I’ve been catching up on some of the shows I’ve missed over the last few weeks. We don’t have cable, so I miss the really cool stuff that’s on the pay channels (Game of Thrones, Breaking Bad, Walking Dead, etc. – that’s where DVD sets come in), but we get all the major broadcast networks on the antenna. Yeah, you read that right – ANTENNA – big wiry thing on top of the house. Gives you FREE TV. Works great in metropolitan areas like Southern California, but not so much when you’re in the podunks of Dumbfuckistan. Sorry.
Anyway, what I miss on the regular broadcast nights I can get on the Internet. Usually Hulu, where I have literally hundreds of shows queued up from all my different interests, or the actual network website. Most of them have their recent episodes available for streaming. With video-on-demand becoming more common, and sites like Hulu, Netflix and Amazon doing their own original programming, regular broadcast television will likely go the way of the dodo at some point in the future. Especially when one can sit at their computer and cram all their favorite shows in on one rainy weekend while sitting in their pajamas with popcorn and hot chocolate. Great for those depressive fits when talking to a live human just won’t do.
So, there I was watching the last couple episodes of this season’s The Mentalist on CBS.com (CBS doesn’t have an agreement with Hulu). The Mentalist was one of those shows that took me a while to get into. I couldn’t quite connect with the characters initially, and the premise was just another knock off of the quirky-genius-solves-crimes that started with Sherlock Holmes and progressed through Hercule Poirot, Columbo, and into Castle. But it grew on me. I became invested in the characters. It took far too long for the whole Red John thing to play out, which cost them viewers, but I held on. Then I was disappointed when they broke the original team up and transitioned the leads into the FBI. I have my doubts that the real FBI would tolerate someone like Patrick Jane for longer than it takes to say his name, genius case closer or not. But I still stuck with it. Then this season’s finale came and I suddenly realized the cliché monster had attacked me yet again.
You might remember a bit I did last year on clichés (Attack of the Killer Clichés), mainly those found in science fiction. Well, this time it’s about those banal tropes we see everywhere, over and over again, in TV, movies and books. We as writers can do better than this. Don’t make me get the flying monkeys…
1) Public Declaration of Love: usually done at the last possible second when the object of said declaration has already boarded a train, bus, plane, boat, whatever to move onto the next point in their life and leaving the declarant behind. In the case of The Mentalist, it’s a plane. Good performances aside (and the not-so-little-fact that those two particular characters just shouldn’t be together romantically), it’s a tired scene that’s been overused far too many times. There’s plenty of other ways to get this information out and not have it be a schmaltzy retread. For some brilliant relationship writing (hell, brilliant writing in general) watch Farscape. There’s a reason that show still has such a strong following over a decade after it’s cancellation.
2) Last Possible Second Rescue: apparently it’s impossible to diffuse a bomb before the timer reaches :01. I have yet to see one actually blow up because they just couldn’t get it done in time, but I’ve also never seen one with more time on the clock than one second. I’ve seen this one so many times, I actually get mad at the writers for being lazy. Or someone’s falling and they get the benefit of a one-handed grab by somebody, leaving them dangling over the abyss but not dead. Or being pushed from in front of a runaway (insert conveyance here). Or the bad guy gets shot just as he is about to shoot one of the good guys. Or, … well, you get the idea. Drama and tension and suspense can be built without falling into the old tried-and-true. Challenge yourself and avoid the traps.
3) Good Guy is Bad Guy: you know the one – loyal friend, boss, partner, spouse who’s been with you through thick and thin, who NO ONE would ever suspect, is actually the brilliant mastermind behind all the hurt our hero experiences. Talk about betrayal. And boring. This goes for those occasions when an institution, such as the police, the CIA, or the local church elders, is actually the corrupt bastards behind the problems, too. Does this crap actually exist in the real world? Sure it does. But it’s no fun when I know who the disguised bad guy is in the first few minutes of a new show or movie. Kind of makes the rest of the show moot.
4) Bad Guy is REALLY Bad: he twirls his moustache, kicks puppies, tortures people just for fun, etc. He is more of a caricature than a character (I’m looking at you, Slade Wilson). But bad guys are far more convoluted than that. Good and bad are merely two sides of the same coin. It’s a perspective thing. In the latest Superman telling, Man of Steel, General Zod is supposedly the bad guy. He is hell-bent on destroying Earth and that’s all we see. The truth is, though, he is doing exactly as he was bred and trained to do – protect and save Krypton. He is the hero in his mind, and he can’t understand why Kal-El doesn’t agree with him. Bad guys have reasons for doing what they’re doing. They have lives, families, hobbies, just like the rest of us. The most interesting baddies are the ones we can identify with, or even feel sorry for. Make them real and you’ll find your stories suddenly opening up with possibilities.
5) Dead but not Dead: this one is probably the one that annoys me the most. One of the lead characters has been killed! Oh no! Whatever shall we do? Cue crying co-characters, sad music, funeral scene, and pulled heartstrings. But wait! He’s not really dead! It was a 1) ruse to fool the bad guy, 2) mistaken identity, or 3) alternative time line. Just don’t. If you’re going to kill a character, make it for good. See Walking Dead if you have any doubts how to do it.
So there’s my latest batch of cliché pet peeves. I’m sure there’s plenty more out there, but let’s try to kill these off first. We’ll all be better writers, and I’ll be less annoyed. At least, for awhile…
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