This blog post is a continuation of the satirical series, “Poking Fun at Fantasy Tropes.”
So far, we’ve looked at the tropes of taverns, heroes, mentors, quests, and allies. Now we’re taking a look at something certain storytellers can’t seem to stop writing about in mind-boggling detail: the fantasy world itself.
I promise I’ll keep this brief. (As you might know, worldbuilding is rarely brief. But writing a satirical blog post about worldbuilding, well, that I can keep relatively short.)
There’s a lot about fantasy worlds that don’t make sense from a logical point of view, but some storytellers (myself included) insist on using those head scratching, logic-defying elements all the same. Why? Well, for my part, it’s fun.
Here are a few commonalities found in many fantasy worlds (as with all of these posts, these observations are generalizations):
They’re Usually Stuck in the Middle Ages
How is it, that in worlds with millennia-spanning Ages (And most of the stories usually take place in the Third Age), technology hasn’t advanced much past our world’s equivalent of the Middle Ages? Swords and spears and armored knights, oh my! What excuse do such worlds have? They even have magic to aid them in their quest for technological advancements!
Admittedly, some storytellers get around this by claiming that there was once an Age in their fantasy world where technological advancements far surpassed the Age in which the main story takes place, but something disastrous, something calamitous happened which returned the world essentially to the Dark Ages. Since then, the world has been rebuilding little by little. Who knows? Maybe by the end of the story, characters will discover the properties of black powder… (Can’t call it gunpowder if there aren’t any guns, right?)
They’re Usually One, Central Landmass
Let’s face it, having characters travel around a world the size of our own with multiple vast continents would be exhausting. Even with the cop-out means of magical transportation, it gets pretty tiring—not to mention hard for storytellers to manage.
It’s so much simpler if there’s only one central landmass on which everything takes place! (Oh, sure, there are oceans and scattered islands across the deep, but those are far-off places where protagonists don’t often travel.) At most, there are two or three other large landmasses in the world—and the story usually doesn’t take the protagonists there.
They’re Usually Unfinished
No matter how intricately detailed a storyteller is, the world is never set in stone. It’s constantly evolving, growing, and changing. Foundationally the world might stay the same, but renovations—small tweaks her and there and splashes of fresh paint—are never ending and always ongoing.
Sometimes, the story suffers for it as the storyteller becomes fixated on getting everything just right and figured out. Other times, the never-ending nature of the world’s growth and progress is a good thing. It means that more stories can be told in such a world.
At the End of the Day
Vast genealogies, detailed ecosystems, weather patterns, interesting cultures, millennia-spanning histories, rich clothing styles and variations, specific mannerisms, population numbers, and intricate languages—some fantasy worlds have them all. (And some fantasy writers enjoy writing about them so much that they fill the pages of their stories with such elements…) Such places are so detailed and planned out that each sentence is like immersing yourself in, well, another world.
Other fantasy worlds are cookie-cutter worlds clearly patterned after our own. Change a few names (and the names of places) to sound more fantasy-esque, add in some magic and mythological creatures, and boom—you’ve got a brand-new world. I’ll admit, such places are rather familiar, but when the stories themselves are well-told, it’s not unwelcome to be someplace recognizable.
Why not? Well, because in both cases—whether the world is uniquely its own or clearly patterned after our own world—the world itself is a backdrop, exquisitely painted. It’s an open door that we want to travel through, even if we don’t want to follow the same plot and pattern that the protagonists in such stories take. In myriads of fantastical lands and realms, there are many different stories to be told; many different stories to be read.
I think that’s beautiful.
Until next time,
Al
