Pet Peeves in Fanfiction

Reader mode
Blaflaix said:
Nope.
MHA mostly.
"My body moved on its own!"

Which is extremely concerning when you're taking about a person that could demolish a building accidentally.
I hope his body doesn't "move on its own" in any bad way... :rolleyes:
Click to expand...
Click to shrink...
A person that could demolish a building accidentally… in a world with confirmed mind-control.

"My body moved on its own!" should mean an investigation into whether that was an outside influence, not immediate praise & commendation.
 
Just BROB, ROB, or higher beings in general sticking their nose in as the premise for starting a story. Shit is boring, generally explicitly outside the narrative, almost always pointless and completely unnecessary, and a total waste of however many words it takes to get through, for writer and reader alike. Or actively makes the story worse in some way.

I mean, you have literally infinite options available. Alice crawled into a rabbit hole. Dave and John took drugs that sent them interdimensional. Rimuru died to start his shit off. Dorothy got picked up by a tornado. The kids from Narnia found a closet. Kid in the Golden Compass has a badass knife. Interstate 60 had the Interstate 60. Star Trek had a transporter accident. Myst and shield hero had the book. John Carter hid in a cave. Pick an isekai and you've got a decent chance of hitting a summoning spell. Or a summoning spell gone wrong.

Point is, I'd prefer "random accident in infinite multiverse" over "deliberate act by powerful entity for no or detrimental effect on story." Hell, flip a coin into a wishing well. Walk under a bridge on the sabbath after chasing a cat widdershins around your house three times. Trip on a crack in the curb that somehow swallows you whole.

Just fuck off with the obnoxious use of ROB all the time.
 
the vale said:
Just BROB, ROB, or higher beings in general sticking their nose in as the premise for starting a story. Shit is boring, generally explicitly outside the narrative, almost always pointless and completely unnecessary, and a total waste of however many words it takes to get through, for writer and reader alike. Or actively makes the story worse in some way.
Click to expand...
Click to shrink...
It can work if the higher being is a reoccurring character. Or better yet, bring the higher being along Konosuba style.
 
I prefer people falling down wells that open up into alternate timelines to misusing the gods.
 
On the one hand, ROB scenes are usually boring, do nothing for the narrative, and I usually skip past them. But on the other hand, they aren't "literally Jesus Christ shows up to kill and then insert the author as a secondary character as punishment for writing derivative fanfics", so I guess that's a point in their favor? 😅
 
In a lot of cases it seems like the ROB is there to be a target for vitriol.

The MC is a "reluctant" hero, so they obviously can't be doing this on purpose, but having a random event causing it would make their complaints seem empty and petty.

So you put a face on the well/truck/rabbit hole, and suddenly you can whine and complain all you want without any danger of actually being sent back to your boring life!

Then the entire story consists of a whiny hero doing amazing and fun things while complaining constantly.
Just like the author intended.
 
Imo the only story that makes good use of a ROB is yojo senki, every other story that uses them would be at least a little better off not having them.
 
the vale said:
Just BROB, ROB, or higher beings in general sticking their nose in as the premise for starting a story. Shit is boring, generally explicitly outside the narrative, almost always pointless and completely unnecessary, and a total waste of however many words it takes to get through, for writer and reader alike. Or actively makes the story worse in some way.

I mean, you have literally infinite options available. Alice crawled into a rabbit hole. Dave and John took drugs that sent them interdimensional. Rimuru died to start his shit off. Dorothy got picked up by a tornado. The kids from Narnia found a closet. Kid in the Golden Compass has a badass knife. Interstate 60 had the Interstate 60. Star Trek had a transporter accident. Myst and shield hero had the book. John Carter hid in a cave. Pick an isekai and you've got a decent chance of hitting a summoning spell. Or a summoning spell gone wrong.

Point is, I'd prefer "random accident in infinite multiverse" over "deliberate act by powerful entity for no or detrimental effect on story." Hell, flip a coin into a wishing well. Walk under a bridge on the sabbath after chasing a cat widdershins around your house three times. Trip on a crack in the curb that somehow swallows you whole.

Just fuck off with the obnoxious use of ROB all the time.
Click to expand...
Click to shrink...
In some settings all powerful gremlin creature who likes fucking with people, summoning someone from a different world into this one to cause mischief is a reasonable plot point.

But you expect that they will make things as complicated as possible and not wish fulfillment.

In Warhammer 40k I can picture the chaos gods doing something like that but as the chaos gods they would want to cause as much misery as possible summoning someone at the worse moment and causing chaos.
Brain Spiders said:
Imo the only story that makes good use of a ROB is yojo senki, every other story that uses them would be at least a little better off not having them.
Click to expand...
Click to shrink...
In that one the ROB was a constant force in the story and a foil to Tanya so it made sense. It served a point.
Astrid Fornhoff said:
I prefer people falling down wells that open up into alternate timelines to misusing the gods.
Click to expand...
Click to shrink...
Me too stuff being random and not cosmic destiny feels so much more visceral.
the vale said:
Just BROB, ROB, or higher beings in general sticking their nose in as the premise for starting a story. Shit is boring, generally explicitly outside the narrative, almost always pointless and completely unnecessary, and a total waste of however many words it takes to get through, for writer and reader alike. Or actively makes the story worse in some way.

