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4 Thriller Tropes and Twists That This Thriller Fan Hates

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This is my second post on what to avoid while writing exciting thrillers. You can read the first one here.

As is customary (and necessary) with these kinds of posts, let’s get my thriller credentials out of the way.

I’m a not thriller writer yet. I’ve been however reading and watching thrillers for as long as I can remember. It’s one of my favorite genres, and over the years, I’ve developed an acute sense of what works, what is too tired, and what really shouldn’t be attempted for the good of the writer and the audience.

Let’s go over four pet peeves of mine, why/how they came to be so, and what can you do about it if you want to include them in your story.

And please remember, while readers and watchers come with all kinds of tastes and preferences, if there is one person in your audience that hates one thing, there’s a big chance there are many more people who agree.

  • The “They were dead all along!” ending.

Ah, yes.

This type of ending is nostalgic and takes me all the way back to 1999 – a simpler time. When your audiences (including me) hadn’t seen this ending a bunch of times before and welcomed the twist.

I welcomed it so much that it elevated the whole movie for me. Also, my bad for attempting the see the movie on the small screen. Still, watching this movie was a better experience due to this surprise ending.

You seriously need to watch it (affiliate link) if you like supernatural stuff featuring ghosts.

Then, 2 years later, another mystery/thriller/horror came out. Also featuring ghosts.

I honestly enjoyed this one (aff. link) as a whole more than the first one. Maybe because I watched it on a bigger screen, with the lights out, at home alone with a friend where we were on the sixth floor. The wind noise could get to such spooky levels that you could shoot a Paranormal Activity there without paying for sound effects.

Then the ending was…yes, they were dead all along. And… I didn’t mind. It made sense. It didn’t take away from the experience. It worked for the movie.

But this kind of ending is not the happily ever after romantic comedy overs expect and welcome. You can’t keep writing thriller after thriller with this ending and then be surprised when the audiences hate you for it.

7 years after the second movie I mentioned, a romantic mystery thriller came out. Solid actors. Interesting story. Likable characters. And then the ending…. oh, yes, you guessed it…They were dead all along.

Now, there is no law or rule that says you can’t use this ending. But it’s no longer a surprising, impressive twist.

It disappoints the reader/watcher.

Seek out the films I talked about above. See if your ending brings something different to the table.

Chances are, your audiences will prefer a more used but less “memorable” ending. Because while you want to be remembered, you’d rather be remembered for having entertained them.

  • Memory loss.

Ah, memory loss…

Where would most genres be without characters that suffered from some sort of temporary or permanent amnesia?

Like most things, earlier ones in the market are going to receive a better welcome. Especially if one of the earlier ones was so original in its storytelling and the screenplay.

I love the film Memento (aff.link). The story is told chronologically backward, with the ending being the beginning. And the answer to whodunnit is also just…amazing.

Memento tells the story of Leonard, a man with short-term memory loss trying to find out who killed his wife. But due to his condition, he can’t trust anyone, including himself. And this makes for a very compelling watch.

But Memento is an exception for me.

I usually get bored. If I read memory loss in the description, I put down the book. I don’t pick the film. I debate whether to continue the series.

Don’t get me wrong. Memory loss is horrible, and if it happened to someone I knew, I’d do everything I could do to help them and be there for them.

However, I don’t have the energy and enthusiasm to do that for fictional characters.

Because I have seen them so often.

While as a writer you need to put your characters through hell and make them suffer through/deal with different sorts of conflict, memory loss should be handled with care.

Is it making your story more thrilling or less thrilling?

Is it making it more or less predictable? You don’t want your audiences bored. And when it comes to predictability, they don’t want to be able to predict certain things.

How much has your audience seen this kind of memory loss in this kind of situation with this kind of character? (Be careful before you say never. They probably have.)

  • The protagonist has an identical twin!

I don’t have anything against twins or twin characters in fiction.

My complaint is about certain tropes.

Are your twins so radically different in personality, maybe to the point if one is a good cop and the other is a vicious criminal?

Is one twin happily married with kids living in suburbia while the other can’t stay sober, hold down a job/keep a relationship, or a job?

Do they dress as different as Marilyn Manson in make-up and a Jonas Brother?

These twins, because they are basically night and day, usually have a falling out. They don’t keep in contact.

