Fantasy Pet Peeve Discussion Thread

[TwiLyghtSansSparkles]

It totally works for me. They are very much the only people that understand each other. Adolin can never understand the deep emptiness and pain that Shallan feels and with thus never know the real her. Just the pampered naive light eyed girl.

 

Perhaps he hasn't lived with it the way Kaladin has, but that doesn't mean he can't empathize with her. And although the argument could be made that Kaladin and Shallan could help one another heal, I think Adolin—a well-adjusted guy from a good family who respects her—will be better for her in the long run. His perspective can provide her with the positive framework she needs to work through everything that haunts her. Just because he hasn't lived her nightmare doesn't mean he can't ever understand or know about it; in fact, if Shallan doesn't share her past with him at some point, their relationship may very well be doomed, because if she can't trust her own husband with the deep wounds of her past, what can she trust him with? 

Edited July 17, 2015 by TwiLyghtSansSparkles

[Blightsong]

Perhaps he hasn't lived with it the way Kaladin has, but that doesn't mean he can't empathize with her. And although the argument could be made that Kaladin and Shallan could help one another heal, I think Adolin—a well-adjusted guy from a good family who respects her—will be better for her in the long run. His perspective can provide her with the positive framework she needs to work through everything that haunts her. Just because he hasn't lived her nightmare doesn't mean he can't ever understand or know about it; in fact, if Shallan doesn't share her past with him at some point, their relationship may very well be doomed, because if she can't trust her own husband with the deep wounds of her past, what can she trust him with?

That's my point. I doubt that she would ever share that with Adolin, that's just my gut feeling after the interactions with those characters. She revealed her true self to Kaladin because she saw in him what she saw in herself. She still views her real self as the scared girl who hasn't spoken to anyone in months, but she was able to open up to Kaladin which already shows more promise than Adolin.

 

WoR Spoilers:

[spoilers]Someone said that they like Shalladolin because she deserves a nice guy. Adolin is not a nice guy. A nice guy doesn't murder someone after losing his temper. In fact I wouldn't be suprised if she saw her father I that.[/spoilers]

Edited July 18, 2015 by WeiryWriter
careful with the spoilers

[Edgedancer]

Carelful with the spoilers. She Didn't finish the Book yet.

[Blaze1616]

Though I loathe to do so, I think I'm going to slightly defend Roth. Spoilers follow.

 

I always felt she killed Tris, not because the story called for it, but because she had to be different than all the other teen dystopians with female protags. And though I disagree with pretty much everything about the death, I can't fault her for trying to be different.

 

Ugh...I feel dirty...I need to shower.

[Kaymyth]

I've observed a social expectation that if you're nice enough, you deserve to "get the girl". (Or guy. It can go both ways.) This only contributes to the objectification of other human beings. You do not earn your partner, (In the sense that I am discussing) you mutually accept one another.

 

This x1000!

 

Just because Person A is nice and Person B is nice doesn't necessarily mean that they are compatible.  Relationships are way more complicated than that.  To tell someone, "Oh, you should give him a chance because he's nice," is inherently disrespectful to both parties.

[Orlion Blight]

I also think the idea of "compatibility" is an over-used trope

[navybrandt]

I hate when the hero makes a bad decision and spend the rest of his life trying to atone for the perceived wrong he did - which wasn't really bad or evil - just a bad situation. Or when she fails to save someone from the villain and treats it like she murdered the person herself.

 

Example:

 

Wheel of Time spoiler:

When Rand "skims" and that female Aiel (I forget her name) falls off the edge. He spends like the next 8 books wailing about how he failed her. Or the one the got stuck in Shadar Logoth. Or the ones that died as soldiers defending him.

He didn't kill them or abuse them in any way. It was just a bad situation. Be sad about it for a while and don't act like it's your fault.

 

The "heroes don't kill" thing annoys me too.

Edited July 17, 2015 by navybrandt

[TwiLyghtSansSparkles]

Though I loathe to do so, I think I'm going to slightly defend Roth. Spoilers follow.

