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Cliches you can't stand

Valmond said:
Magic. The dude literally creates things out of magic and has pocket dimansion full of things he creates.
Also summoned via magic.
Being a head taller from his, let's say 18, year old self is possibly the most plausible thing about him.
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Nothing the myths of Herakles paints him as 8ft tall either. We can sort of assume that the Throne of Heroes mucks thing up.
 
Arawn_Emrys said:
Nothing the myths of Herakles paints him as 8ft tall either. We can sort of assume that the Throne of Heroes mucks thing up.
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I feel like Herakles was at least sometimes depicted as very tall in Ancient Greek art, even if it wasn't a core part of his myth the way it was for Orion.

One thing that's actually kind of neat about the Servants is that a lot of aspects of them that seem made-up are actually just taken from obscure variants of the legend. For example, Excalibur's maximum number of targets is estimated at 1000 people. While I don't think there's any legends about Excalibur having an energy blast specifically, the description of the Battle of Mount Badon in Nenius has Arthur personally killing 960 Saxons. Another example is God Hand; the idea of Herakles having invincible skin comes up in some ancient poetry, even though the version where he gets his invulnerability from the Nemean Lion's skin is better known. There are even occasional poetic references to Medusa being beautiful, despite some versions of the myth attributing her petrification power to her sheer ugliness.
 
Silver2195 said:
I feel like Herakles was at least sometimes depicted as very tall in Ancient Greek art, even if it wasn't a core part of his myth the way it was for Orion.

One thing that's actually kind of neat about the Servants is that a lot of aspects of them that seem made-up are actually just taken from obscure variants of the legend. For example, Excalibur's maximum number of targets is estimated at 1000 people. While I don't think there's any legends about Excalibur having an energy blast specifically, the description of the Battle of Mount Badon in Nenius has Arthur personally killing 960 Saxons. Another example is God Hand; the idea of Herakles having invincible skin comes up in some ancient poetry, even though the version where he gets his invulnerability from the Nemean Lion's skin is better known. There are even occasional poetic references to Medusa being beautiful, despite some versions of the myth attributing her petrification power to her sheer ugliness.
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Napoleon is basically just a character from the trashy romance novels Napoleon read/wrote, I thought that was neat.
 
There's also some mistakes, though. Rin claims that Herakles would have known Medea from the Argo expedition, but he actually left the group to search for his boyfriend Hylas when Hylas was abducted by nymphs before they ever met Medea. There are myths where Medea meets Herakles (according to Diodorus Siculus, she actually cured his insanity), but that comes after Medea breaks up with Jason.
 
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Lisafication said:
... I don't know what metrics you're using, but Shirou is not gonna be that light while simultaneously being as hilariously buff as he is. That's not how weight works. Muscle weighs a lot, yo :V

45 kilos is also not really the norm for even short women, let alone ones who do as much physical activity as Saber. BMI is largely horseshit, but it qualifies as underweight for basically any woman five foot or taller. Sakura is certainly not gonna be carting around tits like that while weighing that little -_-
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There's a scene in the Outbreak Company light novels where a shut-in character is asked how much he thinks a regular woman weighs. He hedges with "maybe 40 kilograms", and his (female) bodyguard has to dryly inform him that real life women tend to weigh more than anime ones, due to having a third dimension.

Having said that, there's a Vtuber (Aqua Minato) who is well known for allegedly being 44.5 kg, and her reactions imply it's her real weight. She's also well known for being quite short (148cm, which Google tells me is about 4 feet 8 inches), and from what I can tell a lot of people think that's still dangerously skinny.

Pidl said:
Are we really hiding a plot twist that is almost old enough to vote?
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People still hide major plot twists in media that are definitely old enough to vote, assuming they could vote. The example which I saw recently was Final Fantasy X, where certain spoilers are still put into spoiler blocks by default, despite the game being out since 2001.

Another example is Final Fantasy VII (1997), which is kind of a weird case: I've seen a couple of blind playthroughs recently (as in from 2020), and while both the players are aware of one major spoiler, they were completely blindsided by another major spoiler. One of them speculated that maybe the first spoiler was so well-known that it hid the existence of the other.
 
Adloquium said:
Having said that, there's a Vtuber (Aqua Minato) who is well known for allegedly being 44.5 kg, and her reactions imply it's her real weight. She's also well known for being quite short (148cm, which Google tells me is about 4 feet 8 inches), and from what I can tell a lot of people think that's still dangerously skinny
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That is a BMI of 20.3. A pretty normal and healthy weight actually. She is just extremely short.
 