Oh, and often, they have managed to keep it a secret from anyone that they have a twin.

Yet somehow, despite all the extreme differences, when push comes to shove, they can replace each other just like that and no one notices. (Eye roll.)

I’ve had identical twin friends, and even when they dressed alike, and their personalities were pretty similar, they were still clearly distinguishable from each other.

Despite the shared genes, these are separate people with separate identities. And the more time they spend apart, the more difficult it’d be to imitate each other flawlessly.

This is such a common plot device in so many genres, but I see it most often with thrillers.

I’m not saying you shouldn’t write about identical twins. They are fascinating. But you should know what came before you.

Bring something fresher to the table. Go to where authors haven’t traveled to so often.

Your biggest twist probably shouldn’t be “Hah, he had a twin! That explains it.” Because that is probably what the audiences guessed first and wished you wouldn’t go there.

Now, if you’ve conducted market research and found out that thrillers with twins are selling insane numbers, then fine. I guess it is what the market wants.

But be sure.

  • Split Personality Disorder (especially as the source of crimes/big plot twist/twist ending)

Audiences, especially those who deal with mental health issues and/or those who are sensitive about mental health in general (and yes, this is a big audience in numbers) are a bit sick of seeing people with mental health issues being the criminal and/or villain.

And certain mental illnesses fascinate writers more than others.

The movie Split (Amazon aff. link) takes a bit of a pass from me because James McAvoy is a phenomenal actor. And also because we know what we are going to watch going in.

His split personality is not the big twist. While there are some issues in the film, the diagnosis is not it.

If you are giving your villain mental illness(es), be very careful. Get help from sensitivity readers. Use trigger warnings.

And make sure you’re not pulling a variant of “they were dead all along” but in the form of “oh, one of their many personalities is the murderer!”

Some people love that twist. However, even people who loved that twist the first time might not enjoy it over and over.

Friendly Reminder

You don’t have to take my advice. You don’t really need to take anyone’s advice when it comes to your story. But it’s always a good idea to stop and consider.

How does your target audience feel about this?

And it’s always possible to combine several seemingly unrelated or not-so-fresh ideas and come up with something interesting.

As much as I have complained about memory loss, protagonists who were revealed to be dead, and twin replacement tropes, it doesn’t mean there are no stories left to tell here.

Hell, if one of your twins had complete memory loss, the other replaced him/her but then they are revealed to be dead all along? If you can coherently pull this off, send me the link to your book. I’ll take a look!

It might be pushing it to give them a split personality disorder on the top of everything, though…:)

*

What about you? What thriller tropes and twists are you sick of? Let me know!

 

 

 

 

3 Things to Avoid When Writing a Thriller (According to an Avid Thriller Fan)

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Image by Pete Linforth from Pixabay.

I’m not a bestselling thriller author, so why write this article?

Because for anyone writing a solid thriller, there is a chance I’m in your target audience as a thriller reader and watcher.

Legal, medical, psychological, horror, action, romantic…I’m all for these thriller subgenres and more.

I consume quite a bit of it, and when I’m finally confident in my idea and story, I’ll also write thrillers. (But I am slightly more in love with writing romance, so those next books will get written first.)

I find thrillers a very tricky genre to write as the audience usually has very high expectations, has already seen many variations of your characters, conflicts, and main concept. They are sick of seeing certain twists, tropes, and character and event types.

For instance, I am not fond of amnesia, whether I come across it in a thriller, romance, or romantic thriller.

So, while you’re obviously free to write the story you want to write, it will help you to keep in mind audience expectations, and what will possibly disappoint them. And I’m by no means the only thriller fan who doesn’t want to see the tropes I’ll mention below.

This list is short and unexhaustive. But avoiding these three (or finding satisfying ways to justify them) will improve your story and please your readers.

Ready? Let’s get ready to thrill and be thrilled.

  • Stupid protagonists that make it really hard to root for their survival

This is truly the bane of my existence as a fan of the genre.

Look, I get it. It’s your job as a thriller writer to put your protagonists in increasingly dangerous situations. And we are only human. Fueled by stress, adrenalin and fear, we are likely to make some irrational decisions.

But, and this is a crucial but, there is humanly stupid/afraid… then there is intolerable idiot.

I’ll give you an example.

Let’s say you are in the wilderness and you run into a huge, angry bear. What do you do?

