What’s the most annoying trope in books or movies?
This is a trope that mostly concerns works of science fiction.
It is the habit of writers to treat planets like countries. To condense the vastness of space into something that serves as a rough analogy to Earth.
So, you get single planets run by single governments headed by either a single ruler or a small council of administrators. For an entire world. Ask yourselves, reader, how many countries, polities, states, provinces and cultures exist on Earth? Do you see our planet realistically being ruled by a single government? Easily? With no serious expenditure of resources?
I understand that if you’re writing a space opera, you don’t want to get bogged down in details nor become so mired in the worldbuilding that you can’t see the forest for the trees. But sometimes it stretches the audience’s suspension of disbelief to think that an entire planet is composed of a mere four tribes and two major cities. Contracting a whole world into such a simplistic portrayal just strikes me as … silly.
Practical, for reasons of saving time, but still silly.
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Many thanks for visiting my blog. I post updates on my writing career, I muse over storytelling and fiction, and I reflect on the curious and wonderful things in life.