 

I always felt she killed Tris, not because the story called for it, but because she had to be different than all the other teen dystopians with female protags. And though I disagree with pretty much everything about the death, I can't fault her for trying to be different.

 

Ugh...I feel dirty...I need to shower.

 

I more think she wrote the end of Allegiant as an answer and rebuttal to the end of Deathly Hallows.

 

And honestly, I think she's wrong. 

 

Character death is something that must be handled delicately in any genre (unless you're going for the Highest Body Count in Modern Fantasy Award, in which case, keep being you, George R.R. Martin). Fictional characters, written well, are like friends. When Rowling killed off Sirius Black, I nearly stopped reading the series, because it was as though one of my friends had died. I almost threw the book across the room when I got to Fred's death, and I definitely cried when I reached Colin Creevey and especially Remus and Tonks. But all of those deaths were there to serve a purpose. Colin's death showed the merciless nature of war; Fred's showed how war tears families apart; Tonks and Remus' drew attention to children made orphans by war. 

 

In this post, Roth makes a fundamental misinterpretation of the series: She posits that all of those deaths showed Voldemort to be a threat. Which is true—but she should not have stopped there. Each death served a specific purpose in the story of Harry Potter's private war with Voldemort. Cedric Diggory showed how callous Voldemort is toward human life. Sirius Black showed how Voldemort had and would continue to tear Harry's family apart. Albus Dumbledore showed how determined Voldemort was to gain control of the wizarding world (and, while I doubt this was intentional, it also showed me how ill-suited Draco Malfoy was for the life of a Death Eater and made me angry that he was denied even the tiniest chance at redemption). All of the deaths in the seventh book serve a specific purpose beyond letting the reader know Voldemort is a threat. 

 

Now, back to my original point: Rowling killed many characters fans adored, and she killed them without mercy, but not without purpose. However, she let Harry live beyond his death. I believe this to be a solid choice. Every book is told primarily from Harry's perspective. He is the reader's guide to the wizarding world, their eyes and ears, their companion as they walk through Hogwarts and Diagon Alley. Killing him would have been traumatic for young readers who had grown to depend on Harry to show them the world, partly because it would have been so unexpected. Harry has made it through countless near-death situations alive—though not without mental scars. His life so far has, save for the bright spot of Hogwarts and his friends he made, sucked. Raised by his abusive relatives, forced to sleep in the cupboard under the stairs, knowing he would never meet his parents….killing him, at this point, would tell young readers that "Life sucks, and then you die. Heroism brings no rewards. No matter how often you make the right choice, you'll still end your story in a hole in the ground. Sweet dreams, kids!" No, for Harry's story to have proper closure, he needed to triumph over evil and live a long and happy life beyond the final page. 

 

Can an author kill the reader's guide to the world and give the story proper closure? Absolutely! It has been done well many times—but Allegiant was not one of those times. Look at Insurgent. Tris is suicidal for much of the book. She throws her life away at one point, and it takes actually being prepared for execution to make her realize she's not done living yet. This should have been a turning point for her character arc. It should have been the moment when she decides to live life with purpose, the moment when the author chooses to let her live on past the final page so she can give the deaths of her friends meaning. Instead, the author chooses to have her….throw her life away and rob her brother of his chance to be remembered as a hero and not a traitor. Tris' death completely negated her turning point in Insurgent and traumatized thousands of young readers, if the sheer number of fixfics where Tris survives, marries Tobias, and has anywhere between two and four adorable children is any indication. 

 

In short, killing the main character can be done well. Roth did not do it well. There is a difference between killing a character for a purpose that serves the theme and story and killing them for shock value, and Roth has not learned this yet.

Edited July 17, 2015 by TwiLyghtSansSparkles

[Slater]

About Love Triangles, I made this joke before but I have always appreciated how Brandon dealt with the one in Mistborn...

 

"Well of Ascension teaches us to end any and all love triangles by killing the **** outta one of the participants so you can move on with the real plot."

