Vote for the fantasy story that is the most cliched!

Any of these ideas could be turned into a strong, non-cliched story.

HConn said:

Any of these ideas could be turned into a strong, non-cliched story.

Click to expand...

That's what I was thinking. But that's true of just about any cliche in the right hands.

Of course they can, but they cliche stems from how often they don't.

You forgot a couple:

The orphan who is unknowingly the last descendent of a famous hero and/or the prophecied one to save the world

The young girl who defies society's conventions and becomes a famous warrior/ruler who saves the world/nation/village.

brokenfingers said:

The orphan who is unknowingly the last descendent of a famous hero and/or the prophecied one to save the world

Click to expand...

Or a descendent of a god or something like that. This is also overdone in computer role-playing games.

Probably you all know this book, but Diana Jones's "Tough Guide to Fantasyland" is a wonderfully funny compendium of fantasy cliches. Buy it if you don't have it and prepare to laugh a lot.

What prevents me from voting for this category is the idea that *none* of these cliches are limited to merely fantasy. But are cliches in all genres.

So therefore, I want to vote for a fantasy specific one.

Rabe...
...being difficult!

Vomaxx said:

Probably you all know this book, but Diana Jones's "Tough Guide to Fantasyland" is a wonderfully funny compendium of fantasy cliches. Buy it if you don't have it and prepare to laugh a lot.

Click to expand...

Last I checked it was out of print. And my copy's gone on walkabout.

i read more stories on writing boards than anything else, i think. one i see popping up every now and then is the deposed spoiled princess thrown into the big bad world has to get her kingdom back. popular amongst teen girls and middle-aged men, for some reason (before you ask, no, i haven't written one).

from my experience, the grand-daddy of 'em all is the ragtag band of misfits banding together to destroy the ultimate evil in his tower of power. almost invariably a trilogy. and who do they trust with the only weapon/item that can end the terror? why, the least likely of them all, of course. this is why i quit reading fantasy altogether back in early '90's, it was just all the same. some of the dragonlance books were pretty good, though.