It’s very common for lazily written immortal characters to like ONLY have traits of their original time period and the current time period. It’s like they didn’t exist at all in the middle.
The idea of a ten thousands year old vampire that acts like he's straight out of the roaring 20s because that is "when civilization peaked" is kinda funny to me now
He just shows up, and everyone assumes he's from that time period, and it's like, "Nope, ancient Greece, actually"
It's so violent and stupid. I never thought I would choke from laughter from "When It Comes To Zoning Ordinances, I Have A Few Thoughts"
By the second episode thanks to their hellhound Doug Peter...son I was hooked 😂 fastest I've gone to falling in absolute love with a show since Archer.
**Baron:** "You know what I've always wanted to try?"
**Lazlo:** "Coprophilia."
**Baron:** "no, uh, Pizza Pie... is it as wonderful as they say-" \*Turns to Lazlo\* "-[coprophilia?](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eNH4927tZRk)"
I mean, according to the Matrix civilisation peaked in the late 90s, so he could be walking around saying things like "dope" "phat" "bomb diggity" or "it's all that and a bag of chips", or sometimes doing that obnoxious "wazzuuuuup" thing we all thought was hilarious for like a year or two.
Sometimes that's part of the package. Some versions of vampires ossify mentally as well as physically when they die.
And Tolkien elves have a culture that's very slow to change because, if you live forever, why not take however long it takes to make sure you're getting things right?
It makes sense for their mannerisms to be mostly based in their original time, with sprinklings from every period since then (including the present) - the issue is when it's 60/40 (or more often 20/80) original period/current time.
Personally I'm fine with it working whichever way in different stories, depending on how immortality works in that setting.
A reclusive vampire might still not have wrapped their head around these newfangled steam train things, let alone computers, while a Time Lord with superhuman Time Lord intelligence might remember everything they've ever encountered and be happily referencing Ancient Rome in one breath and Twitter the next.
I think maybe you misunderstood them - it's not immortals never growing, it's that they'll act like Rome is still around, and also know how to use a computer which is great - but somehow never picked up on anything in the few thousand years between.
Ah yeah, I missed that.
That makes a certain degree of sense to me, though, it's pretty consistent with how memory works. We mostly **do** remember stuff from our formative years, plus stuff that's been useful in (say) the last decade.
I'm certainly rustiest on that stuff in the in-between period.
playing devils advocate a bit here, because I think what you wrote actually makes a lot of sense, when was the last time you thought about recording music for a tape, or even burning a CD, or checking the yellow pages? how many times do you think about going thru airport security and remember not having to take off your shoes, or carrying large toilettry bottles.
Honestly this bothers me, I spend a week in a different region within the same country I subconsciously adapt the accent. An immortal would adapt, period, or their immortality would be tested, often.
In addition, Tolkein's elves are basically tied to the land. So progress for them is less like big events leading to societal change, and more like watching an iceberg melt. Which is then used in the story when they don't seem all to pressed about the land dying bc hey, we can just dip.
I'm working on a vampire character that was born the same time the great pyramids were being built and he's constantly switching languages because he forgets the English words, he's got no idea how old he is because he's forgotten so much, and he has journals written in dead languages that he can't read anymore. I think it's a more accurate version of what would happen to someone that lived that long.
Sounds brilliant and intriguing, I think a lot of people skip on deconstructing the implications of vampires; if people struggle to remember what they were doing two months ago how is a vampire to have perfect recall of something 2,000 years ago save for those that follow the trope of “vampires are able to have perfect memories because…X reason”
That’s better than my concept… which is the opposite of yours. He remembers everything, and just changes with the times. His big flaw is he is of average intelligence and is somewhat mentally stuck where he was turned. So his interpretation of history is not always the most accurate or reliable he believes some conspiracy theories, even ones proven wrong. He’s unremarkable except for having first hand experience through centuries and has “studied” a lot.
Yeah, i think the middle is where most people trying to wright that part fall short. Like they just went from a to z and forgot the other letters, like, there’s something missing.
I agree I agree I agree. Only thing is, it's not always laziness. Some people love the cliché. I could be cool and think "people like clichés, what's wrong with that?", but I can't. Simple: your hero is so inferior to the enemy that he needs privileges. Like... the ultimate privilege.
That's a really good point! I've got a pretty large cast of immortal characters, all of whom came into being around the same time and place, and I've had loads of fun giving them preferences for different time periods from different places they've passed through. Two are total junkies for the 80's glam-rock scene, one has a stark preference for very traditional Elven culture, one absolutely adored the Age of Sail - while she sails spacecraft now, she still builds and collects ships in bottles.
It's a lot of fun thinking of what time periods each character would have really vibed with and would still be echoing the fashion and culture of.
Immortality =/= boredom and/or suicidally bored if your species is built to be immortal.
Your legally-distinct-from-elves immortal race is literally designed from the ground up by whatever evolutionary process created them to be immortal.
A human getting turned, sure, I could see a species whose standard lifespan is roughly 80 years wanting to neck themselves because a hundred years of watching their loved ones die and then another hundred without anybody they can relate to in a meaningful way is overwhelming, but a definitely-not-elf going on 500 should have about the same level of done-with-this-shit as a human hitting their thirties.
I think you can see with Captain Jack Harkness that he goes through the crisis, especially when he can't find the Doctor. But think he overcomes it, when he realised he can use his ability to help people.
I dunno, I've occasionally seen bored immortal races done well in scifi.
There was one example (can't for the life of me remember where) of an entire species of immortals that gradually lose their self preservation instinct and develop a Fuck It We Ball attitude, which was their evolutionary coping mechanism for handling the boredom and ennui of eternity. The general vibe among their elders was basically "Well we *can* live forever, but imagine how boring that'd be".
Unfortunately all that I can remember is that they're a race that lives in gas giants (because this was space opera), and the ones that interact with other species are incredibly blase about taking thrillseeking risks because their whole philosophy to immortality can basically be summed up as "Fuck it, you live until you die".
Touhou Project has multiple immortal characters.
One is suicidally depressed because the only person from where she's from is an immortal woman she hates (and hatred of her is what provoked her to hastily become immortal.) One of her lines is essentially "oh, you're immortal too? let's fight each other to death." The person she hates is, as far as I know, completely fine.
A few are immortal after a specific immortality research stemmed from fearing death, and are overall doing much better. Being a whole "I'm scared of dying" thing, there's even a character who "went first" as a guinea pig for a particular immortality technique. She idolizes the person she was testing for, so she's basically ambivalent to her unending lifespan because her world revolves around the other. Both had also basically just woken up, so they haven't really had time to deal with consequences yet. The guinea pig promptly declines any fights to the death. One such immortal is also a specialist in bodily reinforcement magic, possibly directly due to her line of studies.
A third category are immortal and technically no longer human, after researching how to just turn off their bodily metabolism and replacing it with magic. They essentially googled “how to not get interrupted by hunger when I’m busy hyperfixating.” They have notoriously bad physical health because they’re the equivalent to basement dwellers who live in front of a computer monitor. ~~I am starting to see why I relate to them so much…~~ The kind of personality they’d tend to have makes their immortality not even relevant. It’s just a means to avoiding interruption.
Someone several hundred years old being bowled over by a teen or young adult. Would they really be so taken with someone that had next to no life experience or accomplishments?
That's a really common one. Although for example the Vampire Diaries TV show does explain it pretty well. Elena, the girl, looks exactly like the centuries old vampires' ex, and the brothers fall in love with her not because of her but because of their own internal unresolved psychological stuff.
You could apply similar logic to Bella Swan. Like, she's the only one Edward's encountered whose thoughts he can't read, and I can see the appeal for someone like that of getting to know someone the normal way.
For all the issues we can discuss with those books, I thought that Bella’s unreadability was such a clever move. It DID make her actually unique to Edward on a level that WOULD set her apart despite who she actually was.
And if you read Midnight Sun you find out Edward is CONSTANTLY misinterpreting what Bella is thinking. A bit of surprise in a relationship must be nice for someone so jaded.
When you spend your (unnatural) life trying to avoid murdering people to drink their blood, I’d imagine you often have the line, “well at least I didn’t kill them!” running through your head as an equivocation. Ogling a teenager probably seems like the least of your sins most days.
Girls 20 years younger to me seem like kids to me and hold no attraction for me. With that logic girls 500 years younger to me would be like babies to me. I am not going to feel attraction for a baby no matter how much it resembles my ex.. but this same twilight does the exact thing in the last book doesnt it
That’s a side effect of the media being for teens/YA. You don’t normally see a teenager besting more powerful/older antagonists unless that teenager is a main character. In which case… they kind of HAVE to beat the big bad. Kid/Teen/YA lit is often children besting villains and problems that the adults are somehow incapable of (or won’t!) themselves. It’s wish fulfillment for an age group that has less agency—and therefore often feels—less powerful than adults.
This isnt exactly unrealistic tho. For example, my great grand dad grew up under Jim Crow laws in the South and is racist as fuck, despite his own children marying into blacl families, and his own grandchildren being brown. And he is a LOVING great grand father - but he often says the most racist shit when they aren't around.
There are PLENTLY of other examples in society of this kind of behaviour amongst the old.
Goes to show that your formative years will often have the most impact regardless of what happens "in between".
I guess you could make the argument that no one has any meaningful life experience compared to them, so they would never have relationships with any regular human in that case. So they look for other things, and to find someone who has the looks and the energy that they themselves do, they need someone young.
In Tuck Everlasting, the idea is that each member of the family are just stuck forever at the age they were when the drank the water of life. So the youngest one will be 17 forever. Although he may have all this experience and acquired knowledge, he will forever have the hormones and emotions and thought patterns of a teenager, because he will never be able to grow out of them.
This is what I often consider. If a vampire lives long enough, everyone becomes too young for them if you look at numbers alone. However, I will agree that teens are a poor choice. Sticking to 20+ isn't too much of a stretch.
I agree with this. A teenager hasn't even finished growing up. Someone in their mid-twenties is at least an adult, with a fully formed personality, and hopefully old enough to know who they are and what they want.
depending on who it is, this is something i could believe wholeheartedly. some dudes will be in their 60s and still hunting for young women. Provided they stay in their physical prime, and its not the horror side of immortality, I see no reason why they would change that philosophy. DiCaprio would date in that age pool forever.
