Last night watched the “Evil Mirror” story…with the haunted mirror going about killing people and plants and dogs and whatever…
For a while it was shaping up that the heros would succeed, but it want back to two tropes that are getting boring now
a) setting up the sequel
b) no proof of the evilness of the mirror.
Just for once - I’d like to see a “one off” movie where the supernatural thing is proven, the hero succeeds and they have the video evidence they planned all along.
If you’ve seen the haunted mirror movie (can’t remember the name) - I actually thought it would end with the anchor impaling the brother, then going on to break the mirror - and the sister having to live with the guilt. now that would have been an ending!
I have, and the detail is rather unsatisfying. From what I remember, it merely paints a picture of Tom Riddle’s progression from troubled child toward becoming a megalomaniacal sociopath. Problem is, it does nothing to add any complexity to the adult character, Voldemort only behaves like a single-minded sociopathic megalomaniac whose only desire is to become more powerful. There is no complexity to the contemporary character, he is deeply uninteresting.
Now, Severus Snape, there is the interesting character, the one she builds all the complexity into. And there is a definite parallel in him to Darth Vader, the Emperor is pure evil, but Vader shows signs of being interesting, of having actual humanity behind all that anger.
Ironically, one of the best studies in character construction is Galaxy Quest: most of the major characters are pretty layered, although Sarus does come off as pretty one-dimensional. There is something to be said for larding a story heavily with absurdity and humor, because if the main plot is kind of weak and tired, at least well done humor and/or weirdness will make it entertaining (e.g., Fifth Element).
The trope to kill is the “getting grilled by the detectives at the station without a lawyer” one. Even the stupidest criminal type knows enough to lawyer up instantly.
One I just watched: Dying man, with his last breaths, leaves an incredibly cryptic message instead of just telling the protagonist the succinct answer.
I really hate the “stick thin actress who devours 3 refrigerators every meal.” I mean, if they’re an athlete or it’s tied into their superpowers, fine. Like, I can kind of buy it with some of the fighters in Dragonball Z because they seem to spend every second of every day working out. In reality, professional athletes man or woman can put away truly insane amounts of food and still be fit.
But it was really obnoxious with, for instance, Fred in Angel. I’m highly skeptical Fred would really look like she did if she ate a chocolate pie and the Denny’s grand slam every morning. She didn’t even do much fighting on the team! It just seems like the thing that encourages excuses and body image issues. “Why can’t I eat 3 times the amount my boyfriend does and still look like Amy Acker like Fred does? My genetics are fucked.”
Like, I’m not saying portray everyone as anorexic or anything, that’s just as bad (unless it’s a Very Special Episode I guess). But maybe lay off the weirdo relationship with food a bit in the writing.
I hate The Indestructible Villain. You know the type – like Jason in the later Friday the Thirteenth movies. The kind that, even when you think they’re dead, aren’t dead. So the cocksure heroes walk off, allowing said Bad Guy to attack them again. As soon as they do, they’ve forfeited my sympathy. Especially if they’ve seen the guy apparently Come Back From the Dead before.
Drop the body off a cliff! Tie it up! Chop it into little pieces! (If the pieces tend to reconnect, as has been happening for over half a century, put them in individual containers. I think Tupperware would defeat a sectioned T-1000) Embed it in concrete! But do Something! And for Og’s sake, don’t go standing in front of windows or doors.
Also, I realize that it’s a way of building tension, but any time the characters hold up Getting On the Train or Using the Escape Portal or Pulling up the Ladder just so they can have a Meaningful Discussion or a Love scene instead of getting to safety. If the Bad Guys then get them, they have forfeited all my sympathy. This has happened more times than I can count (pretty famously in The Matrix), and was so commonly used in pulp literature than L. Sprague decamp inveighed against it in The Science Fiction Writer’s Handbook.
Closely related is the trope in humorous movies where the hero gets a cab to wait “just a minute” while he goes in, and it stays there the whole play/movie. Even though they used this in the movie of Arsenic and Old Lace, I still hate it.