Adloquium said:
People still hide major plot twists in media that are definitely old enough to vote, assuming they could vote. The example which I saw recently was Final Fantasy X, where certain spoilers are still put into spoiler blocks by default, despite the game being out since 2001.
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I think there's a curve. When something comes put, not a lot of people have seen it yet and you need to hide spoilers. After a few months, everyone has seen it and you don't need spoilers. After a lot of time has passed, however, more and more people in the audience are new--either younger fans, or people new to the series, and the number of people who need spoilers hidden goes up again.
 
arromdee said:
I think there's a curve. When something comes put, not a lot of people have seen it yet and you need to hide spoilers. After a few months, everyone has seen it and you don't need spoilers. After a lot of time has passed, however, more and more people in the audience are new--either younger fans, or people new to the series, and the number of people who need spoilers hidden goes up again.
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And then you have people who scream at you for spoiling things that are in the poster and in the TV spots.
 
the legions of 80s/90s punchlines about colorful protesters trying to stop the development of a mountainside because "the rare endangered screeching woodweasel" would lose its habitat. Yeah God forbid somebody give enough of a shit to not want an animal species obliterated forever from the face of the earth.

Or in general the portrayal of Environmentlists as a bunch of wacky hippies. Because it's not like a damaged ecosystem effects people
 
Comrade Future said:
People whose only feature is the absence of such. By type: Favorite hobby - eating and sleeping.
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Eh, that last bit could be worked into something. Like, a genuinely lazy person can make a good comedy protagonist as they go to greater and greater lengths to preserve their ability to sit on their ass and do nothing. And fail at doing so. (See Killing Slimes for 300 years for someone who's goals are entirely to enjoy some goddamn peace and quiet.)
 
Arawn_Emrys said:
Eh, that last bit could be worked into something. Like, a genuinely lazy person can make a good comedy protagonist as they go to greater and greater lengths to preserve their ability to sit on their ass and do nothing. And fail at doing so. (See Killing Slimes for 300 years for someone who's goals are entirely to enjoy some goddamn peace and quiet.)
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You know - even lazy people have hobbies besides gluttony and sitting on their ass. And don't use this issekai as an example - no one will become Overpowered if they kill smlies for centuries! It's just a lack of game mechanics in video games.
However, transferring a girl from another world as a saint is also such an idea.
 
Comrade Future said:
You know - even lazy people have hobbies besides gluttony and sitting on their ass. And don't use this issekai as an example - no one will become Overpowered if they kill smlies for centuries! It's just a lack of game mechanics in video games.
However, transferring a girl from another world as a saint is also such an idea.
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It's a comedy. It's making fun of the usual game mechanics isekai. Like, every aspect is mocking some bit of isekai genre conventions. Except her "eternally 17" which is apparently a reference to a specific voice actress. (It also hamfistedly tries to teach about proper work-life balance, something Japan has issues with)
 
Gh055twr1t3r said:
Gotcha. So generic isekai protagonist #waytoofuckingmanyofthem.
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I've been thinking about this for a while, but what is the Generic Isekai Protagonist, exactly? Like, is this "Generic" in the sense that they're bland, boring, and mediocre, or is this "Generic" in the sense that they're the common staple or template to Isekai stuff? Maybe even both? Because I've gone through an Isekai Binge lately, and it's really hard to identify what makes a Generic Isekai Protagonists? What makes them Generic? Who are they based on? Are there actually too many of them?

Hm. Well. The number's definitely more than one -- but you have to actually go somewhat deeper into the barrel to find these Generic Isekai Protagonists, since the popular ones, at the top of the barrel, aren't what one might call Generic Isekai Protagonists. I mean, Kirito exists, of course, but there's aplenty of other Isekais. Slime Tensei, Killing Slimes, Youjo Senki, Re:Zero, KonoSuba, Seven Dukes' Erica, Overlord, Bookworm, I Favor the Villainess, Bakarina, mother fucking Kumoko (even including Shuu), etc etc.

I realize I'm rambling, and it's hard to explain it, but it's like, Iunno, Generic implies that they're common af, that for one non-generic Isekai protagonist, I would encounter ten of them -- but so far, unless I actually look for them, actually digging through the trough, they're not actually that common?