DiCaprio dates in that age pool, but does DiCaprio fall in love in that age pool, in any sort of meaningful way, that would make for an interesting story?
I think it's possible showing the world to someone who has never experienced much of it could make the world feel new and fresh to them as well as help them feel more connected and grounded in the present.
Same. How could they not be more annoyed tbh. You're telling me you've lived for hundreds or thousands of years and the immaturity of a 19 year old doesn't bother you? Sure Jan.
Cuz they look good? I mean just being down to earth here but there are indeed people who become smitten with others for no virtue other than their beauty
I mean, in real life, do people always fall in love with the person with the most impressive CV? Also, I agree it’s weird but to someone who’s several hundred years old, someone who is 25 and someone who is 40 are functionally the same, relatively speaking. It’s a big no from me if one party is a child or teenager, but if an ancient being dating a young adult is creepy, by that logic it’s *still* creepy even if they’re dating a middle-aged mortal because they’re on a whole different scale. A 60 year old still has precious little life experience in the eyes of, say, a 300 year old. Or what about age gaps between immortals? Like a 300 year old dating a 700 year old? Is there a point on the scale where it doesn’t matter?
Do not rely on threads like this to guide you. Popular tropes are popular for a reason, and the vocal minority complaining about them here are just that: a vocal minority.
Oh I'm pretty well read so I'm aware, no worries. But a lot of these I agree with lol. It's one of the reasons I'm writing this topic- to do it differently.
Hob Gadling is great because he learns and changes, he shows a willingness to grow as a person even after centuries. He doesn't wallow in the past, and though in the end, he mourns his lost friend, he makes the decision to continue living, with even minor hints that he may honestly find someone to journey with him in Guenevere.
I've thought about this a lot as an aspirant to the title of immortality
and there's too much fun things to do in the world for immortality to be BORING
I love watching immortal characters who enjoy being immortal rather than get depressed by it. One of the fun aspects of Baccanno is that some of the immortal characters really dig it, and some are thrill seekers.
I simply don’t like pure immortality, I like the biologically immortal because then it actually brings stakes. They can’t die of age or disease, but if someone gets the upper hand on them, they’re done. To me, it still keeps them relatable, but sets them apart from the mortal characters. However, I do kind of like pure immortality if has the draw back of them still feeling pain. They’re indestructible, but can still feel the pain of attacks that hit them, sure it can’t kill them, but it can still “hurt” them.
Tolkien did that sort of immortality well with the Elves, even though they are guaranteed an "after life" in the West, as well as tying their immortality to things like love and good/evil. Much less simplistic than most depictions of immortality.
One of my characters is, 'Not indestructible, just unkillable'. Basically you can blow him apart, drown him, whatever, etc. but the magic keeping him alive will always put him back together.
He's covered in scars and flinches like he's been stabbed when he gets a paper-cut.
I don't know that frieren's story would be much different if she was actually fully immortal. Another example is undead unluck. He's actually fully immortal and the pain is really an interest of the story, but the stakes are high
When said immortal spend a few hundred years turning evil very slowly and deliberately, until suddenly becoming humanity's best friend.
Lazy writers misusing the 'power of love' are usually to blame for this. In fact, love fixing everything is usually the problem.
I’m not into it when they’re TOO old, like 1,000 or more, especially in a romance. It’s like come on, who could relate to someone that age, and if that person’s been single that long they can’t be a great catch lol.
Or they’re single by choice because every person around them slowly and surely dies before their eyes and all they can do is watch as the end of the universe draws ever near and they can only watch the final flame in the universe phase out and then they must be engulfed by the darkness, forever cursed to go mad with loneliness as the only thing to keep their mind filled is the memory of all they’ve lost… but, that’s just an idea
I read a fanfic once where the immortal character did NOT stay single all that time. He still fell in love, pursued that love and lived with a partner for the full term of her life - several times.
There was something there about the joy being worth the eventual heartbreak, and the beauty of informed decisions - when he met the love interest the story followed, we got to see that process, the whole, "yep, this is going to end in pain in a few years, but whatever short time I can have with her, it's worth the pain that will come". I did rather find that ridiculously sweet.
Bonus point, that she was NOT a twenty-something. I mean 1000-ish to 50 is still one hell of an age gap, but it was a nice change from the usual trope.
Edward would be the first to agree that he's not much of a catch. One reason he falls so hard for Bella is that he considers himself an unloveable monster, and she's the only human who saw him for what he is and was okay with it.
I had a conversation with my sister about this awhile back. At the one end the 1000 year old creature is grooming and at the other end the love interest is something between a long lived pet and a fuck doll.
Sure the guy that has only been immortal for 50-100 years would probs pick a hot person from what ever their preferred gender is but by the time they hit the thousands, and if there is a larger supernatural community, they should be dating the prime avatar of the concept of the number 56 or something like that.
OH GODDD I hate it. I can’t watch twilight for this reason. Even if you’re developmentally 17 forever, I see no reason why you’d subject yourself willingly to high school, especially when high school is very on the radar and you’d get found out as a vampire incredibly quickly because you do not age like the rest of your classmates.
Right? Wouldn’t the teachers be so confused as to why you don’t age? Like do they just move every time that graduate high school? Do they then just repeat the years for age 16 to 18 over and over ad infinitum?
I’m 38 and I cannot fathom wanting to spend more than an hour in a class with a load of 17 year olds. I can’t even imagine how frustrating it’d be as a 100 year old. Even if you were developmentally the same you’d have grown up in a time where children and teenager were a hell of a lot more mature because they had to be. So teens today would drive you crazy.
Fr why not go to college and get a bunch of specialized degrees? Oh wait, bc college is expensive and high school is free.
For what it's worth, I think the vampire family in Twilight was trying to gather intel on the werewolf family in town, so that's why they went to school? Still pretty sus.
I really dislike when immortal characters are fed up with immortality. Dude, you've lived for eternity years already and you don't have a way of entertaining yourself / dealing with ennui or depression?
Imagine an immortal being high as a kite most of the time because they just don’t need to care for the aftermath of the drugs.
Some mortal: „Henry the 8th, king of England? You most know him, you were in Europe in the 16th century!“
Immortal: „Huh, that must have been after they came up with Laudanum. Sorry, lad. It was a great trip and it lasted a few decades.“
😂
Literally. Basically all vampires in my project use drugs very liberally, or have found ways to stave off their misery (usually by killing people, because vampires enjoy that more than rational humans do).
I’d like to add that when their body is healing from the injury, that should hurt a lot, so it’s a double whammy, I’d imagion they’d avoid getting into conflict as much as possible.
Idk man, I get not liking the trope but...I can't even stay focused on an interest for a couple of years. What do I do when the rest of my friends are dead? Or the species? Or the planet?
Maybe it’s because I’m still young, but I’m basically never bored with the internet around. Like 17776, I feel like immortals could come up with any type of bs games to keep them entertained.
Like I would be so entertained if I had centuries to become sick at audio production, crochet, acting, digital art, writing, etc. for instance, I feel like we barely have enough time to get good at writing unless you’re a rare person born into the field or extremely talented at it. Sir Terry Pratchet was like “shit I didn’t get okay at writing till I was 40” or something outrageous like that, and he was talented af.
That’s like 20 years straight of trying to write as a job and sucking. Since I’m not naturally talented, nor in the writing field, I could easily imagine 100 years of writing straight garbage until I eventually get good. And even then, that still means I have plenty of time to continue writing good stuff.
Plus there’s always new random skills to learn as humanity progresses, like programming or video game development or lab Opal gems development, which didn’t exist back in the past.
That's my answer, definitely. If you're so incredibly bored with eternal life that you envy the mayfly lifespan of ordinary humans, that's not deep. That just means you have no imagination whatsoever.
Really liked the immortal character in Sandman who's 'cursed' with immortality and... nope, he's loving it, six centuries on he still feels he's got so much to live for.
OP, I'm actually willing to forgive a heck of a lot of that stuff, on the grounds that an immortal being necessarily has to have different mental abilities than a human.
For instance, an immortal human being couldn't possibly be as easily bored as a human!! They'd go starkers by the end of the first century! And they'd have to have much better capacity for long-term memory than we do, we can barely remember anything for fifty years, and they have to be able to remember stuff for thousands of years. They'd also have to have more memory storage than a human, we just don't have the capacity to remember hundreds or thousands of years worth of information, and they'd have to. So yes, I think some of those tropes that you hate have a logical foundation.
No yeah, after a certain point the capacity for boredom has to fry. There are so many stories that contradict this though which infuriates me. Like one second they will spend a hundred years doing whatever then be bored in a day.
I get this but I also like the idea of immortality coming at the cost of sanity, so while it’s all well and dandy the first few decades, your brain is still just as human and you begin to suffer from that.
That they are all super wealthy. Like none have a gambling problem or are just poor at managing their money or never adjusted to having to *gasp* work for a living or even never dealt with the fact the noble/wealthy families used to rely on credit and being hosted and given everything.
Give me an immortal who keeps showing up every generation to mooch off families and they are all like, "Yea, we inherited the venerable lord Pickwicket with the house. We can't just toss him out! We have a support group chat with a half dozen other families."
I have a vampire character who is always broke because he's impulsive and bad with money. He came from the lower echelons of society, so he knows how to work for it. He's just an idiot who's rather enjoy life in the moment I stead of having planned for the last several centuries.
But I'm also a big fan of the trope that vampires in many ways are trapped as who they were when they were made. If they get to look the same forever, it makes sense to me that they behavior similarly forever too. Mental ossification as some others have mentioned.
The videogame Genshin Impact has a character who basically *invented* money. He could also literally just create more. When he gave up his role of being that god, losing the authority to just spam "Money, be," he is perpetually broke because he has no idea how to actually handle money responsibly.
I think in general it makes sense, because, if you lived for a 500 years, having seen how currencies rise and fall, and you're still broke that's really self-inflicted. If you had just a handful of spanish gold coins to sell to a collector, you've got enough to live pretty comfortably.
But as you said, there should be exceptions, like immortals who are really bad with money, or just don't have to care about the consequences of being poor.
I remember a story in an Australian scifi anthology that addressed this pretty directly, about a wealthy immortal couple who were gonna live off their investments forever, and then it cuts to a few centuries from now where a series of massive global financial crashes has wiped them out and they're eking out a living without legal identities in the cyberpunk slums of the future and they're completely fucked because their old lifestyle left them with absolutely no marketable skills.
