What's your best "good" example of a "bad" trope?

yeah yeah i know Tropes Are Not Bad. But there are a lot of tropes that are widely regarded as things to avoid, far far more often than things to use.

So what's the best example of a well-used "bad" trope?

I was just watching Contagion. As I have some background in biochemistry and microbiology, some of the conversations were silly. One doctor explaining to another doctor what surface receptors are? And needing a layman analogy on top of that? Pah. Practically broke my suspension of disbelief.

I chalked it up to Viewers Are Morons.

and then i realized, Viewers ARE morons. most people don't know jack shit about how proteins work, and they really needed that explanation in there to help educate the audience.

edited 5th Feb '15 5:22:04 PM by willyolio

Viewers Are Morons in particular is something you should be careful about when it's about an area you're interested in. Fan Myopia is a thing not restricted to works. In your case it's a bit clumsy as it doesn't fit the characters, but for the audience it's necessary. That goes for most bits of exposition the characters really should know, but should be explained to the audience.

I have a good example of "Shaggy Dog" Story (a serious, not comedic example), which is often considered a poor type of story due to the inherent pointlessness of it, but that would be a spoiler, so I won't list it.

ICO is one long Escort Mission, but one of the best ones out there. It's also surprisingly fun to play with two players, which for obvious reasons removes the Escort Mission part. Can also mention The Last of Us as a good Escort Mission game, due to a combination of good AI and AI cheats.

Alien does a good job of Developing Doomed Characters, with little need for wanting to get to the monster-kills-everyone bits quickly. Sequels aren't bad either.

I actually like the often ridiculous Solve the Soup Cans puzzles in the Resident Evil games, partially because those games don't take themselves all too seriously (or take themselves hilariously seriously if you interpret it that way). And there needs to be a crank somewhere in the games.

And while it's not an intentional trope, I have about a 50% chance of liking The Scrappy. Even when I think the character is horrible and the series would probably be better without her.

A couple of thoughts:

Not sure how much spoilery detail to give, but the Discworld novel Small Gods has a literal Deus ex Machina occurrence that is really touching because it shows how much Character Development that god has gone through. Also, although differently, that trope can work when used in a winking manner (i.e. Watership Down uses the trope in a chapter called "Dea Ex Machina"; Order Of The Stick has a sudden rescue conducted by an Airship called the Mechane'').

I think Rory Breaker from Lock, Stock & Two Smoking Barrels is an unusually good use of The Napoleon and Mr Big, because he downplays the Compensating for Something/ humor at the expense of short people aspects. Rory actually isn't that short, although he surrounds himself with tall bodyguards and has a sweet tooth (considered a "childish" trait), and is very intimidating despite this.

It's kind of meta in that you can see from the character how he would get the rep of being The Napoleon (sort of like the actual Napoleon in this respect)- you basically have a guy of average height who is surrounded by and commands taller people. Thanks to exaggerated stories, people think of him as a terrifying midget- and in turn, he cultivates this image.

edited 2nd Mar '15 5:16:10 PM by Hodor2

Using a trope like Deus ex Machina literally often means not actually using the trope. And lampshading a trope like that usually means, "yeah, the author is using a crutch trope, so just laugh it off then ignore it and go on with the story". Probably a better use of Lampshading than Deus ex Machina, honestly.