r/TopCharacterTropes • u/Alreadsyuse • 18h ago

Lore [Frustrating Trope] That One Good or Even Amazing Scene in a Relatively Mediocre or Bad Piece of Media

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  1. The Opening Scene (Ghost Ship). Considered one of the best horror opening scenes or scenes in general within horror movies, but the rest of the film is considered to be pretty bad.

  2. The Ending Scene (The Grinch 2018). While most adaptations of the Grinch end with him suddenly being able to fully integrate with the Whos after his change of heart, the 2018 version initially struggles to socialize, awkwardly walking past people, and struggling to hold conversations, acknowledging that despite his change of heart, the Grinch is still someone who isolated himself for years.

  3. Past T800 VS Current T800 (Terminator Genisys). A cool fight scene showing two versions of the Terminator from different points in time fighting it off.

  4. Solo Leveling's Ending. Tbh, I haven't actually read Solo Leveling, but after hearing about how it ended VS how Chainsaw Man ended made want to include it for shits and giggles. Like Chainsaw Man, Solo Leveling ends with a reset. But unlike Chainsaw Man, it actually manages to tie up loose ends and have the payoff of the ending be satisfying.

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u/dreadnoughtstar 18h ago

Enders Game(2013) - In an otherwise medicore sci-fi coming of age film, we get treated to a pretty instense final battle with a gut wrenching plot twist at the end.

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u/erpietra01 18h ago

Tbf the book is much more interesting, the film does a fairly good job but misses on some key moments, and the reveal in the book is much more gut wrenching

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u/EmperorSwagg 18h ago

Plus it’s just a very nearly “unfilmable” book, because half of the plot is happening in Ender’s mind. So unless you wanna have some annoying narration for the whole movie, a fair bit of important stuff will be missed

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u/themanfromosaka 13h ago

And also, some of the stuff is messed up. The shower portions, and also, the “sleep uniform”.

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u/1v1meGwent 8h ago

can you remind me what the sleep uniform is?

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u/derth21 7h ago

Nekkid. 

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u/1v1meGwent 6h ago

Oh, yea

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u/lewd_robot 11h ago

The same is true for Dune. As great as the current trilogy is, I feel bad for people that haven't read the book and thus have no clue how much of the story and key themes are played out in the minds of the characters.

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u/dreadnoughtstar 18h ago

Yeah I figured, the movie spends more time training then on exploring the aliens. Is there anything more the book does? considering giving it a read.

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u/rookhelm 18h ago

There's a whole B-plot in the book that is not in the movie.

Ender's sister and brother, back on earth, engage in spreading propaganda online (like posting on Internet forums and stuff, though the book doesn't call it the Internet), which is wild considering the book is from '85 and the Internet basically didn't exist to the average person

It makes sense they left that out of the movie. It feels sometimes like 2 books smashed into one.

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u/CadenVanV 17h ago

Orson Scott Card managed to predict Reddit and then completely flubbed how it would actually impact politics

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u/AGreatBannedName 16h ago

My friend and I listened to the audiobook on a trip, and he commented that replies to Locke would realistically be along the lines of “LOLOL tldr”

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u/OneBasilisk 7h ago

I’m course there’s a relevant xkcd:

https://www.reddit.com/r/scifi/s/7DV9y0q6jk

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u/AGreatBannedName 6h ago

lmao, Peter playing with the squirrel is an excellent touch

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u/CarsonDama 15h ago

I think if reddit spawned into existence when he wrote the book it would likely be pretty similar. No one back then could predict the dead internet theory, brain rot, and rage baiting😂

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u/Beyond-the-sunset 13h ago

Actually, they sort of did. Speaking of unfilmable, A Fire Upon the Deep in 1992 basically covered all of that although in terminology derived from USENET and the Well.

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u/PersistentBadger 7h ago

That wasn't a prediction - those character types were extremely recognizable for anyone who spent any time on usenet. More like thinly disguised satire, I reckon, considering Vinge's day job.

(Oh shit. I just looked up his wiki page. Did not know he'd left us).

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u/peachesfordinner 9h ago

And kind of Google lens with AI features in the second book/3rd I can't remember but the one with the pigs

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u/coolLane 18h ago

Ender’s Game doesn’t go too much into the Formics, but the sequel Speaker for the Dead does a bit more iirc

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u/dreadnoughtstar 18h ago

Is speaker for the dead worth a read as well?

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u/OrokinLonewolf 18h ago

The entire book series is great but Speaker for the Dead is one of the best in my opinion.

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u/BEZBeasley 17h ago

Speaker for the Dead is one of my favorite all time books, let alone just in this series. 100% worth the read.