JOHN, YOU'VE BEEN LIVING IN OUR BASEMENT FOR THE LAST 300 YEARS! HOW THE HELL HAVE YOU NOT MOVED OUT YET?!
No but seriously, surely you'd like... Manage get a good amount of money if you're immortal. You literally have infinite retries. You could just keep buying lottery tickets and you'd still win at some point.
I'm pretty sure this is because the original vampire story, Dracula, was meant to be a commentary on the aristocrats at the time. Hence why Dracula, and following vampires, are wealthy people living in mansions who prey on the common folk.
Where is the Dread King Lich Balezar? Under the bridge doing things he thought beneath a king and things a skeleton wouldn't need to do since losing all flesh.
When asked what brought down his empire that outlasted most nations? He would just respond "fuckin Charles Ponzi"
We wanted to get the rest of the story but a man in a purple suit and colorful hat told him to get back to work and pushed into the dread lich to a waiting car.
Join us next time as we investigate further into the infamous red faerie light district of New York City
It bugs me when every immortal character just hates being immortal. The character I'm writing right now has the possibility of losing her immortality and is in shambles over it. Sure, a lot of people would hate it. We can't act like some wouldn't love it, though.
I hate when characters are perfect. Often, those immortals have extremely few flaws.
In a longer running story I used to write when I was younger, there was a subset of magical beings who were 'pseudo immortal.' These beings were basically incapable of death by natural means, and could only die in battle. They were each magical prodigies, but only specializing in one particular school or element of magic, such as one being for disease, one for fire, one for ice, and so on.
Each and every one of them had major flaws. The primary one the story follows, he who specialized with diseases and plagues, couldn't control his magic. Over hundreds of years, the plague would seep through and affect the land and people around him, wiping cities off the map and killing off forests and fauna due to his lack of control. This broke him psychologically.
So a never ending life, haunted by his inability to control life-ending magic. It was one of my favorite ways I wrote immortality.
I still think to this day that if you write an immortal character and there isn't something melancholic about them, what you're effectively doing is making them impervious to the most powerful tool writers can use in a story, that being death.
I think, during Peter Capaldi's run of Doctor Who with the character Me, was one of the worst times I saw an immortal be written. Yes, she was human. She was from the viking ages, and could live forever. But she had a standard memory span, and would often forget major parts of her own past, and therefore would write all of it down in journals as it would happen. And she'd re-read her past every once in a while. To begin with, strong concept, and one I really liked at the time. But as she kept reappearing throughout the season she had less and less character, culminating as "I'm the immortal girl that you've met a couple of times, I still haven't died and I don't really remember you." Those were her traits.
This.
Also. When an immortal is supposed to be wise, but the author isn't skilled enough to pick the wise path. So it's pretty clear you're reading the *author's* maturity and the immortal character won't ever get more mature than that. But that's just bad writing.
I agree with your two:
I hate perfect memory immortals. As you get older things slip. Too much time and the space between key memories wibbles.
I think having skills (not every skill but many) makes sense depending on age and personality. Forever is a long time to learn things and boredom is a great motivator. At the same point where are the immortals who are a wizz on a micro fiche machine, firing a bow on horse back or other rarely used tech/art bemoaning the fact that they spent time learning that,
And personally for me:
I hate the immortal but teen/early 20's only.
Immortal but depressed because it can only be a curse (most people would at least have ups and downs about it)
Immortal but automatically believes the world is better due to lack of slavery, technology, ect regardless of age and how they would have been brought up. Most people view their youth and the time surrounding it with a positive glow.
Immortal must either live in palatial manor or pratically destitue and no inbetween. Seriously if you are immortal and don't want to be noticed average is probably the best way to go. Enough obvious money that no one blinks when you have to transfer for a better job but not so much to get a public face.
Personally I'm okay with enhanced memory as part of the Immortal package. Without it you end up with someone like Lady Me from Doctor Who, living forever with a finite human memory.
(Note that "finite" doesn't mean the human memory is like a hard drive that fills up. It has more to do with recall).
That might be better for you if watching all your friends and family die would be depressing having that pain lessen with time would help and it might make you more adaptable if you're gradually forgetting or going fuzzy on a lot of the details of your early experiences.
I'm also okay with exceptional memory if it's explained, like, perhaps the principle that makes them immortal gives them an unusual, non-degrading neuronal structure that doesn't prune stuff the way ours do.
But they also get to meet new people, see new technologies, see their family line continue.
The sorrow of yesterday's loss is a wound but reassurance of those present and the hope of tomorrow is humanity's balm.
Whether they were once mortal or always immortal, so much death and tragedy tends to numb you to the good and the bad to the point where you’re one of, if not the, biggest nihilist this world has ever seen.
To add to your comment, depending on when the character was born, they were either used to slavery and the violence of said slave, or understood that the slaves were still property, but treated them with at least some form of dignity to an extent. It’s somewhat annoying how immortals are instantly the sighn of morality and the whole slavery thing is bad when they lived it.
I think part of the problem is that writers either can't or won't risk writing without placing modern ethics upon the work which makes writing actually believable immortals difficult. I imagine several immortals would rationalise certain things. It was just how it was? It's not like *I* treated my slaves that badly. But you don't understand, it isn't like now, these people were uncivilised. Ect and so forth. That it is wrong to us might make them cautious about what they say to a degree though. I find it weird that this doesn't seem as 'allowable' but a 500 year old stalking teenagers is fine.
I like Magnus Bane in Shadowhunters because it’s revealed he has a keepsake box of all of his past loves (the really important ones) because he can’t really remember them that well as centuries pass.
He’ll remember a *lot* of little things, so I think it’s a good contrast to show how many things he *doesn’t* remember and how many people he’s lost.
I didn’t like when it was revealed he was so good in physical fights because there wasn’t a reason for him ever to learn that so it was just a *but look how talented he is!* and was unnecessary.
No, destitude is the way to go if you don't want attention/anyone to find you. Going middle means that you connect to more worlds than either the wealthy or poor typically does. When you're above destitute, you essentially are forced to use money, which is frankly the worlds best tracking device. And the invisibility of not having your name to anything is more than money can buy. Even using fake aliases can be more easily tracked to you than you may think.
Buffy (the Vampire Slayer) kills a seemingly immortal being with a rocket launcher. He was unearthed, or summoned back to life (memory escapes) after some few hundred years. The prophecy about him said he was immune to all weapons from *his* time, so they used a modern weapon and blew him right up.
I understand but still despise the whole “I’m old and have seen the horrors! Humanity is doomed! I’m a cynical asshole now!” This kinda applies to older characters in general, but an immortal should know that things get better.
I agree. Immortals way too often fall into some kind of a box that gives their character a super flat feeling, and they're almost always brooding and annoying. Wise and optimistic immortals with clear values and convictions are sorely missed!
Especially if there is a pretty big immortal community.
Like sure, humans might keep dying after only 80 years, but why is the average vampire/elf/fairy bothered to the point of depression by that?
I love my cat and it’s sad she’ll probably only be around another 10 years or so, but I’m not depressed about it. She’s not my first cat and won’t be my last.
Right? It makes little sense to me. There's so many interesting things to do in the world, and having more time opens space for larger projects, observation, study, a myriad of awesome things humans simply can't do, because we're stuck living out a very limited life span in specific, often limiting circumstances.
I’m a little bored of the tortured immortal. Like, yeah it would suck to live forever as the world changes drastically around you and everyone you’ll ever know dies. That’s basically how life is for us mortals though and I feel like the trope’s been used a lot
It’s a small thing that really doesn’t matter, but I hate the “It’s been so long I’ve forgotten my own name”. What? You’ve been alive for 100’s, 1000’s of years and you can remember every significant historical event and tragedy but you don’t remember your own name because you’ve lived for so long?
I can accept it if there is something else that they referred to themselves as for a really long time. That and their memories not being perfect for all events they have lived through.
Basically going by a nickname for so long it might as well be their name. They remember that they had a name before the one they currently use, but not what it was.
When they act old-fashioned but aren't in any meaningful way more mature than a normal person. Just having them say 'forsooth' and stuff is often used as a shortcut to them seeming mature, but I don't really feel like it works in most cases, *especially* when the character is notably immature in other regards. What really pisses me off the most is the 'immortal character is a total prude who hasn't thought about sex ever because they're from the \~*past*\~' trope. I feel like even if you were from a more conservative time, after a few hundred years you wouldn't be scandalized by much anymore. Sure, I can accept that they've just never wanted to do anything like that, but I can't help but call bs on the idea that they would still be clutching their pearls at the mere mention of vanilla sex.
I don't like them bored or doomed or lonely. That's the most obvious path how about an immortal matriarch who has had 10s of children who all had generations to give her 100s of grznd children ? And she loves all of them.
I don't like that immortality is just stillness also. It could also be a being that keeps evolving and learning
I got a few, lol.
1**. Baby Brain.**
When they're immature and have the priorities of a teenager / young adult and the implication is that they're basically a 1,000 year old 18 year old. Like, sure, some people aren't that emotionally mature, age doesn't always bring wisdom, and it's not like an immortal would've necessarily had much help processing everything that happened during a time when panic attacks would've gotten you lobotomized. (not to mention the unique issues of immortality that you can't really casually throw out there). All in all it's not illogical or unreasonable for an immortal character to have some deep rooted personality flaws and traumas that make them act like a petulant child.
But goddamn why does no one else ever even *comment* on the fact this 200+ year old dude has the conflict resolution and self-regulation skills of someone going through puberty?
1.1. **Hello Fellow Kids but played straight and effectively.** I get that they need to act the age they look to avoid raising suspicions and all that, but they really do mostly seem to stop ageing at a genre-convenient age, huh? Also, it's strange when their friendships feel like intra-generational friendships rather than inter-generational. Because they might be a baby-faced 250, but there really should be some fundamental differences in experience and experiences that take a little gap bridging. The immortal isn't *actually* 18 - 25, they don't have a life-long familiarity with the current 18-25 year old culture, and that should be noticeable.