[Blaze1616]

I more think she wrote the end of Allegiant as an answer and rebuttal to the end of Deathly Hallows.

 

And honestly, I think she's wrong. 

 

Character death is something that must be handled delicately in any genre (unless you're going for the Highest Body Count in Modern Fantasy Award, in which case, keep being you, George R.R. Martin). Fictional characters, written well, are like friends. When Rowling killed off Sirius Black, I nearly stopped reading the series, because it was as though one of my friends had died. I almost threw the book across the room when I got to Fred's death, and I definitely cried when I reached Colin Creevey and especially Remus and Tonks. But all of those deaths were there to serve a purpose. Colin's death showed the merciless nature of war; Fred's showed how war tears families apart; Tonks and Remus' drew attention to children made orphans by war. 

 

In this post, Roth makes a fundamental misinterpretation of the series: She posits that all of those deaths showed Voldemort to be a threat. Which is true—but she should not have stopped there. Each death served a specific purpose in the story of Harry Potter's private war with Voldemort. Cedric Diggory showed how callous Voldemort is toward human life. Sirius Black showed how Voldemort had and would continue to tear Harry's family apart. Albus Dumbledore showed how determined Voldemort was to gain control of the wizarding world (and, while I doubt this was intentional, it also showed me how ill-suited Draco Malfoy was for the life of a Death Eater and made me angry that he was denied even the tiniest chance at redemption). All of the deaths in the seventh book serve a specific purpose beyond letting the reader know Voldemort is a threat. 

 

Now, back to my original point: Rowling killed many characters fans adored, and she killed them without mercy, but not without purpose. However, she let Harry live beyond his death. I believe this to be a solid choice. Every book is told primarily from Harry's perspective. He is the reader's guide to the wizarding world, their eyes and ears, their companion as they walk through Hogwarts and Diagon Alley. Killing him would have been traumatic for young readers who had grown to depend on Harry to show them the world, partly because it would have been so unexpected. Harry has made it through countless near-death situations alive—though not without mental scars. His life so far has, save for the bright spot of Hogwarts and his friends he made, sucked. Raised by his abusive relatives, forced to sleep in the cupboard under the stairs, knowing he would never meet his parents….killing him, at this point, would tell young readers that "Life sucks, and then you die. Heroism brings no rewards. No matter how often you make the right choice, you'll still end your story in a hole in the ground. Sweet dreams, kids!" No, for Harry's story to have proper closure, he needed to triumph over evil and live a long and happy life beyond the final page. 

 

Can an author kill the reader's guide to the world and give the story proper closure? Absolutely! It has been done well many times—but Allegiant was not one of those times. Look at Insurgent. Tris is suicidal for much of the book. She throws her life away at one point, and it takes actually being prepared for execution to make her realize she's not done living yet. This should have been a turning point for her character arc. It should have been the moment when she decides to live life with purpose, the moment when the author chooses to let her live on past the final page so she can give the deaths of her friends meaning. Instead, the author chooses to have her….throw her life away and rob her brother of his chance to be remembered as a hero and not a traitor. Tris' death completely negated her turning point in Insurgent and traumatized thousands of young readers, if the sheer number of fixfics where Tris survives, marries Tobias, and has anywhere between two and four adorable children is any indication. 

 

In short, killing the main character can be done well. Roth did not do it well. There is a difference between killing a character for a purpose that serves the theme and story and killing them for shock value, and Roth has not learned this yet.

 

I 100% agree with you. 

 

and especially Remus and Tonks.

 

It is still too soon for this... (T_T)

[maxal]

That's my point. I doubt that she would ever share that with Adolin, that's just my gut feeling after the interactions with those characters. She revealed her true self to Kaladin because she saw in him what she saw in herself. She still views her real self as the scared girl who hasn't spoken to anyone in months, but she was able to open up to Kaladin which already shows more promise than Adolin.