I’m by no means claiming that I can survive that with my body and integrity intact. I’d probably die from a heart attack. Or throw up and freeze. Angry bears are scary as hell!

But I can tell you what I most definitely wouldn’t do. I wouldn’t antagonize the bear on purpose or attempt to fight it with my bare hands.

Heard a noise when alone in the house? Why would you call out hello? Are you freaking kidding me? You stay quiet, check around with a potential weapon like a baseball bat or something heavy and call for help on your phone.

Or better yet, hide and call the cops. Don’t say hello. This is not a cute stranger at a coffee shop. This is a potential intruder. And in case you are saying it might be a friend, write better friends. You know, those who aren’t likely to drop in announced in the middle of the night, making all sorts of weird and loud noises.

But this is not the only dumb thing most thriller main characters do, is it?

They hide their spare key under a mattress. I mean, regardless of the genre, unless the movie takes place in the safest town of a country like Norway, or you created a utopia where crime doesn’t exist, don’t make your characters put a key where it will be easily found.

And if you do make them put a spare key for anyone to find, for the love of all you hold dear, please don’t make them act angry, surprised, or scared when someone unwelcome comes in.

And the award for the dumbest action, though, goes to characters who aren’t particularly big, strong, or fast. They don’t know martial arts. They don’t know how to shoot a gun. They can’t parkour. They can’t lift grown men. They don’t have any sleuthing or policing skills.

And yet, when they are suspicious, they don’t call the cops. Or hire a PI. Or even talk to a bunch of friends and take them along. Taking your friends into dangerous places is still stupid, but way smarter than going alone and unprepared.

These characters go into buildings that are about to crumble. Buildings so dangerous that you don’t need a ghost or a serial killer to put you in danger. And then they die or get seriously injured. And what do you think the audience feels when this happens? How do you feel when this happens?

Don’t make your characters act stupid.

If you do, make sure you compensate for this in another way.

Maybe your character is depressed and isn’t afraid to die. Maybe he/she is a daredevil and the adrenalin rush makes up for all the threats according to them.

Maybe they are so desperate that there is a bigger chance to survive whatever/whoever is after them that they enter into a dark alley without so much as a car key.

Then yes, you might get a pass. But be aware you’d be walking a thin line.

And if thrillers have shown us anything, if the protagonist is a therapist, the worse we need to expect. And this brings us to mistake #2:

– Incompetent/unethical/irrational/evil therapist characters

Many thrillers love a therapist who is (un)intentionally bad at their job for some reason. Cough, Intersection, cough.

In Final Analysis (1992), Richard Gere’s therapist sleeps with Kim Basinger, who happens to be his patient’s sister. Look, we all get how hot Basinger is, but you gotta keep it in your pants for the sake of your profession.

Of course, this will lead him down a very dangerous path. Are we surprised or scared about anything that happens to him? Not really. And I love Richard Gere.

The 90s are filled with movies from different genres where there is a prominent therapist character who sleeps with a patient. Unethical, bad, and irrational all in one.

Lots of dangerous things happen to this therapist, and you’re like, yeah, whatever man. Let the psycho get him/her. Or let them be fired or whatever.

It’s hard enough to convince people about the validity of therapy and the existence of good therapists without pop culture shoving more fictional bad therapists down our throats.

If you are writing a therapist, it might be a good idea to not make them sleep with patients or patient relatives.

If a therapist has a therapist, this is a good sign. It means they walk the walk. Would you trust a doctor who didn’t go to a doctor when they were sick?

You get bonus points for making your therapist deal with emotionally taxing situations in ways they’d recommend their patients.

Not making your therapist live an isolated life or having them lead a co-dependent and/or toxic relationship would also be a nice change.

I’m not saying all therapists are good at their jobs or taking their own advice. But we have seen enough incompetent and/or bad therapists who make terrible life choices during the entire story.

– Stupid villains

Stupid villains underestimate their enemies and loved ones.

They are impulsive and are bad at making critical decisions.

They have horrible timing.

They forget to check things and take precautions.

They overestimate themselves.

They surround themselves with people who can catch them.

***

Your characters don’t need to be super intelligent. But a little common sense goes a long way when they are planning things or reacting to things.

What about you? What thriller writing choices drive you up the wall as a writer or reader of the genre?

 

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