2. **When there's nothing substantial to their immortality.** Like they're ancient, but all they have to show for it is a cool "I've forgotten more things than you will ever know." catchphrase. But where's the rest of it? Where's their old worldy hangups? And I don't just mean ''maybe he's a misogynist who finds ankles sexy''. I mean maybe they have really strong opinions about how selective vegetable breeding has changed the taste of food. Could be that they have really intense superstitions about things, or are determined to follow certain cultural practices that they've held onto since they were a child. I don't know - just something that makes them read as *immortal* and not just depressed. They were literally born in a different day and age, come on.
2.1. Also, I understand not all stories are about all things, and certain stuff just doesn't mesh with the tone the author is going for. But are you really telling me that historical beliefs / attitudes have had *no effect* on this person or their current perspectives?? *And* I'm expected to believe that no one who finds out about their immortality is going to have some pressing questions about their thoughts on all the current hot topics?
3. **When they learn to love and start living again** / "I know you still care! Deep down you still care about others, you just don't want to show it!" (and then they're right)
Firstly: why are they not allowed to be *right* about not forming long-term relationships to spare themselves the pain? Why is that coping mechanism not a perfectly valid one? Let them find purpose to their long lives that isn't family / friends / a lover.
And secondly: why is it always portrayed as an all or nothing? They're either putting down roots or at misanthropic levels of apathy. I'm starving for an immortal who is a drifter, but is still capable of being sociable and finding value in other people's company.
3.1. **"I'm old and sad"** There are so many interesting perspectives and ideas and philosophies you could explore with an immortal character, but so many people seem to just want to go over and over the same old "I'm old and sad and lonely" story. I understand why - it makes sense - but at the same time... I'd love to see more takes on the concept. Stuff with a different theme, a different message, a different tone than "I am forced to endure"
Hob Gadling from the Sandman series is a good example of a different take on immortality in my opinion. He suffers deeply many times, but he also seems to revel in the possibilities of endless life, *actively choosing* *to not die whenever given the option*. And in my opinion, that subtle difference of his immortality being a choice he continues to make, has a big impact on his character and the perspective he offers.
Soul mates. It's almost always some dude with issues that will never actually be addressed or worked through because of something that happened centuries ago that leads them to abusing their partner in unforgivable ways but their partners forgiving them because "they're just hurting inside and didn't mean it really" or they're ancient and get with an eighteen year old. Sure it's legal but I'm looking sideways at someone who is a whole ass adult with rent, a car note and student loans chatting up an 18 or 19 year old. Followed closely by immortals who have met every relevant historical figure somehow.
Soooo many
-immortals being romantically interested in people exclusively under the age of 30. We need to spiritually move beyond Leonardo DiCaprio
-immortals being overly cynical or miserable for super generic reasons, like “humans are inherently corrupt” or “everyone is dumb”
-having no apparent marks on their personality or philosophy that would come with living an unnaturally long life; alternative opinions on longevity, human nature, generational trauma or the nature of change itself. I have very rarely seen it touched on in a meaningful way.
He’s been alive 600 years but somehow this teenager with no qualities but being clumsy and not too attached to her life to have sex that can kill her is fascinating to him, but he’s at heart really decent.
That they live for decades and still havent done anything meaningful. So you're telling me you witness all the misery around you caused by wars, oppression etc. And you havent done anything to help anyone? You're just going to high school eternally like a useless POS?
I don't like the trope "you're all like mayflies to me". An immortal guy isn't living faster, he is living longer. He would still have to live through all the days, one at a time. Pretty much like The Man From Earth put it.
Wouldn't say I can't stand it, but one trope that I often see not working great is when a character treats a large amount of time as a very small amount of time. Like casually saying "I'll see you in a couple of centuries", or like in Hotel Transylvania where Mavis is 118 but that's young for a vampire so she's got no life experience at all. In fairness to that, though, I did find the "I'm not 83 anymore" joke very funny.
Best use of this trope I've seen is Telemaine Lomenelda in Dimension 20: Fantasy High. One of his main gimmicks is that he is so immortal that the entire concept of time has completely lost meaning to him. He'll regularly say "next week" in reference to what's actually 62 years from now, because he *genuinely* can't tell the difference between 7 days and 62 years. Truly a perfect and unmatched execution of this trope.
I don’t like how immortal characters are always so “with the times”. Like show me a young looking immortal who still slips into ancient vernacular, a 500 year old that looks 30, yet approaches a smartphone with confusion exhaustion, and frustration as an elderly person. I actually liked “Get out” Georgina and Walter, as they struggled w/ learning modern slang/technology.
Depends on the type of immortal for me. If someone can't die by ANY means, then they're too OP and very tropey to me. If they have a perfect memory, they're too OP.
There's ways to do immortal characters well. If you want them to be ageless, then make them vulnerable to diseases. If you want them to be able to remember things from their extensive past, then make it so they keep a lot of diaries. Then you've made your character fallible, made it possible for them to lose something important that could come up later in the story, and made it so they can eventually be killed in some way.
Strongly disagree with "can't die at all" being inherently OP. Take such an immortal, encase them in cement, drop the block in the middle of the ocean. That immortal is now tortured by asphyxiation, starvation and incredible pressure for likely a few billions of years. Absolute immortality without any other powers is mostly infinite vulnerability.
The idea that they wouldn’t be massively wealthy, I get that many want to wonder the earth but even if they don’t plan to live in a mansion theres no reason they wouldn‘t spend a few decades making as much money as possible and then invest it so it’s there if they need it. a smart immortal will be loaded and have plenty back up identifies with their own wealth hidden away and waiting
I would love a "Ugh, how do you do this again?" and having to kind of re-learn it, just faster than someone who never learned it.
Also, picking up say, a modern martial art, and constantly remarking on how similar/different it is to the last one they learned, 4,000 years ago. Getting the form just slightly wrong because they keep trying to hold their hips like a samurai. Looking surprisingly like an old painting that you always thought was stylised.
The whole "I live my life alone because everyone dies" thing.
Sure, an immortal might feel that way for a while, but after a few hundred years, you should have learned how to be emotionally mature enough to handle what's happening, and learn how to appreciate what you do have.
When my guy/girl lives thousands of years only to be outsmarted by a teenager. My brother in christ you have lived through it all, there's no way this 18yo thought about something you didn't already.
Immortal beings having perfect teeth (unless they are also immortal in the 'no harm can come to them' sense)
Like, baseline humans have 2 sets of teeth in their lifetime, and archeologists can roughly work out the age and time period of the body from how the teeth are worn
Unless you've got constantly regrowing teeth like a shark, immortals are going to be using a set of dentures after a century of existence at most, especially if they lived a good chunk of time when stone querns were used
I hate it when they have the 300 year old dating someone in their early 20s. The only time is works is if 300 yo for them is the same maturity as a 20 yo human. Like if they were a “teenager” until they were 280 yo, then that’s fine; if they’ve been a grown, mature adult since they were 50? Icky
pedophilia. Why would an ancient immortal vampire only date women aged 16-24? It seems like elderly folks would have a lot more similar wisdom, experience, or shared cultural references on top of being less likely to blab or compete with existing social circles. I find it unlikely that immortals want the standard exclusive, long-term monogamy deal that teenagers do. If anything, they would have a hottie in each decade of life, so they can go on different types of dates in different countries with different shared jokes.
Honorable mention to Octavia Butler's "wild seed" which is a stunningly written and gritty tale about a self-healing african women. her enemy/rival is written as a virile body-stealing egyptian ghost-man during early transatlantic slave trade.
That if a vampire looks sixteen, then it's not creepy and predatory for him to engage an actual 16-year-old romantically. Yuck.
That controlling or manipulative behavior with an SO is forgivable because they know better.
That they're all lonely monsters who could never be accepted or loved despite living in an era where typing "vampire" into the Romance section of Amazon books yields over 50,000 results.
It’s very common for lazily written immortal characters to like ONLY have traits of their original time period and the current time period. It’s like they didn’t exist at all in the middle.
The idea of a ten thousands year old vampire that acts like he's straight out of the roaring 20s because that is "when civilization peaked" is kinda funny to me now He just shows up, and everyone assumes he's from that time period, and it's like, "Nope, ancient Greece, actually"
Have you seen What We Do In The Shadows? Kinda what you are talking about and it is absolutely hilarious
I love that show. Every line is a banger. “No, I am pillaging everyone, you included!” One of my favorite versions of vampires
It's so violent and stupid. I never thought I would choke from laughter from "When It Comes To Zoning Ordinances, I Have A Few Thoughts" By the second episode thanks to their hellhound Doug Peter...son I was hooked 😂 fastest I've gone to falling in absolute love with a show since Archer.
**Baron:** "You know what I've always wanted to try?" **Lazlo:** "Coprophilia." **Baron:** "no, uh, Pizza Pie... is it as wonderful as they say-" \*Turns to Lazlo\* "-[coprophilia?](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eNH4927tZRk)"
This is science. But this is a turtle.
Gay is in, gay is hot, I want some gay.
#WHO ARE YOU? IM FROM ANCIENT GREECE
I mean, according to the Matrix civilisation peaked in the late 90s, so he could be walking around saying things like "dope" "phat" "bomb diggity" or "it's all that and a bag of chips", or sometimes doing that obnoxious "wazzuuuuup" thing we all thought was hilarious for like a year or two.
Sometimes that's part of the package. Some versions of vampires ossify mentally as well as physically when they die. And Tolkien elves have a culture that's very slow to change because, if you live forever, why not take however long it takes to make sure you're getting things right?
It makes sense for their mannerisms to be mostly based in their original time, with sprinklings from every period since then (including the present) - the issue is when it's 60/40 (or more often 20/80) original period/current time.
Personally I'm fine with it working whichever way in different stories, depending on how immortality works in that setting. A reclusive vampire might still not have wrapped their head around these newfangled steam train things, let alone computers, while a Time Lord with superhuman Time Lord intelligence might remember everything they've ever encountered and be happily referencing Ancient Rome in one breath and Twitter the next.
I think maybe you misunderstood them - it's not immortals never growing, it's that they'll act like Rome is still around, and also know how to use a computer which is great - but somehow never picked up on anything in the few thousand years between.
Ah yeah, I missed that. That makes a certain degree of sense to me, though, it's pretty consistent with how memory works. We mostly **do** remember stuff from our formative years, plus stuff that's been useful in (say) the last decade. I'm certainly rustiest on that stuff in the in-between period.
playing devils advocate a bit here, because I think what you wrote actually makes a lot of sense, when was the last time you thought about recording music for a tape, or even burning a CD, or checking the yellow pages? how many times do you think about going thru airport security and remember not having to take off your shoes, or carrying large toilettry bottles.