Someone said that they like Shalladolin because she deserves a nice guy. Adolin is not a nice guy. A nice guy doesn't murder someone after losing his temper. In fact I wouldn't be suprised if she saw her father I that.

 

This post is like catnip to me  I so strongly disagree with it, I must resist the temptation to expand on the subject and bore the whole forum with another one of my lengthy post as to why Adolin IS a nice guy and has nothing to do with Lin Davar 

 

However, since the purpose of this thread is to discussed tropes and not Adolin's love life   let's steer away from the subject. If anyone should be wiling to hear more about it though, it has abundantly been discussed in the Stormlight Archive section of the forum. If you are too lazy to look it up, you can always PM me and I'll summarize it for you. This is a conversation I never tire from.

 

As far as tropes go.... The Nice Guy trope is one that is too often brought up in a negative way. We could also talk about the Rich Guy which always is portrayed negatively: he is either stupid, evil, selfish, spoiled... and of course, the Poor Guy always knows better... This one is getting old, for me.

[maxal]

I hate when the hero makes a bad decision and spend the rest of his life trying to atone for the perceived wrong he did - which wasn't really bad or evil - just a bad situation. Or when she fails to save someone from the villain and treats it like she murdered the person herself.

 

Example:

 

Wheel of Time spoiler:

When Rand "skims" and that female Aiel (I forget her name) falls off the edge. He spends like the next 8 books wailing about how he failed her. Or the one the got stuck in Shadar Logoth. Or the ones that died as soldiers defending him.

He didn't kill them or abuse them in any way. It was just a bad situation. Be sad about it for a while and don't act like it's your fault.

 

The "heroes don't kill" thing annoys me too.

 

YES. Agree. Rand moaning endlessly about every single woman he saw dying close to him for 8 books was the most unpleasant experience and it had made me hate the character. Luckily, there were other characters than Rand in WoT.

[Blightsong]

Edit: Ignore this, got carried away with the Adolin discussion.

Edited July 18, 2015 by Blightsong

[Adamir]

Edit: Ignore this, got carried away with the Adolin discussion.

And now I am curious... If you want people to ignore a post, delete it. But right now, I am willing to sit at Sadeas's feast and eat several platefuls the night he enslaves Rock if it means I find out what I was supposed to ignore.

[ThirdGen]

Edit: Ignore this, got carried away with the Adolin discussion.

 

I always like to drag this one back out of storage.

 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ds6-o4gomRc

 

IGNORE THIS!

[Blightsong]

And now I am curious... If you want people to ignore a post, delete it. But right now, I am willing to sit at Sadeas's feast and eat several platefuls the night he enslaves Rock if it means I find out what I was supposed to ignore.

I have no idea how to delete posts... Sorry XD

[Delightful]

Didn't Katniss also die? When I heard about allegiance my reaction was "oh she's killing off everyone too".

Another example on the Stalker Guy = True Love - I was recently watching 17 Again. There's this side plot of a rich nerdy, socially clueless guy trying to woo the professional school principal. (Both are adults). He makes inappropriate comments. He deliberately and obviously tries to get her attention and she tells him multiple times to back off. He has elaborate presents delivered to her at work.

It all comes together when he corners her on the street, blocking her way downstairs so she is forced to talk to him. He asks her out again, she refuses. He then says "if you come to dinner with me I'll donate laptops to the school! Think of all the children!" And she agrees. (Whhyyy??? He shows absolutely no respect for you or your boundaries!!!)

Then, they're at dinner and he goes "I'm really sorry im so awkward I'm just poor boohoo nerdy guy who doesn't know how to deal with people and is trying to impress you. I'm such a nerd I spend a small fortune on fan merchandise, I don't know how to deal with people!"

She looks at him coyly, and asks something in LOtR elf Language. He replies. BOOM. she's a nerd. It's TRUUUEEE LOOOVVVEEE.

*vomits*

Woman, I thought you were smart. Just because he's lonely and wants a girlfriend doesn't give him license to ignore what you want iriehwbejskalajsjdbekwowoebeiwiw.