Hm.

I wonder if this is because I don't go through the anime charts anymore?

Edit: unless 'generic' in this case is just based on appearance?
 
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My understanding is that Isekais are commonly started in as light novels, so perhaps a lot of them don't even get anime to begin with.
 
Comrade Future said:
People whose only feature is the absence of such. By type: Favorite hobby - eating and sleeping.
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You can have the protagonist do nothing but sleep and it could work, The Lazy King is an isekai that does it pretty well.

I would define vanilla protagonists as not having an interest or passion for anything, and dragged along for the plot. If they have a defining trait it's not likening anything that stands out or not socially acceptable.
Like the protagonists in maniac pixie dream girl stuff or the most basic of romance heroines...
 
My feeling would be that a blank slate has no relevant background, skills, or experiences, and has no pre-existing goals and motivations. A blank slate's behavior and personality are non-distinctive.
 
SoothingCoffee said:
I've been thinking about this for a while, but what is the Generic Isekai Protagonist, exactly? Like, is this "Generic" in the sense that they're bland, boring, and mediocre, or is this "Generic" in the sense that they're the common staple or template to Isekai stuff? Maybe even both? Because I've gone through an Isekai Binge lately, and it's really hard to identify what makes a Generic Isekai Protagonists? What makes them Generic? Who are they based on? Are there actually too many of them?

Hm. Well. The number's definitely more than one -- but you have to actually go somewhat deeper into the barrel to find these Generic Isekai Protagonists, since the popular ones, at the top of the barrel, aren't what one might call Generic Isekai Protagonists. I mean, Kirito exists, of course, but there's aplenty of other Isekais. Slime Tensei, Killing Slimes, Youjo Senki, Re:Zero, KonoSuba, Seven Dukes' Erica, Overlord, Bookworm, I Favor the Villainess, Bakarina, mother fucking Kumoko (even including Shuu), etc etc.

I realize I'm rambling, and it's hard to explain it, but it's like, Iunno, Generic implies that they're common af, that for one non-generic Isekai protagonist, I would encounter ten of them -- but so far, unless I actually look for them, actually digging through the trough, they're not actually that common?

Hm.

I wonder if this is because I don't go through the anime charts anymore?

Edit: unless 'generic' in this case is just based on appearance?
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I think there's several different types of generic isekai protagonists, but there are enough of all of them that they can be all be called generic (lots of terrible isekai out there on Narou). One of them is basically Shun from Kumoko - a bit of a Mary Sue (he's great at magic and swordmanship, all the girls love him, etc.), but an inoffensive one - he's a nice guy. You can argue that the real flaw of these kinds of characters is naivete, or at least lack of exceptional intelligence, although they often live in worlds where almost everyone else is also rather dim, and anyway they often have access to very basic 21st-century knowledge that is treated as implausibly useful. The protagonist in Slime Tensei fits into this category (except when he's doing war crimes, of course).

Second you have someone like the protagonist in Mushoku Tensei, who is a gross otaku pervert who gradually develops into a barely adequate human being and is excessively rewarded by the world around him for it. Milder versions of this blur into the first type.

Thirdly, you have the introverted murderhobo who interacts with the world primarily by making numbers go up. Kumoko herself is basically this, but it mostly works because her internal monologue is funny. Naturally stories where the protagonist is reincarnated as, e.g., an inanimate object will have elements of this.

The fourth kind is actually a villain (he's obsessed with revenge, owns slaves, etc.), but the writer doesn't realize it. Shield Hero is the obvious example here.

Obviously there are plenty of isekai protagonists who don't fit into this categories. The protagonists of Tanya the Evil and Overlord are villains that the writers are fully aware are villains. I guess most protagonists of actually good isekai are variations of the first type; they just live in a more fleshed-out world where other people and societies are capable of intelligent thought, and the limitations of their 21st-century general knowledge are acknowledged. (Bookworm comes to mind; she faces a lot of obstacles early on because having read a book about something isn't the same as remembering all the important details, and a lot of her knowledge is useless without resources.)
 
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I seen a lot stories about people being reincarnated as a person who was a villain or extras in what ever novel, dating game or visual novel they were playing or reading before dying which almost certainly involves the 'original plot' going off the rails and blowing up, "My life as a Villainess all routes led to doom" is but one example of many I've seen over the last few years though I will admit I yet to see a bad one of those as of yet.
 
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