Post History

Source: https://writers.stackexchange.com/a/48095
License name: CC BY-SA 4.0
License URL: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/

Source: https://writers.stackexchange.com/a/48095
License name: CC BY-SA 4.0
License URL: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/

There's more you can do with a trope than play it straight or subvert it. You can [play with it](https://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/PlayingWithATrope) in various ways: invert it (which you did), parody it, lampshade it, exploit it, and much much more. And you can avert it - that is, **the trope just isn't present in your story at all**. There are countless tropes you are averting in your writing, because there are just countless tropes, many of which aren't relevant to your story at all.

Whether you choose to engage with a trope, and how you choose to engage with it is up to you, as @MarkBaker explains. I can't thing of a trope that's a "holy cow" that should never be engaged. You can play with any trope you like. However, **your goal is to tell a story. Tropes, and whatever you choose to do with them, are tools.** They're the means, not the end. Don't let them get in the way of telling the story you want to tell.

As for the implications of playing with this particular trope, look at how it plays out, examine what it means, then decide whether you like this or want to change it. For example, you might see that the message that comes out is "balance is needed", or "each approach has it's time and place". If that's a message you like, go ahead. If you don't like what comes out from the way you chose to use a trope, change it.

Original score: 5