List of SFF Clichés

[Elvendon]

The youngest child of a group that journeys to another world being the one who makes the most profound insights into the plot/goodness/makes the first overtures towards the goodies/adjusts to the new world most easily.

[Quokka]

Good and Evil.

[polymath]

The hero is a down-at-heel aristo in a thousand year old space empire, super-bright but socially a pariah due to family misdemeanour/lack of money/accent and must overcome idiotic stupid young brattish aristo opponents whilst earning their grudging respect/making them look really stupid during space-battle-practice/actual combat/high-society dinner parties.

Old family friends, old family retainers or old family bodyguards all pull together because of the warm memories of what the hero's family did for them during the hard times/the war/because they were really really good people and there's no way they would let down the son of their old warrior-friend/family-protectors-during-civil-war/ballet-partners.

The old family butler always gets killed helping him out.

[Winters_Sorrow]

Damn, you just summed up & ruined for me, Walter Jon Williams' "The Praxis" series...

[polymath]

Which, uncoincidentally, is what I've just started to read...literally just started it, not even sure what's going to happen yet, which prompted me to post the above because you can see it all over the place. It is a cliche though.

[Brown Rat]

Plot twist: The planet is sentient. (Usually "cleverly" signaled by a spaceship landing on the planet, followed moments later by an earthquake or storm, and nobody figures it out for hundreds of pages.)

Another plot twist: The computer is sentient. (Could also be signaled by an earthquake or a storm. Ditto the hundreds of pages.)

[Wolfeborn]

woods/forest are always filled with elves, haunted or have mystical properties/strange beasties they never contained normal everyday birds squirels tres and mud.

Desert planets with no sign of water whatsoever will almost always have water found on it/ice metled on it etc etc, same goes for normal deserts which will always have an oasis just in the nick of time (not necessarily sff but hey)

[Nokia]

Everyone always managed to keep everything they know to themselves when the villain's sidekick, who is renowned for his horrific torture, tortures someone.

[Thunderchild]

the weapon or experiment will alter one of the good guys in just the right way to fight the bad guys

[Paige Turner]

Every explosive device has a red digital countdown display. Which is very handy.

[Coolhand]

To defeat a vast, powerful, unbeatable alien army, simply find and kill the Queen/Controlship/Hive Mind.
Bob's your uncle, one quick clean and mostly painless end to the war.

[alicebandassassin]

Being differant alone but part of a large comunity you do not feel part of. Your bound to end up a hero and or dead

[jackokent]

Originally Posted by Paige Turner

Every explosive device has a red digital countdown display. Which is very handy.

But should you cut the green wire or the red one?

[alicebandassassin]

Cut them both and hedge your bets

[Paige Turner]

Originally Posted by jackokent

But should you cut the green wire or the red one?

Either is fine, as long as you s-l-o-w-l-y close the cutters on one wire, then rapidly switch and snip the other.