I have a few:
- Chosen ones, fate, destiny, &c. When you get down to it, a story with these themes is one where a single person or handful of people is ontologically, cosmically better and more important than everyone else. It’s eerily similar to that right-wing meme about how “most people are just NPCs” (though I disliked the trope before that meme ever took off).
- Way too much importance being given to bloodlines by the narrative (note, this is different from them being given importance by characters or societies in the story).
- All of the good characters are handsome and beautiful, while all of the evil characters are ugly and disfigured (with the possible exception of a femme fatale or two).
- Races that are inherently, unchangeably evil down to the last individual regardless of upbringing, society, or material circumstances.
11 points
*
I recommend an obscure, fun, bonkers SF novel called The Killing Star, which features accelerating metal slugs to 90% c before flinging them into planets. There’s also a chapter that takes place on the Titanic. And TNG makes an appearance toward the end. Supposedly the ships in this novel inspired the interstellar vehicles we see in the Avatar movies. There’s also an earlier book in this series which features wooden spaceships piloted by kangaroos (though it’s all hard SF, I assure you!).
