One Hundred Fantasy Clichés That Really Need To Rest In Peace

#42: The Last Man Standing

Along with commonly occurring fantasy genre story-lines such as the supernatural romance plot or the magical school plot, there exists a variety of tales where the main character is the only one left standing in a serious situation.  Always in these plots, a group of ragtag survivors, whether it be during a zombie outbreak or some disastrous magical occurrence, are written out of the story one by one through a series of gruesome deaths.  By the climax, two characters, usually the main character and their love interest, are the last standing.  A huge fight breaks out during the climax where tragically the love interest gets killed off.  The main character survives though thanks to pure luck and is left to deal with the consequences however the situation they got stuck in gave them.

  I have seen this cliché story be played out again and again, usually with almost no variation to make it stand out.  Every single one of these stories plays by the same tune.  Despite the different settings in each of these kinds of stories, the plot always remains the same.  It is like watching a TV show for the hundredth time, where the material has become dull due to knowledge of what is going to already happen in the plot.  In these plots, suspense is completely absent.  Because of this, creating such a story almost always is going to result in boredom for the reader.  They know what is going to happen in the end only a few pages in.

  There are creative ways to avoid this cliché if you desire to create a similar kind of setup.  The trick is simple; just keep more than one of the characters alive in whatever disaster of the week is occurring.  Therefore, the audience can still be surprised by what the story has in store for them.  The Walking Dead comics are a great example of this subversion of the trope.  While Rick is established as the only sure character that will survive any of the crazy scenarios in the plot, other characters are not immediately given the chopping block.  While character deaths are still high, they are unexpected to the audience.  The characters that are chopped off usually stick around for a strong portion of the comic's story, long enough for the audience to believe they are just as safe as Rick when suddenly the group gets attacked by zombies.  By then we are attached to the characters, so the cliché becomes less prevalent.

  Skill is the true answer in subverting a cliché plot.  Many have said it is possible to write any type of story as long as devotion and true mastery of writing are involved.  I truly believe in this.  Without subverted plots, how would The Walking Dead be popular?  It would just be another last man standing zombie survival story.  However, it took the extra mile by putting true effort into the storyline and earned its fandom in return.  The true gift of writing is pure talented skill.