- This is a big reason for the divisive reception of Akame ga Kill!. For the most part, it's a pretty standard fantasy adventure manga, with characters who fit directly into classic archetypes of the genre. Even the settings and concepts have rather unoriginal names (i.e "The Empire", "Danger Beasts"). The only real difference is that Death Is Cheap doesn't apply.
- Black Clover is a highly derivative work that has been accused of this a lot. Asta being the hyperactive Stock Shōnen Hero seeking to become the strongest, alongside his more serious and talented Stock Shōnen Rival Yuno, are frequently dubbed copies of Naruto and Sasuke, despite the two pairs being vastly different in terms of their dynamic. The Black Bulls, the general setup of the magic system, and the Magic Knights gets the story called a Fairy Tail copy. Asta lacking conventional powers, but then being granted an unusual one has been compared to Izuku Midoriya's origins in its contemporary rival My Hero Academia. The overall tone of the manga has even seen it called "the new Bleach".
- Cross Ange has this as one of the main complaints given by detractors. It's about a Fallen Princess who initially is cold and mean but undergoes a Defrosting Ice Queen process, thanks in part to a male Love Interest who is essentially the generic harem protagonist except he’s just comic relief, complete with her acting Tsundere and beating him for being an Accidental Pervert. She joins the all-female La Résistance against the Evil Empire that exiled her; said empire is a clear Nazi-analogue, displaying Fantastic Racism against Norma, and is populated by an Always Chaotic Evil race (the Mana people). The heroes are forced to also fight dragon-like monsters (creatively called DRAGONs), before finding out that they were Human All Along and that Humans Are the Real Monsters. The initial Big Bad is a generic evil emperor with no redeeming qualities, before it is revealed that he is a Disc-One Final Boss being controlled by a generic evil god who also has no redeeming qualities and tries to brainwash and rape the heroine and various other female characters to show how evil he is. He is eventually beaten by The Power of Love and a happy ending is had for all- except the “evil” race, who are left to die off.
- The Disappearance of Nagato Yuki-chan, a spin-off manga from The Haruhi Suzumiya, is based on the Alternate Universe seen in The Disappearance of Haruhi Suzumiya, is a relatively cliché rom-com series that plays most of its tropes straight, albeit reimagining most of the cast in an AU without the supernatural elements of its parent series, and had a rather lukewarm fan reception, especially compared to that of the film adaptation of ''The Disappearance of Haruhi Suzumiya".
- The Disastrous Life of Saiki K. has a character named Hiroshi Satou, who is perfectly average in everything and has the power to attract clichés. One episode is about a baseball game that follows a cliché plot. Saiki lampshades every single cliché or generic line. However, Nendo and Kuboyasu pull the plot away from clichés, and Saiki has to enforce the plot. Nendo's pure skill leads to victory anyway.
- Dragon Quest: The Adventure of Dai is a shonen manga series done as though it were a Dragon Quest game. Thus it does not just use cliches, it beats them down, makes friends with them, and then watches in amazement as they come out of nowhere and tell it to go on without them. It's part of its charm.
- Future Robot Daltanious does nothing original in terms of the Super Robot genre. Pick a Super Robot trope and Daltanious plays it straight every time. You even have character designs ripped off wholesale from Mazinger Z.
- GaoGaiGar plays every single trope of the Super Robot genre as straight as an arrow. However, this doesn't detract from how awesome it is.
- See also Gekiganger 3 from Martian Successor Nadesico which is even more of an example. Practically every attack and character is lifted from some famous Super Robot series, mostly Mazinger Z (for robot design and attacks) and Getter Robo (the characters and everything else).
- The Guardian Hearts OVA series manages to cram in each and every cliché of anime Fanservice and the Unwanted Harem. To the seasoned viewer, viewing it for the first time feels like seeing it the second time.
- Harem Royale - When the Game Ends - has many of the cliches of the Harem Genre (Marshmallow Hell, Thanks for the Mammary, eating lunch together, going on a vacation together etc.), because its main premise is that a demon is forcing most of the main characters to act as the harem of her (the demon's) contractor. It does this while playing the premise for horror as the twist is that the “losers” of the harem will be sent to hell.
- Pop Team Epic:
- Hoshiiro Girldrop, a Show Within a Show from the manga's second season, is deliberately designed to be as much of a standard Idol Genre romcom as possible: its introduction features the start of a Childhood Friend Romance, and previews of it in the anime pit the Drop Stars' growth and rivalry with other groups against the main couple's kindling feelings. Of course, Pop Team Epic being Pop Team Epic, it can't go more than a chapter (in manga) or an 5 minute segment (in the anime) before Popuko hijacks it, and a late-game preview indicates it uses cliches from completely different genres as well (the main heroine making a Heroic Sacrifice during a devastating battle). The only aspect of the series that takes itself seriously is its anthology, which appropriately looks like any anthology series for an established manga.
- In the anime, all of the Space Neko Company shorts are genre spoofs played straight. "DONCA SIS" in particular is a Flirty Stepsiblings Shoujo romance with a rivals-to-lovers plot, with Popuko and Pipimi playing the Abusive Parents by changing nothing about themselves.
- "Emotional Documentary: Hellshake Yano" is all about a rock star holding the line for his band via Epic Rocking. This deliberately contrasts its very nontraditional presentation: two guys recording themselves flipping through sketchbooks kamishibai-style.
