What's a fad you're glad it's gone away?

[GipoScribantino]

Among cliches and overuse of tropes there are details that come and go according to fads and the tastes of the general public.
These are often unimportant points hidden in dialogues but sometimes you get whole comics out of a fad.
What's a fad you're glad it's gone? I'm saying "one" but you can post more if you want, I don't really care about the number and it's fine to complain here.

Please note this is not about cliches or such. Yes, I also have a gripe about status screens in isekai, but that's not what this thread is for (especially since status screens are still there).

Personally, one I'm glad it's gone is characters explaining "life advice" or "hacks".
Often those "hacks" are simply ineffective making the whole thing pointless, but sometimes you get recommended actually dangerous practices especially when the "advice" is rooted into Japanese superstition and folklore. Even the safe but wrong ones can result in people doing more work than necessary.
When it was popular you'd have characters teaching you "the proper way" everywhere, from isekai giving out recipes to romance carried by life hacks to you name it.
I still see it sometimes, but it's either relegated to one-off jokes or barely explained so nobody can actually try to put into practice properly, and almost always in isekai where it can be excused under the usual guise of colonialism.

 

[panzerkampfwagyu]

Hmmm... That's a hard one...
Maybe Tsundere being allowed with being way more violent than is reasonable?
A lot of the things I dislike usually are still around.

I do guess that Adaptations that are complete rewrites do seem to be gone for good, though. (Even if Rozen Maiden S1&S2 were better off through it, ironically)

 

[Mangamoz]

You mean fads in the manga/anime media?

This is a hard topic to get into since a lot of the plot devices in manga seem to be stuck in limbo, or return some years later with a vengance.

Example; it was more common in older manga/anime for the female heroine of a romance to have a "cheating" or "rape scare" arc at some point in the story. This plot gimmick died for some years, but is now having a resurgance again with the rise of NTR becoming more mainstream in non-hentai stories.

 

[GipoScribantino]

You mean fads in the manga/anime media?

I posted this in the "Manga" section after all.

This is a hard topic to get into since a lot of the plot devices in manga seem to be stuck in limbo, or return some years later with a vengance.

Right, then let's just say "it's gone for the time being".
If it comes back it comes back, let's talk about how we are better off without it until then.

 

[Mangamoz]

Hmmm

I am legitimately having a hard time thinking of anything. I think of something, and then I go:

"Ah wait, that story I saw the other day was still doing it."

 

[BakedBanana]

What about when the MC gets nose bleeds from seeing fanservice of females? I remember that being a big thing in old manga, I don't believe I see it nowadays though.

 

[Mangamoz]

What about when the MC gets nose bleeds from seeing fanservice of females? I remember that being a big thing in old manga, I don't believe I see it nowadays though.

Oh yeah that's a good one, these days manga are less scared of outright showing a BIG OLD BONER on screen without using old censor evading tactics like nose bleeds.

 

[Mangamoz]

A manga fad that I WISH was dead is the new trend of monogamous romance stories rug pulling you mid-story and suddenly shifting to a harem genre.

I miss when most harem would tell you upfront it was a harem, without any bullshit writing trickery.

 

[wandere]

It's hard to tell sometimes; these translated manga sometimes reach us from across time and space, or in the case of adaptations, mediums where they may have existed years or decades prior. It's hard to think of them moreso than things I want to come back, almost?

Example; it was more common in older manga/anime for the female heroine of a romance to have a "cheating" or "rape scare" arc at some point in the story. This plot gimmick died for some years, but is now having a resurgance again with the rise of NTR becoming more mainstream in non-hentai stories.

I feel weird on this one, because I see it, but it feels sort of different. The way it's approached at least sometimes feels more egalitarian, less prone to one-dimensional seducer, [your choice of term for promiscuous woman], etc-type characters (which are usually left more as gags or brief plot devices) and more likely to be maturely handled on some level. When it's shitty, it's shitty though (every time I think of a bad example of this a light novel adaptation flashes in my mind; should I see a doctor?)


I guess I don't miss the copious amounts of racism we saw in the past. It's...honestly it's still there but it's more likely to not be there or be subtler to the degree that I at least am not actively dwelling on it. (Y'all ever read Shaman King? Wild.)
The more I think about it the more unsatisfied I feel with the current state of affairs, but also the more I feel like this is heavily based on the ln/wn influx. It felt like the earlier ones in that initial wave were...better than what we get now? I reread Dungeon Nursery and that holds up great despite getting axed. I find myself sometimes wanting to rewatch season 1 of In Another World With my Smartphone recently because at least it was a whimsical, silly, unapologetic harem wish fulfillment fantasy that didn't attempt to make a silly concept serious. This terrifies me.
If we ever get out of the edgy isekai era, please get back to me so I can add it to the thread.