[maxal]

Didn't Katniss also die? When I heard about allegiance my reaction was "oh she's killing off everyone too".

 

No.... There are two characters I recall dying... It was not so badly done as Divergence.

 

I rather liked Hunger Games, though Katniss, as a character evolves in a non satisfying way. I also think Hunger Games would have been better if the author had fleshed out more their opponents: instead of making everyone from District 2 huge brutes, she could have given them a personality. I also think the story would have been stronger if Peeta had died in the first movie and if Katniss had survived with the guy from 2. 

 

It would have made a nice parallel with her relationship with Gale. Gale, the nice guy who slowly shows his true color, deep down, he is a brutal district 2 killer. In opposite, you could have had a District 2 brutal killer who slowly becomes more than that, deep down, he is not such thing. It would have been better than boring Peeta who hardly has a personality in this story.

 

Hunger Games is one story where I do think the "there were once enemy" trope could have worked to its advantage. 

 

About Love Triangles, I made this joke before but I have always appreciated how Brandon dealt with the one in Mistborn...

 

"Well of Ascension teaches us to end any and all love triangles by killing the **** outta one of the participants so you can move on with the real plot."

 

I have a hard time calling Well of Ascension a love triangle.... Nothing happened. It was a rather placid one...

 

 

I more think she wrote the end of Allegiant as an answer and rebuttal to the end of Deathly Hallows.

 

And honestly, I think she's wrong. 

 

Character death is something that must be handled delicately in any genre (unless you're going for the Highest Body Count in Modern Fantasy Award, in which case, keep being you, George R.R. Martin). Fictional characters, written well, are like friends. When Rowling killed off Sirius Black, I nearly stopped reading the series, because it was as though one of my friends had died. I almost threw the book across the room when I got to Fred's death, and I definitely cried when I reached Colin Creevey and especially Remus and Tonks. But all of those deaths were there to serve a purpose. Colin's death showed the merciless nature of war; Fred's showed how war tears families apart; Tonks and Remus' drew attention to children made orphans by war. 

 

In this post, Roth makes a fundamental misinterpretation of the series: She posits that all of those deaths showed Voldemort to be a threat. Which is true—but she should not have stopped there. Each death served a specific purpose in the story of Harry Potter's private war with Voldemort. Cedric Diggory showed how callous Voldemort is toward human life. Sirius Black showed how Voldemort had and would continue to tear Harry's family apart. Albus Dumbledore showed how determined Voldemort was to gain control of the wizarding world (and, while I doubt this was intentional, it also showed me how ill-suited Draco Malfoy was for the life of a Death Eater and made me angry that he was denied even the tiniest chance at redemption). All of the deaths in the seventh book serve a specific purpose beyond letting the reader know Voldemort is a threat. 

 

Now, back to my original point: Rowling killed many characters fans adored, and she killed them without mercy, but not without purpose. However, she let Harry live beyond his death. I believe this to be a solid choice. Every book is told primarily from Harry's perspective. He is the reader's guide to the wizarding world, their eyes and ears, their companion as they walk through Hogwarts and Diagon Alley. Killing him would have been traumatic for young readers who had grown to depend on Harry to show them the world, partly because it would have been so unexpected. Harry has made it through countless near-death situations alive—though not without mental scars. His life so far has, save for the bright spot of Hogwarts and his friends he made, sucked. Raised by his abusive relatives, forced to sleep in the cupboard under the stairs, knowing he would never meet his parents….killing him, at this point, would tell young readers that "Life sucks, and then you die. Heroism brings no rewards. No matter how often you make the right choice, you'll still end your story in a hole in the ground. Sweet dreams, kids!" No, for Harry's story to have proper closure, he needed to triumph over evil and live a long and happy life beyond the final page. 