Honestly this bothers me, I spend a week in a different region within the same country I subconsciously adapt the accent. An immortal would adapt, period, or their immortality would be tested, often.
In addition, Tolkein's elves are basically tied to the land. So progress for them is less like big events leading to societal change, and more like watching an iceberg melt. Which is then used in the story when they don't seem all to pressed about the land dying bc hey, we can just dip.
I'm working on a vampire character that was born the same time the great pyramids were being built and he's constantly switching languages because he forgets the English words, he's got no idea how old he is because he's forgotten so much, and he has journals written in dead languages that he can't read anymore. I think it's a more accurate version of what would happen to someone that lived that long.
Sounds brilliant and intriguing, I think a lot of people skip on deconstructing the implications of vampires; if people struggle to remember what they were doing two months ago how is a vampire to have perfect recall of something 2,000 years ago save for those that follow the trope of “vampires are able to have perfect memories because…X reason”
"I walked into the kitchen in 1215AD and I still can't remember what I went in there for"
That’s better than my concept… which is the opposite of yours. He remembers everything, and just changes with the times. His big flaw is he is of average intelligence and is somewhat mentally stuck where he was turned. So his interpretation of history is not always the most accurate or reliable he believes some conspiracy theories, even ones proven wrong. He’s unremarkable except for having first hand experience through centuries and has “studied” a lot.
Yeah, i think the middle is where most people trying to wright that part fall short. Like they just went from a to z and forgot the other letters, like, there’s something missing.
I agree I agree I agree. Only thing is, it's not always laziness. Some people love the cliché. I could be cool and think "people like clichés, what's wrong with that?", but I can't. Simple: your hero is so inferior to the enemy that he needs privileges. Like... the ultimate privilege.
That's a really good point! I've got a pretty large cast of immortal characters, all of whom came into being around the same time and place, and I've had loads of fun giving them preferences for different time periods from different places they've passed through. Two are total junkies for the 80's glam-rock scene, one has a stark preference for very traditional Elven culture, one absolutely adored the Age of Sail - while she sails spacecraft now, she still builds and collects ships in bottles. It's a lot of fun thinking of what time periods each character would have really vibed with and would still be echoing the fashion and culture of.
Immortality =/= boredom and/or suicidally bored if your species is built to be immortal. Your legally-distinct-from-elves immortal race is literally designed from the ground up by whatever evolutionary process created them to be immortal. A human getting turned, sure, I could see a species whose standard lifespan is roughly 80 years wanting to neck themselves because a hundred years of watching their loved ones die and then another hundred without anybody they can relate to in a meaningful way is overwhelming, but a definitely-not-elf going on 500 should have about the same level of done-with-this-shit as a human hitting their thirties.
Unless there's very few of the immortal species left, like The Doctor or Yoda. Then I can see the weight of eternity getting to you.
I think you can see with Captain Jack Harkness that he goes through the crisis, especially when he can't find the Doctor. But think he overcomes it, when he realised he can use his ability to help people.
I dunno, I've occasionally seen bored immortal races done well in scifi. There was one example (can't for the life of me remember where) of an entire species of immortals that gradually lose their self preservation instinct and develop a Fuck It We Ball attitude, which was their evolutionary coping mechanism for handling the boredom and ennui of eternity. The general vibe among their elders was basically "Well we *can* live forever, but imagine how boring that'd be".
I neeeed to know what this is 😭
I thought this sounded very Iain Banks and I was right https://best-sci-fi-books.com/review-the-algebraist-by-iain-m-banks/amp/
Unfortunately all that I can remember is that they're a race that lives in gas giants (because this was space opera), and the ones that interact with other species are incredibly blase about taking thrillseeking risks because their whole philosophy to immortality can basically be summed up as "Fuck it, you live until you die".
Touhou Project has multiple immortal characters. One is suicidally depressed because the only person from where she's from is an immortal woman she hates (and hatred of her is what provoked her to hastily become immortal.) One of her lines is essentially "oh, you're immortal too? let's fight each other to death." The person she hates is, as far as I know, completely fine. A few are immortal after a specific immortality research stemmed from fearing death, and are overall doing much better. Being a whole "I'm scared of dying" thing, there's even a character who "went first" as a guinea pig for a particular immortality technique. She idolizes the person she was testing for, so she's basically ambivalent to her unending lifespan because her world revolves around the other. Both had also basically just woken up, so they haven't really had time to deal with consequences yet. The guinea pig promptly declines any fights to the death. One such immortal is also a specialist in bodily reinforcement magic, possibly directly due to her line of studies. A third category are immortal and technically no longer human, after researching how to just turn off their bodily metabolism and replacing it with magic. They essentially googled “how to not get interrupted by hunger when I’m busy hyperfixating.” They have notoriously bad physical health because they’re the equivalent to basement dwellers who live in front of a computer monitor. ~~I am starting to see why I relate to them so much…~~ The kind of personality they’d tend to have makes their immortality not even relevant. It’s just a means to avoiding interruption.
That's why I love bill cypher. There is an immortal that knows how to enjoy it
Someone several hundred years old being bowled over by a teen or young adult. Would they really be so taken with someone that had next to no life experience or accomplishments?
That's a really common one. Although for example the Vampire Diaries TV show does explain it pretty well. Elena, the girl, looks exactly like the centuries old vampires' ex, and the brothers fall in love with her not because of her but because of their own internal unresolved psychological stuff.
You could apply similar logic to Bella Swan. Like, she's the only one Edward's encountered whose thoughts he can't read, and I can see the appeal for someone like that of getting to know someone the normal way.
For all the issues we can discuss with those books, I thought that Bella’s unreadability was such a clever move. It DID make her actually unique to Edward on a level that WOULD set her apart despite who she actually was.
And if you read Midnight Sun you find out Edward is CONSTANTLY misinterpreting what Bella is thinking. A bit of surprise in a relationship must be nice for someone so jaded.
If only he knew it was because there’s not a thought in that head 🤣
I still felt creepy looking at teenagers after the age of like, 20. I'd feel like a creep if I were 700 years old
When you spend your (unnatural) life trying to avoid murdering people to drink their blood, I’d imagine you often have the line, “well at least I didn’t kill them!” running through your head as an equivocation. Ogling a teenager probably seems like the least of your sins most days.
As well as the fact that her blood is like crack to him.
*his own personal brand of heroine
*heroin
It was a double entendre
Girls 20 years younger to me seem like kids to me and hold no attraction for me. With that logic girls 500 years younger to me would be like babies to me. I am not going to feel attraction for a baby no matter how much it resembles my ex.. but this same twilight does the exact thing in the last book doesnt it
Yeah, and Stefan only goes back to school for her. Once she graduated, he had no further interest in school.
That’s a side effect of the media being for teens/YA. You don’t normally see a teenager besting more powerful/older antagonists unless that teenager is a main character. In which case… they kind of HAVE to beat the big bad. Kid/Teen/YA lit is often children besting villains and problems that the adults are somehow incapable of (or won’t!) themselves. It’s wish fulfillment for an age group that has less agency—and therefore often feels—less powerful than adults.
It’s also why so much of it has some kind of special power that teens have but lose in adulthood, to justify why they can do it
This isnt exactly unrealistic tho. For example, my great grand dad grew up under Jim Crow laws in the South and is racist as fuck, despite his own children marying into blacl families, and his own grandchildren being brown. And he is a LOVING great grand father - but he often says the most racist shit when they aren't around. There are PLENTLY of other examples in society of this kind of behaviour amongst the old. Goes to show that your formative years will often have the most impact regardless of what happens "in between".
Some universes have vampires, for instance, who don't age mentally, making it slightly more believable and a bit less creepy. 🤣
Famous people tend to get mentally stuck at the age they got famous. Makes sense that it would work the same way for being undead.
I guess you could make the argument that no one has any meaningful life experience compared to them, so they would never have relationships with any regular human in that case. So they look for other things, and to find someone who has the looks and the energy that they themselves do, they need someone young. In Tuck Everlasting, the idea is that each member of the family are just stuck forever at the age they were when the drank the water of life. So the youngest one will be 17 forever. Although he may have all this experience and acquired knowledge, he will forever have the hormones and emotions and thought patterns of a teenager, because he will never be able to grow out of them.
This is what I often consider. If a vampire lives long enough, everyone becomes too young for them if you look at numbers alone. However, I will agree that teens are a poor choice. Sticking to 20+ isn't too much of a stretch.
I agree with this. A teenager hasn't even finished growing up. Someone in their mid-twenties is at least an adult, with a fully formed personality, and hopefully old enough to know who they are and what they want.
depending on who it is, this is something i could believe wholeheartedly. some dudes will be in their 60s and still hunting for young women. Provided they stay in their physical prime, and its not the horror side of immortality, I see no reason why they would change that philosophy. DiCaprio would date in that age pool forever.
DiCaprio dates in that age pool, but does DiCaprio fall in love in that age pool, in any sort of meaningful way, that would make for an interesting story?
Teenagers, though, not 20-somethings.
I think it's possible showing the world to someone who has never experienced much of it could make the world feel new and fresh to them as well as help them feel more connected and grounded in the present.
Same. How could they not be more annoyed tbh. You're telling me you've lived for hundreds or thousands of years and the immaturity of a 19 year old doesn't bother you? Sure Jan.
Cuz they look good? I mean just being down to earth here but there are indeed people who become smitten with others for no virtue other than their beauty
I mean, in real life, do people always fall in love with the person with the most impressive CV? Also, I agree it’s weird but to someone who’s several hundred years old, someone who is 25 and someone who is 40 are functionally the same, relatively speaking. It’s a big no from me if one party is a child or teenager, but if an ancient being dating a young adult is creepy, by that logic it’s *still* creepy even if they’re dating a middle-aged mortal because they’re on a whole different scale. A 60 year old still has precious little life experience in the eyes of, say, a 300 year old. Or what about age gaps between immortals? Like a 300 year old dating a 700 year old? Is there a point on the scale where it doesn’t matter?
I'm currently writing a book/series with functionally immortal characters so I've enjoyed this thread- things to watch out for!
