Board Thread:Theories/@comment-26624146-20170814155115/@comment-24850639-20180809203628

Cliche isn't inherently bad. It's tropes that people usually have a problem with. All tropes are cliche, but being cliche doesn't automatically mean it is a trope. I'll try to explain lol.

An underdog and/or outcast from society overcoming impossible odds to become incredibly powerful is extremely cliche. However there soooooo many different ways of telling this story that it hasn't become a trope. The side of good ultimately winning the decisive battle is extremely cliche. Yet again, there are so many different forms and options of telling this story that it doesn't become a trope. As long as the road to get to said decisive battle, and the battle itself aren't highly predictable, it doesn't annoy you that you know whats going to eventually happen. You're just looking for what shatters your expectations along the way, like the surprise death of an important character, or some other kind of deus ex machina.

Here's some examples of tropes:

Distant/Dead parents - Everyone loves to root for someone who comes from humble beginnings, but why are the parents always either dead or just flat out not involved in their children's lives? Or if the parent's are actively involved, then at some point something tragic happens where they end up dead and/or gone anyway. There's not too many ways you can put a spin on the parents not being there, and is thus a trope. Unfortunately AoT is guilty of this one.

Fate/Destiny - The protagonist turns out to be some kind of "Child of Prophecy" or "Chosen One" that makes them preordained in some kind of way to deal with the ultimate threat of the series. Again, not too many spins on this one. AoT kinda avoided this, but kinda fell into the trap at the same time. Eren's situation was forced upon him - we all knew how much he hated Titans because of what happened with his mom, and that he never asked to be transformed into a Titan. However at the same time, he has been given literally the ULTIMATE power to deal with the Titans, so how can he not eventually succeed?

Big breasticles - Not necessarily a problem when you're looking for some fap material, but otherwise it's a little confounding how most, if not all the girls in a series have gravity-defying racks for no apparent reason. If one of you know of such a school, or corporation where this is the case, please give me directions. I like how AoT avoided this one, and you love the woman of  this series for their characters, not their bodies. Hange Zoe is bae. Just sayin.

Here's why I think we're having this discussion: another very common trope in anime/manga is known as "Tsundere". This is a character development process where a character is initially depicted as being incredibly cold/apathetic or abrasive towards others, but is eventually shown to have a much warmer and more relatable side. This alone isn't inherently bad, it's how its used. This form of character development is generally limited to females, and then applied to a love interest. So girl likes guy (or girl) and that somehow translates to deciding to be incredibly rude or violent towards said character before eventually revealing that they've been in love with them this entire time. If any of you are 90s babys, think Helga from Hey Arnold LMAO.

But seriously, its the love application of this cliche that earns it the trope classification. There's no need to make expressing love for someone so convoluted, yet so many writers seem to love to tread those waters over the course of their entire frickin series. An argument can be made that Mikasa's actions towards Eren are a form of Tsundere. While not as cold as she was at the very beginning of the series where she essentially tells him he can't do certain things without her, she's consistently maintained this demeanor of butting in when he doesn't want her help, or assuming that she needs to rescue him all the time because he can't handle himself. While not the same as flat out insulting him or harming him, it's still pretty demeaning, and arguably emasculating. Eren eventually ending up with someone who treats him like this makes me sick, not even mentioning the whole adoptive sister aspect. Ymir on the other hand, was a perfect example of how to avoid making it a trope. She CLEARLY has always had feelings for Historia, and was never shy about expressing them. At the same time, she also wasn't shy about challenging Historia's philosophies and ways of thinking in a way that caused her to grow. Even though you can consider it a form of being hostile, it served a clear purpose in the two helping each other develop. She was hostile to practically anyone else (quite a bitch actually lol), yet she showed that she cared for her comrades by appeasing both sides. She transformed and revealed her secret to protect her friends, but also turned herself in because she felt guilt over personally wronging Reiner and Bertholdt. In this we gain insight into her background, and understand her more completely as a character. Mikasa's actions toward Eren don't make me understand her any better, they actually confuse me. How the heck is she so overprotective when he's the one who inspired her to fight in the first place? Sorry for the long post, but I enjoy this discussion when it's actually a productive discussion and not a toxic shipping debate.