 

Can an author kill the reader's guide to the world and give the story proper closure? Absolutely! It has been done well many times—but Allegiant was not one of those times. Look at Insurgent. Tris is suicidal for much of the book. She throws her life away at one point, and it takes actually being prepared for execution to make her realize she's not done living yet. This should have been a turning point for her character arc. It should have been the moment when she decides to live life with purpose, the moment when the author chooses to let her live on past the final page so she can give the deaths of her friends meaning. Instead, the author chooses to have her….throw her life away and rob her brother of his chance to be remembered as a hero and not a traitor. Tris' death completely negated her turning point in Insurgent and traumatized thousands of young readers, if the sheer number of fixfics where Tris survives, marries Tobias, and has anywhere between two and four adorable children is any indication. 

 

In short, killing the main character can be done well. Roth did not do it well. There is a difference between killing a character for a purpose that serves the theme and story and killing them for shock value, and Roth has not learned this yet.

 

Twilight, great post. I agree with everything you say, though I did not share your attachment to the Harry Potter characters, but you make very valid points. Killing must be done with a purpose, not to try being different or because it is the new fab or because many readers now assert the value of an author by his body counts.

 

I am not surprised the kids write fanfics about Tris surviving... What an insipid relationship. I think I may be too old to appreciate Divergence.

[Quiver]

Why is the chosen one always a young farmboy?

 

I don't watch it, but I heard about a show, Yonderland, where the chosen one (from what I understand) is a middle-aged woman, and that sound's like it could be a very fun story. Imagine a wizard following a prophecy back to it's route, and discovering that there is a chosen one; a child, one who can be raised in the arts needed to overthrow the Dark Lord. They follow the prophecy to it's subject... and discovers that they spent so long finding it that the kid grew up, has a family (with kids) and other responsibilities and can't just go gallivanting around the world to stop The Great Evil.

 

Also, why are Father/Son relationships always so big in fantasy, with the Father always being evil? I had an idea a while ago that I thought would be fun to write, where the "evil general" character was the son of a stories heroine. Middle-aged female protagonist having to kill her child? Yes please!

...I mean, it's depressing, but still...

[TwiLyghtSansSparkles]

Why is the chosen one always a young farmboy?

 

I don't watch it, but I heard about a show, Yonderland, where the chosen one (from what I understand) is a middle-aged woman, and that sound's like it could be a very fun story. Imagine a wizard following a prophecy back to it's route, and discovering that there is a chosen one; a child, one who can be raised in the arts needed to overthrow the Dark Lord. They follow the prophecy to it's subject... and discovers that they spent so long finding it that the kid grew up, has a family (with kids) and other responsibilities and can't just go gallivanting around the world to stop The Great Evil.

 

Also, why are Father/Son relationships always so big in fantasy, with the Father always being evil? I had an idea a while ago that I thought would be fun to write, where the "evil general" character was the son of a stories heroine. Middle-aged female protagonist having to kill her child? Yes please!

...I mean, it's depressing, but still...

 

A mother having to kill her child? That would be dark. O.O It'd be interesting to read about, but very dark. 

 

All spoilers that follow are mild (the Steelheart spoilers are only for the prologue, and the Hunger Games and Divergent spoilers are probably pretty well-known by now) but I'll put them in a tag just in case: 

 

While the "Chosen One" plot line can be done well—and I've enjoyed works where it was done well—I wish there were more stories where the Hero chooses the Call instead of the Call choosing the Hero. That's part of what I've loved about the Reckoners books so far: David was definitely in the wrong place at the wrong time, but he chose to be the one who would bring Steelheart down. He could have fled the city, or disappeared into the life of an unnoticed worker, but he decided to use what he knew to become—for lack of a better term—the Chosen One. I'd love to see more stories that give their protagonists that sort of agency. 

 

For all its flaws, that's one point in favor of The Hunger Games. Katniss chooses to take her sister's place and become District Twelve's first volunteer. She didn't directly choose to become the symbol of the rebellion, but she did choose to become the Mockingjay. (Only after a lot of hesitation and a few tantrums, but that's another story.) While Katniss does exhibit many traits of a typical Chosen One, it's her choice that makes her into the Chosen One. 