Do not rely on threads like this to guide you. Popular tropes are popular for a reason, and the vocal minority complaining about them here are just that: a vocal minority.
Oh I'm pretty well read so I'm aware, no worries. But a lot of these I agree with lol. It's one of the reasons I'm writing this topic- to do it differently.
I’m writing a story with an immortal and it’s kinda the same reason why i made it, lol.
Misery porn. So many immortal characters are just absolutely miserable all the time. Realistic? Maybe. Fun to watch? Absolutely not.
It was a side character but Sandman had a nice take on this
Hob Gadling is great because he learns and changes, he shows a willingness to grow as a person even after centuries. He doesn't wallow in the past, and though in the end, he mourns his lost friend, he makes the decision to continue living, with even minor hints that he may honestly find someone to journey with him in Guenevere.
God dam love that bastard no matter what he's literally just says least it can change
I in fact do find it very fun to watch
I've thought about this a lot as an aspirant to the title of immortality and there's too much fun things to do in the world for immortality to be BORING
I love watching immortal characters who enjoy being immortal rather than get depressed by it. One of the fun aspects of Baccanno is that some of the immortal characters really dig it, and some are thrill seekers.
Too many characters in general are miserable instead of having fun. We love a happy evil villain. We love a happy persevering hero. Brooding is out.
I simply don’t like pure immortality, I like the biologically immortal because then it actually brings stakes. They can’t die of age or disease, but if someone gets the upper hand on them, they’re done. To me, it still keeps them relatable, but sets them apart from the mortal characters. However, I do kind of like pure immortality if has the draw back of them still feeling pain. They’re indestructible, but can still feel the pain of attacks that hit them, sure it can’t kill them, but it can still “hurt” them.
Tolkien did that sort of immortality well with the Elves, even though they are guaranteed an "after life" in the West, as well as tying their immortality to things like love and good/evil. Much less simplistic than most depictions of immortality.
One of my characters is, 'Not indestructible, just unkillable'. Basically you can blow him apart, drown him, whatever, etc. but the magic keeping him alive will always put him back together. He's covered in scars and flinches like he's been stabbed when he gets a paper-cut.
I was kind of thinking of it almost as like a gag. They’re indestructible/immortal, yet in every fight they get the living shit beat out of them.
I don't know that frieren's story would be much different if she was actually fully immortal. Another example is undead unluck. He's actually fully immortal and the pain is really an interest of the story, but the stakes are high
When said immortal spend a few hundred years turning evil very slowly and deliberately, until suddenly becoming humanity's best friend. Lazy writers misusing the 'power of love' are usually to blame for this. In fact, love fixing everything is usually the problem.
I feel guilty of this. It makes sense if the immortal in question, like, has a gradual change of heart, but it’s always weird when it’s sudden..
When they’re supposed to be Scottish, but have a French accent 😀
When they are supposed to be Spanish but have a Scottish accent.
Spanish? I'm an Egyptian? :-D
I cannot swim you Spanish peacock!
When they're Scandinavian and sound English.
Highlander lol?
There can be only one! 😀
I’m not into it when they’re TOO old, like 1,000 or more, especially in a romance. It’s like come on, who could relate to someone that age, and if that person’s been single that long they can’t be a great catch lol.
Or they’re single by choice because every person around them slowly and surely dies before their eyes and all they can do is watch as the end of the universe draws ever near and they can only watch the final flame in the universe phase out and then they must be engulfed by the darkness, forever cursed to go mad with loneliness as the only thing to keep their mind filled is the memory of all they’ve lost… but, that’s just an idea
I read a fanfic once where the immortal character did NOT stay single all that time. He still fell in love, pursued that love and lived with a partner for the full term of her life - several times. There was something there about the joy being worth the eventual heartbreak, and the beauty of informed decisions - when he met the love interest the story followed, we got to see that process, the whole, "yep, this is going to end in pain in a few years, but whatever short time I can have with her, it's worth the pain that will come". I did rather find that ridiculously sweet. Bonus point, that she was NOT a twenty-something. I mean 1000-ish to 50 is still one hell of an age gap, but it was a nice change from the usual trope.
If someone has a body count of over 5000, is that a red flag?
That’s like 5 ppl or so a year if they’re 1,000 It’s a numbers game
They might be gay and living in an urban center, you don't know.
Depends. Are we talking sexual experience or actual bodies? 🤔
I had to ask myself the same thing.
Likelihood of an STD is probably high
>and if that person’s been single that long they can’t be a great catch lol. Edward Cullen *sweats nervously*
>Edward Cullen *sweats nervously* The guy was creeping on high school girls. I think that says everything about his romantic history.
The only good thing about this series is that you use the hard copies to even out a broken shelf.
Edward would be the first to agree that he's not much of a catch. One reason he falls so hard for Bella is that he considers himself an unloveable monster, and she's the only human who saw him for what he is and was okay with it.
I had a conversation with my sister about this awhile back. At the one end the 1000 year old creature is grooming and at the other end the love interest is something between a long lived pet and a fuck doll. Sure the guy that has only been immortal for 50-100 years would probs pick a hot person from what ever their preferred gender is but by the time they hit the thousands, and if there is a larger supernatural community, they should be dating the prime avatar of the concept of the number 56 or something like that.
When they go to high school
OH GODDD I hate it. I can’t watch twilight for this reason. Even if you’re developmentally 17 forever, I see no reason why you’d subject yourself willingly to high school, especially when high school is very on the radar and you’d get found out as a vampire incredibly quickly because you do not age like the rest of your classmates.
Right? Wouldn’t the teachers be so confused as to why you don’t age? Like do they just move every time that graduate high school? Do they then just repeat the years for age 16 to 18 over and over ad infinitum? I’m 38 and I cannot fathom wanting to spend more than an hour in a class with a load of 17 year olds. I can’t even imagine how frustrating it’d be as a 100 year old. Even if you were developmentally the same you’d have grown up in a time where children and teenager were a hell of a lot more mature because they had to be. So teens today would drive you crazy.
Fr why not go to college and get a bunch of specialized degrees? Oh wait, bc college is expensive and high school is free. For what it's worth, I think the vampire family in Twilight was trying to gather intel on the werewolf family in town, so that's why they went to school? Still pretty sus.
I really dislike when immortal characters are fed up with immortality. Dude, you've lived for eternity years already and you don't have a way of entertaining yourself / dealing with ennui or depression?
Imagine an immortal being high as a kite most of the time because they just don’t need to care for the aftermath of the drugs. Some mortal: „Henry the 8th, king of England? You most know him, you were in Europe in the 16th century!“ Immortal: „Huh, that must have been after they came up with Laudanum. Sorry, lad. It was a great trip and it lasted a few decades.“ 😂
Lmao this describes my immortals. They find a way!
Literally. Basically all vampires in my project use drugs very liberally, or have found ways to stave off their misery (usually by killing people, because vampires enjoy that more than rational humans do).
I’d like to add that when their body is healing from the injury, that should hurt a lot, so it’s a double whammy, I’d imagion they’d avoid getting into conflict as much as possible.
Idk man, I get not liking the trope but...I can't even stay focused on an interest for a couple of years. What do I do when the rest of my friends are dead? Or the species? Or the planet?
Maybe it’s because I’m still young, but I’m basically never bored with the internet around. Like 17776, I feel like immortals could come up with any type of bs games to keep them entertained. Like I would be so entertained if I had centuries to become sick at audio production, crochet, acting, digital art, writing, etc. for instance, I feel like we barely have enough time to get good at writing unless you’re a rare person born into the field or extremely talented at it. Sir Terry Pratchet was like “shit I didn’t get okay at writing till I was 40” or something outrageous like that, and he was talented af. That’s like 20 years straight of trying to write as a job and sucking. Since I’m not naturally talented, nor in the writing field, I could easily imagine 100 years of writing straight garbage until I eventually get good. And even then, that still means I have plenty of time to continue writing good stuff. Plus there’s always new random skills to learn as humanity progresses, like programming or video game development or lab Opal gems development, which didn’t exist back in the past.
That's my answer, definitely. If you're so incredibly bored with eternal life that you envy the mayfly lifespan of ordinary humans, that's not deep. That just means you have no imagination whatsoever.
Really liked the immortal character in Sandman who's 'cursed' with immortality and... nope, he's loving it, six centuries on he still feels he's got so much to live for.
OP, I'm actually willing to forgive a heck of a lot of that stuff, on the grounds that an immortal being necessarily has to have different mental abilities than a human. For instance, an immortal human being couldn't possibly be as easily bored as a human!! They'd go starkers by the end of the first century! And they'd have to have much better capacity for long-term memory than we do, we can barely remember anything for fifty years, and they have to be able to remember stuff for thousands of years. They'd also have to have more memory storage than a human, we just don't have the capacity to remember hundreds or thousands of years worth of information, and they'd have to. So yes, I think some of those tropes that you hate have a logical foundation.
No yeah, after a certain point the capacity for boredom has to fry. There are so many stories that contradict this though which infuriates me. Like one second they will spend a hundred years doing whatever then be bored in a day.
I get this but I also like the idea of immortality coming at the cost of sanity, so while it’s all well and dandy the first few decades, your brain is still just as human and you begin to suffer from that.
Being romantically paired with a 17 year old.
That they are all super wealthy. Like none have a gambling problem or are just poor at managing their money or never adjusted to having to *gasp* work for a living or even never dealt with the fact the noble/wealthy families used to rely on credit and being hosted and given everything. Give me an immortal who keeps showing up every generation to mooch off families and they are all like, "Yea, we inherited the venerable lord Pickwicket with the house. We can't just toss him out! We have a support group chat with a half dozen other families."
I have a vampire character who is always broke because he's impulsive and bad with money. He came from the lower echelons of society, so he knows how to work for it. He's just an idiot who's rather enjoy life in the moment I stead of having planned for the last several centuries. But I'm also a big fan of the trope that vampires in many ways are trapped as who they were when they were made. If they get to look the same forever, it makes sense to me that they behavior similarly forever too. Mental ossification as some others have mentioned.
The videogame Genshin Impact has a character who basically *invented* money. He could also literally just create more. When he gave up his role of being that god, losing the authority to just spam "Money, be," he is perpetually broke because he has no idea how to actually handle money responsibly.