I mean, you have literally infinite options available. Alice crawled into a rabbit hole. Dave and John took drugs that sent them interdimensional. Rimuru died to start his shit off. Dorothy got picked up by a tornado. The kids from Narnia found a closet. Kid in the Golden Compass has a badass knife. Interstate 60 had the Interstate 60. Star Trek had a transporter accident. Myst and shield hero had the book. John Carter hid in a cave. Pick an isekai and you've got a decent chance of hitting a summoning spell. Or a summoning spell gone wrong.

Point is, I'd prefer "random accident in infinite multiverse" over "deliberate act by powerful entity for no or detrimental effect on story." Hell, flip a coin into a wishing well. Walk under a bridge on the sabbath after chasing a cat widdershins around your house three times. Trip on a crack in the curb that somehow swallows you whole.

Just fuck off with the obnoxious use of ROB all the time.
Click to expand...
Click to shrink...
What does ROB and BROB mean anyway?
 
The critical part of ROB is the Random.
They aren't a character with a stake in the story, they aren't an antagonist or protagonist or ally.
They show up, fuck around with the MC, then leave.

There's no real conflict because they are Omnipotent.
There's no real character because they are Random.
It really is just like a tornado with a face.

Once they become part of the story, with motivations and interactions, they become a normal character.
A powerful antagonist is not a ROB, they are a challenge to overcome.
 
Rule 2: Don’t Be Hateful - Violation of thread policy: do not complain about the orientation of characters in fanfics
Oh...can of worms opened, so time for a list - right?

Well, I'll get started then:

- Canon-Rehash! Yes I know that some canon-happenings might be outside of the protagonist's control especially at first (even if they are a self-insert with prior knowledge), but at some point you need to leave most of canon behind when you've produced too many "splashes" in the pond that is the story! Not to mention that re-telling canon just with say another pairing is just boring! If I want canon, then I'll read/watch/play the original work!
- Slash (not my thing - no, I am not against gay people. Hell, during my last holiday I ended up visiting a street that is well known for gay bars etc.)
- Male-Pregnancy! No, not even with magic or science fiction technology, just no!
- Stupid protagonist not taking obvious openings.
- pregnancy over all (not my thing - don't have kids in RL and I don't want any either...and even worse when I read something like a Harry Potter fanfiction! Damned, they are teens! Them having relationships is ok, as it's what teens do...still, pregnancy at that age sucks, so writing about it in a positive sense weirds me out!)
- Soulmates/Imprinting etc. (Seriously, love is a beautiful thing, but forcing people to be together never is! Hell, we've had that in RL! It was called arranged marriage and the west luckily dumped this decades ago, as it was crappy!)
- "Highschool" (or other RL-Situation) AU! If I read a story, like say about vampire, then taking away the vampirism makes it bland and boring! I don't want the Harry Potter cast in a regular school without magic and Voldemort being a regular criminal or the cast of Twilight not being vampires! Don't get why this is a thing at all!
- inventing siblings for canon characters, as that seldom works well (mostly those siblings turn out to be Mary-Sues!)
- defending the bad guys (unless you change the premise!), if you say write a Harry Potter fanfiction and try to turn Draco into a sympathetic person (he's not, he's a petty bully not worth a shred of sympathy!)

There, done for now - got more, but I'd have to spend a while thinking about it...I think those are enough anyway!
 
Canon rewrites are fine, honestly?
So you tried to sneak in the Do Not Mention The Orientation of Characters Thing Literally In The Thread Footer.
Sometimes the obvious, isn't.
There's probably a specific word for this phobia to address the pregnancy thing.
Soulmates can be weird, sure. Also, arranged marriages still exist in the west, feel sad.
I half agree with the evils of normie AUs but like, I write fanfiction for old teen dramas so... hypocrite? I guess?
OCs are fine, even the sibling ones. THERE ARE DOZENS OF US I SAY, DOZENS
Yeah, that one I agree with on surface for now.
 
Blaflaix said:
The critical part of ROB is the Random.
They aren't a character with a stake in the story, they aren't an antagonist or protagonist or ally.
They show up, fuck around with the MC, then leave.

There's no real conflict because they are Omnipotent.
There's no real character because they are Random.
It really is just like a tornado with a face.

Once they become part of the story, with motivations and interactions, they become a normal character.
A powerful antagonist is not a ROB, they are a challenge to overcome.
Click to expand...
Click to shrink...
It shouldn't even be an entity and instead be some glitch in the matrix or someone messed up a spell or something. A natural reaction.

Mundane AUs. They can work if the characters mundane version is connected to the in universe one.