- This is the entire point of Kujibiki♡Unbalance, which started out as a fictional manga/anime within Genshiken and intentionally uses numerous tropes that were popular in manga and anime at the time Genshiken was first published, particularly those related to the Moe boom of the early-to-mid 2000s. Despite its heavily tropey nature, it became popular enough on its own to be spun off into its own small franchise.
- A Manga With Too Many Premises is a Yuri Genre manga with this Played for Laughs. A high school girl named Ryou and a young woman named Yuna meet by chance and realize they played together when they were young. At that point, a man shows up, someone Ryou and Yuma both recognize as their father, and he reveals that he has two separate families, making the women half-sisters. Ryou collapses, and when Yuna helps her, they realize they can both read each other's minds by touching, and then fall in love. They then kiss, which causes them to switch bodies. All this happens in the span of four pages.
- Mobile Suit Gundam AGE showcases every stock element common to the Gundam franchise. It tends to dance on the line between this and Tropes Are Not Bad.
- My Hero Academia has a positive version of this. While the basic of the plot and much of the aesthetics of it have been used and reused before, the manga gives a new spin on and depth to these clichés, particularly related to the characters and their interactions (such as making The Hero's best quality being a quick-thinking strategist, instead of his brute strength and make the stoic ace one of his close friends instead of an Aloof Ally).
- Nisekoi is one of the most cliché shounen rom-com manga series in recent memory. Despite this, it has a pretty big fanbase and an anime adaptation, proving that, at least to some, Tropes Are Not Bad.
- Done deliberately in the final episode of Neon Genesis Evangelion, in which most of the cast acts out a stereotypical High School animenote in a scene apparently taking place in Shinji's mind (or it may be an Alternate Universe).
- Nura: Rise of the Yokai Clan: The premise is fairly original on paper (boy raised by Yōkai becomes clan heir and sets out to both prove that Dark Is Not Evil and make sure it stays that way, while fighting against a Yokai-supremacist clan led by a badass Dark Action Girl Big Bad) but the execution quickly falls into this between the Stock Character cast and the inevitable segue into Shonen tropes (to the point where the dark action girl is being manipulated and gets usurped by a hideous, uncharismatic Fat Bastard and an Aizen expy).
- Nyaruko: Crawling with Love! does this on purpose as part of an Affectionate Parody of Dating Sims in an episode where the cast gets trapped in an old game console and has to play out the game to its completion (Mahiro, cast as the Player Character, has to find a girlfriend by the end of the school year) if they want to get back to the real world. Pretty much every single Dating Sim trope is either used (like Meet Cute) or at least paid lip service (Mahiro's mother warning him that if he doesn't pick a girl soon, his best friend might confess instead).
- Origin: Spirits of the Past: Almost all the reviews, both good and bad, noted that the movie's main flaw was that it stormed all the tropes and Aesops made famous by Studio Ghibli and played them straight, making it look like an unoriginal mix of Nausicaä of the Valley of the Wind and Princess Mononoke. Additional flaws, like the movie's tiring pacing and lack of character development, only added to it.
- The manga Otomen is an intentional example of this. Being an overall parody of shojo manga and a satire of Japanese gender roles, the author has pretty much stated that she goes out of her way to do every shojo manga cliche in the book.
- It seems strange, but it seems that the manga Seitokai Yakuindomo manages to use all the most stereotyped themes for dirty jokes, including regular jokes about masturbation, dildos and blowjob. In each episode and almost every scene.
- Tengen Toppa Gurren Lagann likes breaking the laws of physics and its own setting in increasingly awesome ways. It embraces and revels in its cliches, and you can't help but get swept up in its pure enthusiasm, proving once again that Tropes Are Not Bad.
- To Love Ru is a pretty cliche fanservice-y shonen romcom series, but that hasn't stopped it from being insanely popular (mostly due to how over-the-top the fanservice can get, going far beyond ecchi and straight into borderline hentai).
- The dream RPG Episode at the start of The Tower of Druaga parodies every Heroic Fantasy trope in 20 deeply confusing minutes.
- The Vision of Escaflowne shows that despite playing nearly every single anime trope to the tee, Cliché storms can really work. It's a very beloved series in the Americas, Korea, and parts of Europe (though Italy hates Hitomi). Despite being seen negatively in Japan, it obviously inspired a lot of people who did like it.
- Yosuga no Sora In stages, reproduces virtually every Brother–Sister Incest trope. Responsible elder brother and extremely jealous younger sister tsundere. She masturbates, fantasizing about him, while he is trying to build a relationship with a childhood friend. Other characters reproach the main character for being too close and affectionate with his sister. And so almost to the very end, not to mention the arcs of other heroines.
- Uwakoi and Aki Sora, both by Masahiro Itosugi, collectively take the most infamous tropes associated with ecchi and harem titles - All Women Are Lustful, Fetishized Abuser, Brother–Sister Incest, Unwanted Harem, Yandere, etc. - and plays them all for serious drama (although Uwakoi takes a Darker and Edgier approach).
- YuruYuri seems to be trying to cram every single possible characterization trope pertaining to the Yuri genre into a single universenote . It didn't stop it from being extremely popular as a slice-of-life yuri comedy, spurring beyond the original manga 3 seasons, several written spin-offs, and a few OVAs.
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