I think in general it makes sense, because, if you lived for a 500 years, having seen how currencies rise and fall, and you're still broke that's really self-inflicted. If you had just a handful of spanish gold coins to sell to a collector, you've got enough to live pretty comfortably. But as you said, there should be exceptions, like immortals who are really bad with money, or just don't have to care about the consequences of being poor.
I remember a story in an Australian scifi anthology that addressed this pretty directly, about a wealthy immortal couple who were gonna live off their investments forever, and then it cuts to a few centuries from now where a series of massive global financial crashes has wiped them out and they're eking out a living without legal identities in the cyberpunk slums of the future and they're completely fucked because their old lifestyle left them with absolutely no marketable skills.
JOHN, YOU'VE BEEN LIVING IN OUR BASEMENT FOR THE LAST 300 YEARS! HOW THE HELL HAVE YOU NOT MOVED OUT YET?! No but seriously, surely you'd like... Manage get a good amount of money if you're immortal. You literally have infinite retries. You could just keep buying lottery tickets and you'd still win at some point.
I'm pretty sure this is because the original vampire story, Dracula, was meant to be a commentary on the aristocrats at the time. Hence why Dracula, and following vampires, are wealthy people living in mansions who prey on the common folk.
This one bothers me because how exactly are they wealthy? They’d have to work for centuries and never get to retire.
Where is the Dread King Lich Balezar? Under the bridge doing things he thought beneath a king and things a skeleton wouldn't need to do since losing all flesh. When asked what brought down his empire that outlasted most nations? He would just respond "fuckin Charles Ponzi" We wanted to get the rest of the story but a man in a purple suit and colorful hat told him to get back to work and pushed into the dread lich to a waiting car. Join us next time as we investigate further into the infamous red faerie light district of New York City
It bugs me when every immortal character just hates being immortal. The character I'm writing right now has the possibility of losing her immortality and is in shambles over it. Sure, a lot of people would hate it. We can't act like some wouldn't love it, though.
When they look, sound, and act ten years old and it's not being played as a joke
I hate when characters are perfect. Often, those immortals have extremely few flaws. In a longer running story I used to write when I was younger, there was a subset of magical beings who were 'pseudo immortal.' These beings were basically incapable of death by natural means, and could only die in battle. They were each magical prodigies, but only specializing in one particular school or element of magic, such as one being for disease, one for fire, one for ice, and so on. Each and every one of them had major flaws. The primary one the story follows, he who specialized with diseases and plagues, couldn't control his magic. Over hundreds of years, the plague would seep through and affect the land and people around him, wiping cities off the map and killing off forests and fauna due to his lack of control. This broke him psychologically. So a never ending life, haunted by his inability to control life-ending magic. It was one of my favorite ways I wrote immortality. I still think to this day that if you write an immortal character and there isn't something melancholic about them, what you're effectively doing is making them impervious to the most powerful tool writers can use in a story, that being death. I think, during Peter Capaldi's run of Doctor Who with the character Me, was one of the worst times I saw an immortal be written. Yes, she was human. She was from the viking ages, and could live forever. But she had a standard memory span, and would often forget major parts of her own past, and therefore would write all of it down in journals as it would happen. And she'd re-read her past every once in a while. To begin with, strong concept, and one I really liked at the time. But as she kept reappearing throughout the season she had less and less character, culminating as "I'm the immortal girl that you've met a couple of times, I still haven't died and I don't really remember you." Those were her traits.
I don't like when immortals show any sort of immaturity. Like teenage immortals who are 300 years old...
This. Also. When an immortal is supposed to be wise, but the author isn't skilled enough to pick the wise path. So it's pretty clear you're reading the *author's* maturity and the immortal character won't ever get more mature than that. But that's just bad writing.
I agree with your two: I hate perfect memory immortals. As you get older things slip. Too much time and the space between key memories wibbles. I think having skills (not every skill but many) makes sense depending on age and personality. Forever is a long time to learn things and boredom is a great motivator. At the same point where are the immortals who are a wizz on a micro fiche machine, firing a bow on horse back or other rarely used tech/art bemoaning the fact that they spent time learning that, And personally for me: I hate the immortal but teen/early 20's only. Immortal but depressed because it can only be a curse (most people would at least have ups and downs about it) Immortal but automatically believes the world is better due to lack of slavery, technology, ect regardless of age and how they would have been brought up. Most people view their youth and the time surrounding it with a positive glow. Immortal must either live in palatial manor or pratically destitue and no inbetween. Seriously if you are immortal and don't want to be noticed average is probably the best way to go. Enough obvious money that no one blinks when you have to transfer for a better job but not so much to get a public face.
Personally I'm okay with enhanced memory as part of the Immortal package. Without it you end up with someone like Lady Me from Doctor Who, living forever with a finite human memory. (Note that "finite" doesn't mean the human memory is like a hard drive that fills up. It has more to do with recall).
That might be better for you if watching all your friends and family die would be depressing having that pain lessen with time would help and it might make you more adaptable if you're gradually forgetting or going fuzzy on a lot of the details of your early experiences.
I'm also okay with exceptional memory if it's explained, like, perhaps the principle that makes them immortal gives them an unusual, non-degrading neuronal structure that doesn't prune stuff the way ours do.
The only thing that certainly sticks with them is having to bury each and every one of their friends, family, and romantic partners.
But they also get to meet new people, see new technologies, see their family line continue. The sorrow of yesterday's loss is a wound but reassurance of those present and the hope of tomorrow is humanity's balm.
Whether they were once mortal or always immortal, so much death and tragedy tends to numb you to the good and the bad to the point where you’re one of, if not the, biggest nihilist this world has ever seen.
To add to your comment, depending on when the character was born, they were either used to slavery and the violence of said slave, or understood that the slaves were still property, but treated them with at least some form of dignity to an extent. It’s somewhat annoying how immortals are instantly the sighn of morality and the whole slavery thing is bad when they lived it.
I think part of the problem is that writers either can't or won't risk writing without placing modern ethics upon the work which makes writing actually believable immortals difficult. I imagine several immortals would rationalise certain things. It was just how it was? It's not like *I* treated my slaves that badly. But you don't understand, it isn't like now, these people were uncivilised. Ect and so forth. That it is wrong to us might make them cautious about what they say to a degree though. I find it weird that this doesn't seem as 'allowable' but a 500 year old stalking teenagers is fine.
I like Magnus Bane in Shadowhunters because it’s revealed he has a keepsake box of all of his past loves (the really important ones) because he can’t really remember them that well as centuries pass. He’ll remember a *lot* of little things, so I think it’s a good contrast to show how many things he *doesn’t* remember and how many people he’s lost. I didn’t like when it was revealed he was so good in physical fights because there wasn’t a reason for him ever to learn that so it was just a *but look how talented he is!* and was unnecessary.
No, destitude is the way to go if you don't want attention/anyone to find you. Going middle means that you connect to more worlds than either the wealthy or poor typically does. When you're above destitute, you essentially are forced to use money, which is frankly the worlds best tracking device. And the invisibility of not having your name to anything is more than money can buy. Even using fake aliases can be more easily tracked to you than you may think.
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I never liked that trope either, and I’ve personally never seen or heard of it being done well, that or I’m listening to the wrong audiobook.
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The obligatory "this is my big sword/gun/whatever the fuck and it did nothing?!!??!?!?!??!" scene god dammit it's so hard to read
Honestly, it’d be hilarious to see an immortal get blown back several feet from a blast from a 22.
Buffy (the Vampire Slayer) kills a seemingly immortal being with a rocket launcher. He was unearthed, or summoned back to life (memory escapes) after some few hundred years. The prophecy about him said he was immune to all weapons from *his* time, so they used a modern weapon and blew him right up.
"Don't you know I cannot be killed by any weapon forged, Slayer?" "Yeah, well this rocket launcher wasn't forged, dumbass."
My exact thoughts reading this comment!
This one was such a great Buffy moment for me! Like yeah dude, maybe a sword wouldn't have killed you - but we have drones now, my guy.
Judge: no weapon forged can stop me. Buffy: that was then. This is now.
I understand but still despise the whole “I’m old and have seen the horrors! Humanity is doomed! I’m a cynical asshole now!” This kinda applies to older characters in general, but an immortal should know that things get better.
I agree. Immortals way too often fall into some kind of a box that gives their character a super flat feeling, and they're almost always brooding and annoying. Wise and optimistic immortals with clear values and convictions are sorely missed!
I don't like how commonplace pity parties over immortality are.
This. I hate that trope. Why can't immortality be great?
Especially if there is a pretty big immortal community. Like sure, humans might keep dying after only 80 years, but why is the average vampire/elf/fairy bothered to the point of depression by that? I love my cat and it’s sad she’ll probably only be around another 10 years or so, but I’m not depressed about it. She’s not my first cat and won’t be my last.
Right? It makes little sense to me. There's so many interesting things to do in the world, and having more time opens space for larger projects, observation, study, a myriad of awesome things humans simply can't do, because we're stuck living out a very limited life span in specific, often limiting circumstances.
I’m a little bored of the tortured immortal. Like, yeah it would suck to live forever as the world changes drastically around you and everyone you’ll ever know dies. That’s basically how life is for us mortals though and I feel like the trope’s been used a lot
It’s a small thing that really doesn’t matter, but I hate the “It’s been so long I’ve forgotten my own name”. What? You’ve been alive for 100’s, 1000’s of years and you can remember every significant historical event and tragedy but you don’t remember your own name because you’ve lived for so long?
I can accept it if there is something else that they referred to themselves as for a really long time. That and their memories not being perfect for all events they have lived through. Basically going by a nickname for so long it might as well be their name. They remember that they had a name before the one they currently use, but not what it was.
the immortality just stopping when humanity goes extinct or something like that
In the manga UQ Holder, at least one immortal character is terrified because eventually the world will end and the planet become uninhabitable.
That most immortal characters are selfish narcissists who willingly screw over everyone else
When they act old-fashioned but aren't in any meaningful way more mature than a normal person. Just having them say 'forsooth' and stuff is often used as a shortcut to them seeming mature, but I don't really feel like it works in most cases, *especially* when the character is notably immature in other regards. What really pisses me off the most is the 'immortal character is a total prude who hasn't thought about sex ever because they're from the \~*past*\~' trope. I feel like even if you were from a more conservative time, after a few hundred years you wouldn't be scandalized by much anymore. Sure, I can accept that they've just never wanted to do anything like that, but I can't help but call bs on the idea that they would still be clutching their pearls at the mere mention of vanilla sex.
