Fanfic trope meme

[sholio]

Discovered via trobadora: Fanfic trope sorting meme!



I'm not going to do alt text for this one because it's just SO MUCH. For those who can't see the image, it's a list of small square images with text and graphics for a trope on them, divided into the following categories:
• I would die for this trope
• Love it
• Like it
• Depends on execution
• Really depends on execution
• It's a no from me

My shortlist of "die for it" tropes is hurt/comfort, enemies to lovers, gen fic, and case/mission fic. I think that's pretty much always true!

I will read most of this in most fandoms, though. In fact I'm eyeing this chart and thinking about things I haven't written lately and might need to write. (tbh I think I really should have moved "fighting turned confession" and "meet the family" up from the Like it to the Love it level, but I don't want to create a new image.)

Comments

[musesfool]

Oh, that's really neat. *clicks*

[sholio]

Whee! It's delightful to see how other people's lists vary.

[passingbuzzards]

Oh how fun, thank you for the link! I'm impressed by how even your tiers are, ha, mine come out so much more unbalanced. (But I take issue with this selection, some of these clearly aren't tropes, they're formats and categories! Also so tragically lacking in some of the tropes I would die for, clearly I ought to assemble my own version...)

I will read most of this in most fandoms, though.

Same, though, on some level everything that isn't an active squick or trigger depends on execution. :,D Even if I don't typically enjoy or seek out a particular thing I'm always prepared to believe that someone out there could write it compellingly enough that it wouldn't matter...!

[sholio]

Yeah, I think on the whole nearly all of this is "it depends on execution" and also "it depends on the fandom" - there are some fandoms where I'm all about the AUs and some where I really want the characters in their canon context, for example, and some where I absolutely won't read anything that doesn't fix specific things. It's hard to put anything into a firm box of "would read" or "wouldn't read". I'd say the things on the top 2-3 rows are things I'll almost always at least try, though.

And yeah, I think everybody's going to disagree with lists like this, it's interesting to see what other people consider tropes ...

[passingbuzzards]

Oh yeah, definitely, especially the AU thing! And that's how I approached it for the upper rows too, what tropes tend to appeal to me holistically regardless of context.

(I think genfic and 5+1 were the ones that struck me as the most puzzling inclusions, since those could really be anything...)

[snickfic]

Are "ex-ex lovers" like people having sex after they've broken up? Or what does that mean?

[sholio]

Yeah, I have absolutely no idea about that one! I think I had taken that to mean something fairly negative when I saw it on there (definitely, positively exes?) but now that I think about it, it might be something like breaking up and getting back together, which I do like! But I'm not really sure.

[sheron]

I think it's "second chance romance"

[sholio]

THEY SHOULD JUST CALL IT THAT, I like second chance romance. T_T

[naomikritzer]

SO WITH YOU on ABO and the degree of popularity of that trope just kind of mystifies me.

[sholio]

I think omegaverse is what it's usually called nowadays ....

What has been fascinating is watching it move into published fiction! Self-published mostly, but it's all over in M/M on Amazon these days, and to a lesser extent in het romance. I would never in a million years have guessed THAT would be one of the fanfic tropes that would go mainstream, but I guess some things just really strike a chord with readers' ids.

[trobadora]

I think omegaverse is what it's usually called nowadays ....

Yeah, the other version spells out a pretty nasty slur.

Omegaverse published novels still break my brain a bit.

[yhlee]

...I'm so puzzled by wtf is hanahaki but if it's on a fan fic trope list I am not Googling it...XD

[yhlee]

Joe took the hit. I would never in a million years guessed the existence of this...

[sholio]

I regret to say that I do in fact know what hanahaki is. XD Not googling random fic tropes is probably a smart choice in general, though.

[sweetsorcery]

In essence, I pretty much feel the same way about most of that. :D

[sholio]

Hee! The Biggles fandom really does share a single brain cell sometimes. :D

[yalumesse]

Oh I have to do this, thank you! I haven't often thought about which tropes I'm middling towards, just the very yes and very no ones.

[sholio]

Yeah, I don't think I've thought about the middle ones all that much, either!

[philomytha]

Nice! I am trying to make my own, and resisting the temptation to leave the 'it's a no' box empty because honestly, if a writer I trusted came up with an omegaverse hanahaki American school AU I'd read it... also there is the terrible omission of loyalty kink from the list!

[sholio]

Yeah, I suppose that some of the other criteria not covered above are "how much do I trust the author" and "how desperate am I for fic in this fandom." I probably would read a Biggles hanahaki high school AU ...

[trobadora]

Hee! Somehow I'm not surprised. :D

(There's a reason I think of you as the queen of canon-style h/c. *g*)

[brightknightie]

Thank you for sharing! I am so looking forward to playing with this! (Later... things to do first. ~grin~)

[greenwoodside]

I love this meme -- maybe not quite so much that I would die for it, but I love that it lets me put genfic in that category.

I had to look up hanahaki. And I don't know what 'sex pollen' is, but my imagination is offering up possibilities.

[rietta89]

Thank you for sharing this! It looks like great fun, and it's so interesting to see everybody's lists 👀 (Not me saving them all for exchange-writing purposes...)