Recurring Themes?

[ThisAdamGuy]

[THIS POST HAS BEEN CONSUMED BY THE VOID]

 

[CharlesEBrown]

Closest I've found in my stuff:

• 1st Person Superheroes 3rd Person everything else.
• Most characters wind up in committed relationships, but not all of these last due to someone getting killed at some point.
• Life is cheap - especially if you're a support character.
• There is almost always a red-head in the main cast somewhere, usually female, and often either the love interest, main villain or both (though Jack Diamond avoided this so far...).
• There is often a "Cinderella/Ugly Duckling" moment.
• There is always a "lore dump" character (Carmine Gorman; VICC; The Author of the Forwards in True Blue; Strange Awakening actually has three at different points - Doctor Hastings, Olean, Elaine Seraph; there is a long chain of them in Between Worlds at multiple points, some of which do not last very long...)

Probably more but those are the ones I've found.

 

[HisDivineShadow]

Have you ever taken a step back to look at your stories, and realized that they all have something in common that you didn't even know you were putting into them? What was it?

For me, I just realized that I keep using the "helpless boy, badass girl" trope. The boy (usually the POV character) is thrown completely unprepared into a magical world full of danger and adventure. He meets a girl who grew up in that world and knows how to survive and even thrive in it. She takes the boy under her wing, they become friends, and gradually the boy becomes a badass in his own way. Juryokine has Toke and Zashiel. Henry Rider has Henry and Ethan. Skinwalkers has Zave and Fey. IAFADJAGTIAFR?! has Justin and Lena. The Slayer and the Sphinx has it (kind of) except Porter is the amnesiac fighter and Sarah is the knowledgeable... knowledge-haver. I'm even doing it right now in XNPC with Jeremy and Miranda.

For something I use so much, it's funny that I never realized it until just now. I've always liked strong female heroes (when they're done right, not when they're Captain Marvel) but I guess I must have a thing for reversing the damsel in distress trope too that I never noticed.

And just as I was writing this, another thing occurred to me: unrequited love. In most of these stories, one of those two characters will fall in love with the other, but the other won't return their feelings. Henry falls in love with Ethan, but Ethan falls in love with Jade. Fey falls in love with Zave, but Zave is too busy freaking out about the whole "we have no idea what you are but it isn't human" thing to notice. Toke falls in love with Zashiel, Zashiel feels bad for him and spends the entire second book hooking him up with another girl. The only ones who don't fall in love at all are Justin and Lena (mostly because Justin gets with someone else) and the only ones who actually become a couple are Porter and Sarah. Jeremy and Miranda are going to have been in a relationship before the book starts, but I don't know if they're going to stay that way yet.

I...don't really know what to make of this one. Any armchair psychologists want to take a crack at it?

I'm interested in behavioral psychology, so I'll allow myself a suggestion: you describe weakness as an advantage in the world of your stories because it's safe to be in the role of the weak one there. To live through that experience. Maybe in real life, you have to be strong with no chance to be weak.

 

[CharlesEBrown]

Another thread got me thinking about stuff I did in the past and I realized that any time I have multiple main characters (either a team, or a series of parallel stories, like the Omniverse project I've mentioned a few times was) I always have one or more of the following (usually all five but in three different characters):
1. A character in academia (usually a teacher - come to think of it, usually a HISTORY teacher for some odd reason, once a librarian)
2. An LGBTQ+ character
3. A Medical Professional (usually a doctor of some sort, occasionally a nurse or EMT)
4. A character who abandoned or was forced out of an athletic field.
5. An "outsider" - a character either from another world, another time, or another reality.

One of my early favorite characters, from a long-abandoned series called "Project: Guardian" was three of these - a lesbian doctor who abandoned her promising career as an ice skater when one of her parents was found dead and the other disappeared without a trace (but leaving her with a secret that allowed her to become a Batman-esque superhero).

 

[hidayo]

I use disappointment as a recurring theme.

 

[HisDivineShadow]

The only thing I’ve noticed so far in my stories is that my characters always seem to carry a clear, or sometimes hidden weariness with life. Maybe if I add a dog to the story, it’ll bring in a bit more life?

 

[Ai-chan]

Ai-chan's recurring theme?

"It's so silly you must laugh."

"I have eyes and I must cry."

 

[LuoirM]

Dry humor (like, straight-face, serious delivery of an absurd joke), if I have to count in the last 80 chapter, I'd probably found 160

 

[DaelyxLenAuphydas]

Oh, several times. Let me see if I can find them all.

- I realized that every single story has a major dance scene right before a major plot development. I dont even like dancing, why do I keep writing it in all of my stories!?

- Characters with unrequited lust for people they consider family and a mountain of self loathing and disgust as a consequence. No, they never act on it, that's kind of the point, it's more something they have to work through. Never a good thing, either.

- SIBLINGS. I will never stop writing siblings. I have all the siblings. You cannot STOP me. ...Ties in with the previous a lot.

- Very garden-variety smarmy aristocrats or chauvinistic jackasses as antagonists. More importantly, its kinda rare for me to have a proper antagonist beyond things like this.

- Main characters tend to be really driven and have more to do with starting the plot than the antagonists do. Usually the 'status quo' is more the enemy than anything more specific.

- Cosmic or celestial iconography in character designs!

- I tend to like writing overly dramatic dream scenes, though most end up on the cutting room floor so its not like its that common in my actual writing. Just two, there, I think. Its just an easy way to start writing when i'm stuck though!

 

[HisDivineShadow]

Oh, several times. Let me see if I can find them all.

- I realized that every single story has a major dance scene right before a major plot development. I dont even like dancing, why do I keep writing it in all of my stories!?

- Characters with unrequited lust for people they consider family and a mountain of self loathing and disgust as a consequence. No, they never act on it, that's kind of the point, it's more something they have to work through. Never a good thing, either.

- SIBLINGS. I will never stop writing siblings. I have all the siblings. You cannot STOP me. ...Ties in with the previous a lot.

- Very garden-variety smarmy aristocrats or chauvinistic jackasses as antagonists. More importantly, its kinda rare for me to have a proper antagonist beyond things like this.

- Main characters tend to be really driven and have more to do with starting the plot than the antagonists do. Usually the 'status quo' is more the enemy than anything more specific.

- Cosmic or celestial iconography in character designs!

- I tend to like writing overly dramatic dream scenes, though most end up on the cutting room floor so its not like its that common in my actual writing. Just two, there, I think. Its just an easy way to start writing when i'm stuck though!

some of this sounds familiar to me