Just a quick question when it comes to angst. What's your most favorite and least favorite trope.
For me my favorite is terminally ill characters. Characters slowly dying and trying to close themselves off or hide it from their allies. But someone manages to worm their way into the heart just enough that in a moment of tenderness they accidentally reveal they are dying. Love that shit and it's many forms . I'm still like obsessing over how cyberpunk 2077 does it. Especially with the romancable characters. A scene will go from your character being an unbelievable badass and talking with your potential partner. Then suddenly all the power drains from your body and you're on your knees coughing up blood and suddenly their right next to your side fear and worry in their voice. Love it.
My least favorite has to be "hurting someone to protect them." Hate it hate it. Idk what it is about it i guess the idea of pushing someone you care for away by trying to hurt their feelings really sucks to me? Because if they care for you there's other ways to have them take their distance instead of beating on them emotionally or physically
Oh this is such a fun question because god do I love angst :3
I think my favourite angst is the effect of grief.
Like I think this is obvious enough from how I write S1 Ianite and Redbeard (and the fact that I'm so attached to Redbeard of all characters in the first place), but I absolutely love exploring the effects of grief on characters especially when it drives their character.
I love writing this trope. Obviously for Mianite, but grief is also the driving factor for Katherine Delaney, one of my major OCs.
And also pretty much all my favourite media has grief angst somewhere.
For my favourite examples: Your Turn to Die, Danganronpa V3, and Alice in Borderlands (the manga) because the way that they all use in character arcs forward just hits my brain in the right place.
(Couple notes: I've said Danganronpa V3 specifically because I think it does grief far better than the other two games. But I also can pinpoint specific characters in 1 and 2 that I think are also great grief angst for me.
And while I've said the manga for Alice in Borderlands, because I have a LOT of problems with the TV show adaptation, the Seven of Hearts episode is still phenomenal)
For my less favorite, misunderstanding angst.
I hate it, I hate it so goddamn much. Like really, you can't think of any other form of conflict than having a character assume the worst for no reason? You're all gonna turn against your friend or your partner or your family member because you saw them doing an assumed action from a distance or you heard some rumor that they did a bad thing. You would've all fallen for satanic panic.
I think I have developed a larger hate for this because it's in kids media a lot (I have quite a few younger siblings) in which the misunderstood character always forgives everyone at the end and like FUCK that. Just once I want someone to go "No I don't forgive you for assuming the worst in me" and that to be treated like a good and normal thing.
I can like this trope in death game media, where characters turning to witch hunt behaviour makes sense. However, whenever it's used in other genres (and it is, so often) it tends to piss me off.
Also for yours, I also really love terminally ill characters. Again Danganronpa V3, my beloved, has this. I always love reading fics with this being the main angst driver. And I kinda love leaning into Sonja hiding just how bad her flux flu is from everyone (I just like have so many fic ideas so little time).
I also really love Hanahaki which is a very specific subtype of terminal illness angst.
And honestly yeah, "hurt you to protect you" sucks. It feels to me a lot like misunderstanding angst in that it tends to feel quite cheap like the author couldn't think of a better conflict.
"I'm going to act like a massive dick so you don't feel bad about killing me" is about the closest thing to this trope that I do enjoy, but I think that's because it can only happen in life or death circumstances and it tends to be a much shorter act.