But I don't like how they are more common then cannon related fics.

Also in Mundane AUs characters should resemble their cannon personalities and roles. I saw fan art for a JJK/TLOU fusion fic that put the cast of JJK into the Last of Us setting with no cursed energy.

In this world Sukuna should be Yuji's Darwinist uncle/insane survivalist who turned out to be right who lives with Urhame alone/or with others who despises Yuji for being "weak" in face of the zombie fungus apocalypse. If Sukuna does care for Yuji it has to be explained in cannon as a process.

If Sukuna and Yuji take on the role of Joel and Ellie. Then Sukuna's rampage against the fireflies shouldn't happen because he cares about the brat. But because he prefers living in the fungal apocalypse land and being able to commit cannibalism with no one to stop him.

I can see Sukuna learning to somewhat care about Yuji in different circumstances. But if he did it would be tough loce.

Kenny would probably also have something to do with the outbreak in the first place.
 
Last edited:
Having been on a bit of a My Hero Academia kick recently:

- No, Izuku is not some super-genius Quirk analyst. He's a weird obsessive kid who likes to write out profiles of heroes that are probably about as useful as a wiki synopsis.
- No, Izuku is not some sort of permanently disabled by his emotions. He definitely cries etc., but that never stops him from acting.
- Yes, Izuku is perfectly happy to both break the law and punch a motherfucker. He does this at least twice (Stain, first All For One fight) and would do so again if needed.
- Yes, Todoroki will absolutely join him, and will 100% punch the police.
- No, Todoroki is not some sort of permanently disabled by his emotions.
- In fact, none of the MHA cast that I'm aware of are permanently disabled by their emotions; they're mostly heroes and hero students, you can't do heroics if you are incapable of action due to overwhelming emotions all the time. I say this as someone who's suffered from chronic depression to the point of literally being unable to get out of bed at points: no, someone like that cannot manage the high-stress, high-action, extremely physically demanding job of being a hero. They would be unable to pass the entrance exams, and if by some miracle they managed to, they would quickly be failed out of the heroics course. UA is not a therapy group, it's a school with specific goals for its students, and we know that they are completely okay with ditching students who do not measure up.
- Yes, Mineta sucks and should never have been written into the manga. Worse, he's boring.
- Bakugou is a piece of shit, but you have to give the manga allowances for early installment weirdness; harping on the whole 'why not jump off the roof' thing from the very first chapter over and over just kinda... doesn't work when the entire rest of MHA completely forgets it ever happens. Izuku doesn't even care about it beyond how it might fuck up Bakugou's life if he did it in the same chapter! It's absolutely an inexcusable thing to say, but Bakugou's never treated as the kind of person who'd say that in the rest of the manga, for all that he's still consistently a piece of shit.
 
Last edited:
There's a really annoying thing that happens in fanfic where authors get attached to some turn of phrase or epithet, and then start using it all the time, despite it maybe only being mentioned like once if at all in canon and often not being appropriate.

Naruto has the example of "precious people", which tbf is mostly annoying because of how it's just kind of an awkward translation that doesn't really read well.

Harry Potter then has shit like "the Golden Trio" which just sounds so inappropriately aggrandising. Similarly "brightest witch of her age" - something that as far I can tell was said like once in canon. Both horribly overused and in this really weird way that comes off as very egotistical - it's not something that Hermione should be saying about herself.

iirc Ranma fic has a similar thing with the "nerima wrecking crew" or something? though I don't really know Ranma well.
 
Erebeal said:
There's a really annoying thing that happens in fanfic where authors get attached to some turn of phrase or epithet, and then start using it all the time, despite it maybe only being mentioned like once if at all in canon and often not being appropriate.

Naruto has the example of "precious people", which tbf is mostly annoying because of how it's just kind of an awkward translation that doesn't really read well.

Harry Potter then has shit like "the Golden Trio" which just sounds so inappropriately aggrandising. Similarly "brightest witch of her age" - something that as far I can tell was said like once in canon. Both horribly overused and in this really weird way that comes off as very egotistical - it's not something that Hermione should be saying about herself.

iirc Ranma fic has a similar thing with the "nerima wrecking crew" or something? though I don't really know Ranma well.
Click to expand...
Click to shrink...
A Google search suggests that Nabiki is the source of "Nerima Wrecking Crew" but that it was used maybe once or twice. Can't confirm, manga is too damn long.
 
Anaja said:
Does that even show up in canon rather than just being a fandom term?
I could imagine Snape using it once sarcastically, but nothing beyond that. I certainly don't remember it.
Click to expand...
Click to shrink...
It doesn't no. And as you say, even if it was it would be something sarcastic like that, not a general term, and certainly not something the narrative should be using. Like, you have fics saying stuff like this: "Hermione Granger, the Brightest Witch of Her Age and one-third of the Golden Trio.", which is just weird.
 
Reader mode
You must login or register to reply here.
Back
Top