Ditto with the “I’m getting married today, so don’t try to hold me up” trope. It must have been fresh once, but it’s been used so often that it has lost its power of tension and humor – once I see it, I know exactly what will happen. If you’re going to use this trope (or any of the ones I’ve listed), your only excuse is if you’re subverting it.
Yes, BUT… later in the movie, Lancaster admits to Jean Seberg that SHE’S the real reason he stays at work late.
His wife may be a bitch, but she’s RIGHT to say he always finds some excuse not to come home. And in any case, George Kennedy is the one who saves the day, and he’d have done it even if Lancaster wasn’t around.
The “Genius Computer Hacker Parter” who can access any system or electronic device in seconds using just a few seconds of furious typing.
*Hero: Genius Computer Hacker Partner, I’m at the Villain’s gym locker but there’s a digital lock on it and I don’t know the combination!
GCHP: Okay, put the phone up against the lock. [a few seconds of furious typing] The combination is “1-2-3-4-5.”
Hero: Thanks, GCHP, you’re the best. Aha! Just as I suspected! He HAS been stealing towels from his hotel!*
__
The wife/girlfriend/love interest/kid whose sole purpose is to be taken hostage/threatened and subsequently saved.
*Hero: I’ve got you now, Villain!
Villain: Nah-ah-aahh, Hero! I have your wife, girlfriend, children, and your genius computer hacker partner strapped to a bomb on a sinking ship in a lake of acid inside a volcano ON THE MOON and if you don’t let me go, they’ll DIE!
Yeesh, thank you! If you don’t like comic book movie tropes, I’ve worked out a brilliant scheme for you: DON’T GO TO COMIC BOOK MOVIES! How fucking hard is that to understand?
Right now A Most Wanted Man is playing in theaters. Philip Hoffman’s last role. Very good, taught political thriller, well written, acted and directed. Seriously worth your time. No MacGuffins no evil villains, no world destroying devices. You can find dozens of movies like this at your local art movie house, or on Netflix or Amazon. When those of us who like comic book movies go to a comic book movie, we are going for the tropes. They give the movie it’s structure. They are fun. They are what people want to see. Don’t like em? That’s fine, but why subject yourself to them? It’s like a person going on a roller coaster and complaining that its going too fast and shouldn’t twist around like that.
It’s not a MacGuffin if it does anything useful. Death Star plans? Not a MacGuffin. Travel papers for escaping Morcco? Not a MacGuffin. Holy Grail? Not a MacGuffin.
The world-saving object is the Talisman or Elixor.
Now that we have that out of the way… I would ban explicit hero’s journey stories. At this point it just lazy storytelling. It seems like half the fantasy/sci fi movies I watch now I’ve already read the Cliff’s Notes on, because they’re all just changing character names and places.
It’s OK to use the basic structure for other purposes. If you know what to look for, you can see it in movies as diverse as The Fisher King, Almost Famous, and Dodgeball.
What useful thing does the Holy Grail do?
Still, I think your main point, that the OP misuses the term “MacGuffin,” is a valid one.
[QUOTE=TVTropes]
To determine if a thing is a MacGuffin:
• check to see if it is interchangeable. For example, in a caper story the MacGuffin could be either the Mona Lisa or the Hope diamond, it makes no difference which. The rest of the story (i.e. it being stolen) would be exactly the same. It doesn’t matter which it is, it is only necessary for the characters to want it.
• Does it do anything, and if it does, is it ever actually used in story? If the answer to both is yes, it’s a Plot Device, not a MacGuffin.
[/QUOTE]
It depends on the story. Some versions of the Arthur myth, the knights go out on the grail quest because Arthur and/or the land itself has become sick or wounded, and the Grail is the only thing that can heal them. In other versions, Arthur hears that there’s this Grail thing out there, and decides it would be totally tits if one of his knights found it.
I was stretching to find a third example off the top of my head. I thought only of the healing and life-extending powers of the Grail, but yeah, it can be a true MacGuffin in certain versions. Probably its own category altogether, anyway.
Although the MacGuffin is a known term now, I rarely actually see true ones used lately.