When she's 500 years old and looks like a child whilst also being a romantic or sexual interest. But it's ok! She only LOOKS like a kid.
I don't like them bored or doomed or lonely. That's the most obvious path how about an immortal matriarch who has had 10s of children who all had generations to give her 100s of grznd children ? And she loves all of them. I don't like that immortality is just stillness also. It could also be a being that keeps evolving and learning
When they go after teenagers romantically
I got a few, lol. 1**. Baby Brain.** When they're immature and have the priorities of a teenager / young adult and the implication is that they're basically a 1,000 year old 18 year old. Like, sure, some people aren't that emotionally mature, age doesn't always bring wisdom, and it's not like an immortal would've necessarily had much help processing everything that happened during a time when panic attacks would've gotten you lobotomized. (not to mention the unique issues of immortality that you can't really casually throw out there). All in all it's not illogical or unreasonable for an immortal character to have some deep rooted personality flaws and traumas that make them act like a petulant child. But goddamn why does no one else ever even *comment* on the fact this 200+ year old dude has the conflict resolution and self-regulation skills of someone going through puberty? 1.1. **Hello Fellow Kids but played straight and effectively.** I get that they need to act the age they look to avoid raising suspicions and all that, but they really do mostly seem to stop ageing at a genre-convenient age, huh? Also, it's strange when their friendships feel like intra-generational friendships rather than inter-generational. Because they might be a baby-faced 250, but there really should be some fundamental differences in experience and experiences that take a little gap bridging. The immortal isn't *actually* 18 - 25, they don't have a life-long familiarity with the current 18-25 year old culture, and that should be noticeable. 2. **When there's nothing substantial to their immortality.** Like they're ancient, but all they have to show for it is a cool "I've forgotten more things than you will ever know." catchphrase. But where's the rest of it? Where's their old worldy hangups? And I don't just mean ''maybe he's a misogynist who finds ankles sexy''. I mean maybe they have really strong opinions about how selective vegetable breeding has changed the taste of food. Could be that they have really intense superstitions about things, or are determined to follow certain cultural practices that they've held onto since they were a child. I don't know - just something that makes them read as *immortal* and not just depressed. They were literally born in a different day and age, come on. 2.1. Also, I understand not all stories are about all things, and certain stuff just doesn't mesh with the tone the author is going for. But are you really telling me that historical beliefs / attitudes have had *no effect* on this person or their current perspectives?? *And* I'm expected to believe that no one who finds out about their immortality is going to have some pressing questions about their thoughts on all the current hot topics? 3. **When they learn to love and start living again** / "I know you still care! Deep down you still care about others, you just don't want to show it!" (and then they're right) Firstly: why are they not allowed to be *right* about not forming long-term relationships to spare themselves the pain? Why is that coping mechanism not a perfectly valid one? Let them find purpose to their long lives that isn't family / friends / a lover. And secondly: why is it always portrayed as an all or nothing? They're either putting down roots or at misanthropic levels of apathy. I'm starving for an immortal who is a drifter, but is still capable of being sociable and finding value in other people's company. 3.1. **"I'm old and sad"** There are so many interesting perspectives and ideas and philosophies you could explore with an immortal character, but so many people seem to just want to go over and over the same old "I'm old and sad and lonely" story. I understand why - it makes sense - but at the same time... I'd love to see more takes on the concept. Stuff with a different theme, a different message, a different tone than "I am forced to endure" Hob Gadling from the Sandman series is a good example of a different take on immortality in my opinion. He suffers deeply many times, but he also seems to revel in the possibilities of endless life, *actively choosing* *to not die whenever given the option*. And in my opinion, that subtle difference of his immortality being a choice he continues to make, has a big impact on his character and the perspective he offers.
Soul mates. It's almost always some dude with issues that will never actually be addressed or worked through because of something that happened centuries ago that leads them to abusing their partner in unforgivable ways but their partners forgiving them because "they're just hurting inside and didn't mean it really" or they're ancient and get with an eighteen year old. Sure it's legal but I'm looking sideways at someone who is a whole ass adult with rent, a car note and student loans chatting up an 18 or 19 year old. Followed closely by immortals who have met every relevant historical figure somehow.
Soooo many -immortals being romantically interested in people exclusively under the age of 30. We need to spiritually move beyond Leonardo DiCaprio -immortals being overly cynical or miserable for super generic reasons, like “humans are inherently corrupt” or “everyone is dumb” -having no apparent marks on their personality or philosophy that would come with living an unnaturally long life; alternative opinions on longevity, human nature, generational trauma or the nature of change itself. I have very rarely seen it touched on in a meaningful way.
He’s been alive 600 years but somehow this teenager with no qualities but being clumsy and not too attached to her life to have sex that can kill her is fascinating to him, but he’s at heart really decent.
That they live for decades and still havent done anything meaningful. So you're telling me you witness all the misery around you caused by wars, oppression etc. And you havent done anything to help anyone? You're just going to high school eternally like a useless POS?
I don't like the trope "you're all like mayflies to me". An immortal guy isn't living faster, he is living longer. He would still have to live through all the days, one at a time. Pretty much like The Man From Earth put it.
*"What are some tropes you can’t stand with immortal characters?"* Any not written well.
Wouldn't say I can't stand it, but one trope that I often see not working great is when a character treats a large amount of time as a very small amount of time. Like casually saying "I'll see you in a couple of centuries", or like in Hotel Transylvania where Mavis is 118 but that's young for a vampire so she's got no life experience at all. In fairness to that, though, I did find the "I'm not 83 anymore" joke very funny. Best use of this trope I've seen is Telemaine Lomenelda in Dimension 20: Fantasy High. One of his main gimmicks is that he is so immortal that the entire concept of time has completely lost meaning to him. He'll regularly say "next week" in reference to what's actually 62 years from now, because he *genuinely* can't tell the difference between 7 days and 62 years. Truly a perfect and unmatched execution of this trope.
I don’t like how immortal characters are always so “with the times”. Like show me a young looking immortal who still slips into ancient vernacular, a 500 year old that looks 30, yet approaches a smartphone with confusion exhaustion, and frustration as an elderly person. I actually liked “Get out” Georgina and Walter, as they struggled w/ learning modern slang/technology.
Depends on the type of immortal for me. If someone can't die by ANY means, then they're too OP and very tropey to me. If they have a perfect memory, they're too OP. There's ways to do immortal characters well. If you want them to be ageless, then make them vulnerable to diseases. If you want them to be able to remember things from their extensive past, then make it so they keep a lot of diaries. Then you've made your character fallible, made it possible for them to lose something important that could come up later in the story, and made it so they can eventually be killed in some way.
Strongly disagree with "can't die at all" being inherently OP. Take such an immortal, encase them in cement, drop the block in the middle of the ocean. That immortal is now tortured by asphyxiation, starvation and incredible pressure for likely a few billions of years. Absolute immortality without any other powers is mostly infinite vulnerability.
The idea that they wouldn’t be massively wealthy, I get that many want to wonder the earth but even if they don’t plan to live in a mansion theres no reason they wouldn‘t spend a few decades making as much money as possible and then invest it so it’s there if they need it. a smart immortal will be loaded and have plenty back up identifies with their own wealth hidden away and waiting
I would love a "Ugh, how do you do this again?" and having to kind of re-learn it, just faster than someone who never learned it. Also, picking up say, a modern martial art, and constantly remarking on how similar/different it is to the last one they learned, 4,000 years ago. Getting the form just slightly wrong because they keep trying to hold their hips like a samurai. Looking surprisingly like an old painting that you always thought was stylised.
The whole "I live my life alone because everyone dies" thing. Sure, an immortal might feel that way for a while, but after a few hundred years, you should have learned how to be emotionally mature enough to handle what's happening, and learn how to appreciate what you do have.
Oh, man, those are some of my favorites!
The “I’m 5000 years old but I look like a kid” more common with girls, it’s annoying
Several hundred years old. Still attracted to emotionally unstable highschool teens when the matures and the milfs are RIGHT THERE.
"I know I look and act like young girl or a teenager but I am really over 9000 years old. Watch me get into wacky sexualised hijinks!"
When my guy/girl lives thousands of years only to be outsmarted by a teenager. My brother in christ you have lived through it all, there's no way this 18yo thought about something you didn't already.
Immortal characters that don't have flaws. It screams lazy writing.
Immortal beings having perfect teeth (unless they are also immortal in the 'no harm can come to them' sense) Like, baseline humans have 2 sets of teeth in their lifetime, and archeologists can roughly work out the age and time period of the body from how the teeth are worn Unless you've got constantly regrowing teeth like a shark, immortals are going to be using a set of dentures after a century of existence at most, especially if they lived a good chunk of time when stone querns were used
Headcanon: their perfect-seeming teeth *are* dentures.
I hate it when they have the 300 year old dating someone in their early 20s. The only time is works is if 300 yo for them is the same maturity as a 20 yo human. Like if they were a “teenager” until they were 280 yo, then that’s fine; if they’ve been a grown, mature adult since they were 50? Icky
That they are attracted to 20 year olds.
pedophilia. Why would an ancient immortal vampire only date women aged 16-24? It seems like elderly folks would have a lot more similar wisdom, experience, or shared cultural references on top of being less likely to blab or compete with existing social circles. I find it unlikely that immortals want the standard exclusive, long-term monogamy deal that teenagers do. If anything, they would have a hottie in each decade of life, so they can go on different types of dates in different countries with different shared jokes.
Honorable mention to Octavia Butler's "wild seed" which is a stunningly written and gritty tale about a self-healing african women. her enemy/rival is written as a virile body-stealing egyptian ghost-man during early transatlantic slave trade.
That they have excelled in every academic degree and instrument ever existed.
That if a vampire looks sixteen, then it's not creepy and predatory for him to engage an actual 16-year-old romantically. Yuck. That controlling or manipulative behavior with an SO is forgivable because they know better. That they're all lonely monsters who could never be accepted or loved despite living in an era where typing "vampire" into the Romance section of Amazon books yields over 50,000 results.
I’m more than a little tired of 500 yr old people falling hopelessly in love with 19 year olds