 

Contrast all that with Divergent. For a series that's supposedly all about choices defining you, Tris actually has very little agency. She didn't choose to be born with Super Duper Amazingly Speshul Genes™. She didn't choose to be born into a faction that—let's face it—is actually kind of creepy and is definitely the faction every child would want to leave. (I'm sorry, but there is nothing inherently "selfless" about waiting quietly or forgoing self-defense.) She chose to join Dauntless, but she didn't choose to be the best at everything and oh my gosh that is the most Mary Sueish sentence I've ever typed please don't make me do it again. She didn't choose to come of age in the middle of a brewing faction war. All of those circumstances chose her. And like I said, there's nothing inherently wrong with Chosen One stories—I enjoyed the Harry Potter books partly because of his realistic reactions toward revelations of his Chosen-ness—but I hate it when authors pretend their characters chose their destinies when it's really the other way around.

[+Slowswift]

Great essays, everyone! No, really, I've enjoyed reading this thread.

 

 

 

Um. This is more fiction in general, I guess, but these have always annoyed me.

 

One thing I hate is when the hero, after the villain is safely locked up, visits him and tells him exactly what he did wrong and how to fix it. 'Cause of course he'll never escape, right?

 

In Iron Man 2, for example, Creepy Russian Dude is in jail. Tony Stark visits him. And tells him how to fix the Arc Reactor he made. Like, really? You don't see anything wrong with that? Mr. Stark, I do not feel sorry for you after the beating you took before you managed to take him down the second time.

 

I also hate it when our heroes are running through the Mysterious Ruins chased by X monster, when they stop and wait to see if they've "lost it" yet, conveniently giving it time to catch up. I don't care if you need a break, we're being chased by a kraken. You can rest when we've made it outside and the temple/whatever's collapsed in on itself.

Edited July 18, 2015 by Slowswift

[Edgedancer]

A mother having to kill her child? That would be dark. O.O It'd be interesting to read about, but very dark. 

 

All spoilers that follow are mild (the Steelheart spoilers are only for the prologue, and the Hunger Games and Divergent spoilers are probably pretty well-known by now) but I'll put them in a tag just in case: 

 

While the "Chosen One" plot line can be done well—and I've enjoyed works where it was done well—I wish there were more stories where the Hero chooses the Call instead of the Call choosing the Hero. That's part of what I've loved about the Reckoners books so far: David was definitely in the wrong place at the wrong time, but he chose to be the one who would bring Steelheart down. He could have fled the city, or disappeared into the life of an unnoticed worker, but he decided to use what he knew to become—for lack of a better term—the Chosen One. I'd love to see more stories that give their protagonists that sort of agency. 

 

For all its flaws, that's one point in favor of The Hunger Games. Katniss chooses to take her sister's place and become District Twelve's first volunteer. She didn't directly choose to become the symbol of the rebellion, but she did choose to become the Mockingjay. (Only after a lot of hesitation and a few tantrums, but that's another story.) While Katniss does exhibit many traits of a typical Chosen One, it's her choice that makes her into the Chosen One. 

 

Contrast all that with Divergent. For a series that's supposedly all about choices defining you, Tris actually has very little agency. She didn't choose to be born with Super Duper Amazingly Speshul Genes™. She didn't choose to be born into a faction that—let's face it—is actually kind of creepy and is definitely the faction every child would want to leave. (I'm sorry, but there is nothing inherently "selfless" about waiting quietly or forgoing self-defense.) She chose to join Dauntless, but she didn't choose to be the best at everything and oh my gosh that is the most Mary Sueish sentence I've ever typed please don't make me do it again. She didn't choose to come of age in the middle of a brewing faction war. All of those circumstances chose her. And like I said, there's nothing inherently wrong with Chosen One stories—I enjoyed the Harry Potter books partly because of his realistic reactions toward revelations of his Chosen-ness—but I hate it when authors pretend their characters chose their destinies when it's really the other way around.

