It’s officially fall season. The time when we start getting out our cardigans, leaves, Spotify playlists (I sure have been on “we fell in love in october” by girl in red for the past week), and yes, movies.
If you’re like me and like to think about your favorite and least favorite tropes for this fall, then sit back, maybe grab a soda and popcorn, and enjoy.
1. Love: Found Family
The vibe that fits best with the season of fall: cozy, warm, and most of all, a fresh start. As a reader, I’m genuinely in love with this kind of story. Think the March sisters from “Little Women” (2019).
Typically, in stories, the found family trope is defined as a group of individuals that are unrelated biologically, but come to form their own family unit. While the four March sisters in Meg, Jo, Beth, and Amy are related biologically, they can also be considered as a found family.
Why? Like other found families, they aren’t always built the same whether that’s Jo’s headstrong personality as opposed to Amy’s frugality or Meg’s traditional ladylike qualities, but each sister still loves and chooses each other.
They may bicker over their differences or do hurtful things to each other but at the end of the day, they care enough to return to each other.
Like autumn, it reminds us of the fact that it’s a time to slow down, spend time at home, and maybe to reconnect with yourself and the world around you. Just like the March sisters do.
2. Hate: Love Triangle
Now, yes, this is a subjective perspective and you can argue with me why this trope is good. But to understand why this trope is an example of lazy writing, let’s explore why. A love triangle (or square depending on story) often relies on melodrama in order to accelerate the plot.
Think up “Twilight” with the love triangle between Bella Swan, Edward Cullen, and Jacob Black as the biggest offender of this. Bella is just an ordinary young girl who has no agency outside of choosing between two men.
The first is a brooding vampire whose behaviors classify as red flags such as gaslighting and being emotionally manipulative. Remember when he left Bella in “New Moon” because she got a paper cut.
Edward’s response? Ghost Bella because his brother was about to bite her instead of doing the healthy response by maybe buying some extra Band-Aids. This isn’t romantic by all means
The other is Jacob Black, who in my personal opinion, was a product of character assassination to justify Edward as Bella’s true love.
Ask me in what world would a man who emotionally supports his female friend and is warm towards her would suddenly turn possessive because her emotionally manipulative crush reappears.
The romance isn’t natural and in spite of the name, isn’t romantic at all in the autumn spirit. I could go on and on about reasons why love triangles aren’t great, like how they romanticize toxic behaviors, reduce character agency, or distract from the main plotline, but I said what I said and you can let us know what you think.
3. Love: Friends to Lovers
Moving from love triangles, we have the friends to lovers trope. Friends to lovers is as it says in the name. Whether absurdly hilarious or just conventionally iconic, it’s a slow burn arc that naturally progresses in a realistic manner.
Take for example, the relationship between Harry Burns and Sally Albright in the movie, “When Harry Met Sally” (1989). Their relationship is an example of this because of its slow burn pacing and autumnal feel. No, it’s not just because they are sweater-coded and have iconic scenes like their first rideshare.
We see how they don’t instantly click but also begin to grow closer as they mature together, forming a deeper relationship over time.
This kind of relationship marks an autumnal feel as it reflects the coziness and reflectiveness that autumn brings. Whether that’s a sip of coffee over differing perspectives, walks down the park, or just connecting over time, friends to lovers is the epitome of fall.
4. Hate: Enemies to Lovers
On the flip side, we have the tired old trope that looks like brown leaves or as we love to call it, enemies to lovers. Now I will put a disclaimer as not all enemies to lovers stories are bad, but can be written or executed wrong. Let’s take up two examples of this.
It is a truth universally acknowledged that enemies to lovers can be rather stale and requires a breathtaking amount of reflection, good writing, and character development to even be considered a good one.
We all know the love story between Elizabeth Bennet and Mr. Darcy from “Pride and Prejudice” (2005). Based on Jane Austen’s novel, it follows a young middle-class woman who finds herself at odds with a socially stratified society and a socially awkward man with a bit of an ego.
However, what makes this work is that both characters start out hating each other. Darcy views Lizzy as “tolerable, but not handsome enough to tempt me” while Lizzy makes a hasty impression of Darcy because of this out of a sense of wounded ego.
And this paves the way for the true development, Lizzy begins to learn to see beyond her prejudice and Darcy learns humility while also beginning to fall in love with each other.
On the other hand, we’ve got “Emily in Paris” (2020) with the titular Emily Cooper and her will they or won’t they romance with Gabriel. Right from the start, this relationship isn’t romantic nor does it have a great setup for enemies to lovers.
Emily is an American who has arrived in Paris for a new marketing job while Gabriel is her on-and-off boyfriend who is in a committed relationship with a woman named Camille. Sounds rather bad, doesn’t it? It gets worse from there.
Their relationship doesn’t count as necessarily enemies in that there is no real tension between the duo from the start outside of being the new girl meets the guy next door.
Instead of growing as characters, Emily remains emotionally allergic to conflict while Gabriel is rather passive and remains unfaithful to Emily. In short, enemies to lovers can work, but the development to get there takes good writing and believability.
5. Hate: Makeover Arc
Have you ever thought about the fact that all you need is a glamorous wardrobe and a change in taste in order to be your true, authentic self? Well, I’m here to give bad news, this sucks big time.
The “makeover” as it’s known, is a trope that enables toxic norms about appearance and individuality.
Think up “The Princess Diaries” (2001), the epitome of the makeover from “rags to royalty” because Mia Thermopolis went from a simple nerd to royalty because she started acting, well, like a princess.
From etiquette lessons to look more like a princess to, yes, undergoing a makeover wardrobe (yuck), everything about gaining confidence is fake and promotes the idea that “outer means everything”.
As a matter of fact, the makeover arc is so cliched that even romcoms have relied on this kind of transformation in order to make the “relationship” stick.
6. Love: Self-Discovery Arc
Makeover arcs say that you need to change how you look to be who you are meant to be. Conversely, self-discovery arcs say that you don’t need to change how you look, you just need to believe in yourself.
In “Legally Blonde” (2001), Elle Woods is the epitome of female empowerment who still proves her worth to herself despite the misogyny and stereotypes she experiences from her peers and professors alike as a law student at Harvard University.
Through hard work, growth, and believing in her own worth, Elle evolves from a lovesick college student trying to win back her ex-boyfriend to a self-made lawyer, while still retaining her pink, perky, and fashion-forward self.
Even if you aren’t fashionable or necessarily color-coded, the idea of being your true authentic self works as an empowering example not only for women who are looking for a career, but also for anyone who may be struggling with their sense of self.
Fall, while not my favorite season, is one that intrigues me because it’s filled with a sense of reflection and firsts that bring me into reality. While these movie tropes I’ve discussed again are subjective to opinion, it can be agreed that they bring a sense of good, bad, and sometimes not so fresh to the autumn season.
What are some movie tropes you love and hate and why? Let us know @HerCampusatSJSU!