killing the big boss" was insane.
 

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