What I'd personally like to see at one point would be a mix of being choosen and individual choice. For example we start with the basic choosen one having to defeat the forces of evil. However, he is somewhat reluctant at first, so destiny points the gun to his chest and threatens his loved ones if he doesn't get moving. Choosen starts his world saving buisness but in the back of his mind destiny got on his list for endangering his loved ones.

 

Then the choosen one more or less makes a deal with the forces of evil to take down destiny and as soon the forces of destiny are weakened enough that he can deal with them on his own backstabs evil, making sure it can't cause any significant damage and then ultimately succeds in destroying destiny.

 

Now that could have potential for subverting some tropes. It would also require the protagonist to be a highly inteligent and a bit of a chessmaster, something that happens much to seldomly. I guess all the choosen farmboys come with the stigma of not being that bright.

[Kaymyth]

 

In Iron Man 2, for example, Creepy Russian Dude is in jail. Tony Stark visits him. And tells him how to fix the Arc Reactor he made. Like, really? You don't see anything wrong with that? Mr. Stark, I do not feel sorry for you after the beating you took before you managed to take him down the second time.

 

 

To be completely fair, that sort of thing is totally in character for Tony.  He's an arrogant genius show-off; of course he's going to take a moment to show the villain how much smarter he is.

[TwiLyghtSansSparkles]

What I'd personally like to see at one point would be a mix of being choosen and individual choice. For example we start with the basic choosen one having to defeat the forces of evil. However, he is somewhat reluctant at first, so destiny points the gun to his chest and threatens his loved ones if he doesn't get moving. Choosen starts his world saving buisness but in the back of his mind destiny got on his list for endangering his loved ones.

 

Then the choosen one more or less makes a deal with the forces of evil to take down destiny and as soon the forces of destiny are weakened enough that he can deal with them on his own backstabs evil, making sure it can't cause any significant damage and then ultimately succeds in destroying destiny.

 

Now that could have potential for subverting some tropes. It would also require the protagonist to be a highly inteligent and a bit of a chessmaster, something that happens much to seldomly. I guess all the choosen farmboys come with the stigma of not being that bright.

 

That's another trope that bugs me—the Hero is always the reckless sort who jumps into action without considering the consequences, and the Villain is always a Chessmaster. Like all other tropes, it has been done well; Harry Potter and Reckoners come to mind as two works that didn't gloss over the consequences of having a reckless hero, and made their heroes likable regardless. What bugs me is when a work features a hero whose recklessness makes him dumb, while the villain is a veritable genius who is inexplicably brought down by the hero who should have died in his first skirmish because he didn't think to bring enough ammo. While the story usually means to impress us with the hero's ability to improvise and think on his feet, it just makes him look ridiculously lucky and undermines claims of the villain's intelligence. 

 

And I understand why writers do it. It's easier to generate tension when the villain is always one step ahead of the hero, and the best way to keep him one step ahead is to make him a Chessmaster. I don't know if flipping that dynamic is even possible—and if it is, I'm sure I don't have the skill for it yet—but why can't we have more Chessmaster vs. Chessmaster stories? I think that's part of what made X-Men: First Class such a breath of fresh air: Charles Xavier, Erik Lensherr, and Sebastian Shaw are all Chessmasters with different agendas. Xavier wants to unite mutants and humans and has a plan for it; Lensherr wants revenge on the Nazi who broke him and has a plan for it; Shaw wants to cause WWIII and put mutants on top and has a plan for it. The fun comes not in watching a hero with no plan to speak of defeat a villain who is always one step ahead, but from seeing the friction when these plans cross. 

[+Slowswift]

To be completely fair, that sort of thing is totally in character for Tony.  He's an arrogant genius show-off; of course he's going to take a moment to show the villain how much smarter he is.

 

True.

 

Also, #15 on the "If I Were the Hero" list:

 

 

I will not let the villain go in a moment of mercy. I will see to it that he is properly arrested, at the very least.

 

That list is the best, and the list it references, is basically a list of stupid things characters do and what you'd do differently.