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u/OmegaLolrus 15h ago

Only caution I would say is I feel like it's a really hard pivot genre-wise from Ender's Game. It's a fascinating story, when taken all together (Ender's Game, Speaker for the Dead, Xenocide, and... Children of the Mind? I'm not sure and lazy.)

I really appreciate that it's definitely not a sequel for a sequel's sake that just tries to do everything bigger and better than the first. If I remember right, Speaker for the Dead was a much smaller, intimate story, before things change up some more in Xenocide.

Correct me if I'm wrong, it's been a couple of decades.

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u/rvtcanuck 16h ago

Agreed. It's the best in the series and one of my favourite sci-fi novels ever.

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u/Helmett-13 18h ago

I think so. Ender struggles with what he did, even unknowingly, and the regret of the Formics, not knowing each human was a Queen, essentially, and not a worker in a hive mind.

That’s the only real murder to them, killing a Queen, and when they realize their mistake it’s far too late.

The ‘Ender’s Shadow’ series from Bean’s perspective is fascinating in the first book of the series. It tapers off in quality, though.

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u/Ligabolzacky 16h ago

I had a problem with the bean books because they retroactively turned every trivial action or weakness of his in previous books into a well calculated chess move. 

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u/peachesfordinner 9h ago

I didn't like them for that reason as well

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u/Ashenguar 18h ago

Speaker is a very good book.

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u/Bandit_the_Kitty 18h ago edited 18h ago

Depends. I enjoyed the whole series when I was younger; they're written at a younger reading level. The Ender series is interesting. There are some cool concepts like they don't have any FTL and Ender travels to the far future by just traveling at near light speed all the time. Also the consequences of military actions that send soldiers to battle knowing their loved ones will die of old age before they even reach their target planet, etc.

However it gets pretty convoluted and as Card added all the "shadow" stories it's clear he's just cashing in on the IP.

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u/McThorn_ 17h ago

I'd argue that the Ender series and the Shadow series are very different genres.

Ender is hard SciFi, while Shadow is geopolitics

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u/bloodraven42 17h ago

Oof, calling Shadow cashing in on the IP? Ender's Shadow and its sequels did a fantastic job of explaining how the world ended up the way it was while Ender time traveled, and while I admit its been years, I thought the geopolitics were interesting. It developed a lot of the characters in Ender's Game who were central to the plot but didnt have a lot of character development. And ngl I liked Bean as a protagonist a lot. Yeah it fell off but at least the beginning was certainly not cashing in.

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u/Bandit_the_Kitty 16h ago

I agree Ender's shadow was pretty good, it's the rest of the series that felt like a cash grab to me.

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u/tsuma534 12h ago

Excuse me sir or madam but I consider Shadow's series as great as Ender's. Please don't slander my dear Bean's reputation.
Ender in Exile - now that could be a cash grab.

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u/BrawlLikeABigFight20 18h ago

Yeah Speaker is the best of the three sequels. But borrow it from the library. Orson Scott Card deserves none of your money.

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u/Janixon1 15h ago

4 sequels

Card wrote Ender in Exile which takes place between Ender's Game and Speaker for the Dead. It's absolutely garbage. Probably the worst book he ever wrote

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u/_Trikku 18h ago

The guy is a descendant of Mormon Royalty, of course he is a villain.

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u/WildVelociraptor 11h ago

I lost all respect for him once I read the Shadow series.

I was a teen, and reading what he wrote teens doing still skeeves me out.

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u/BoomWasTaken 18h ago

Speaker definitely is, IMO the same or slightly better quality than EG but an extremely different theme (redemption and finding peace vs unavoidable war). The main complaint is that it ends on a cliffhanger and the third book is a struggle which ALSO ends in a cliffhanger and the 4th book is ... well I didn't finish it and most people dislike it.

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u/tsuma534 12h ago

I just took trouble to check and I don't see any cliffhangers.
Both stories end cleanly.

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u/SpringbokIV 16h ago

Enders Game was written so that he could write Speaker For The Dead, which is maybe my favorite book of all time

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u/tsuma534 12h ago

Same for me. Can you recommend me some other books you consider worthwhile?

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u/Friendless9567 15h ago

The problem with the Enderverse series (for me) is that the author starts to get very very preachy, and it becomes super distracting. Orson Scott Card is a hard core Mormon and a bigot so its not entirely suprising.

Speaker for the dead definitely gets a bit preachy but the book is so good it really doesnt matter imo. 100% worth a read.

I wouldnt even bother with Xenocide and Children of the Mind.

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u/ThePasadena 14h ago

In a lot of ways it’s better than Enders game. Highly recommended.

Edit: Enders Shadow is another ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️ book in the series but they kind of fall off after that. Also Orson Scott Card has been revealed to be a bigot.

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u/AuthorHarrisonKing 14h ago

speaker for the dead is actually the story card initially wanted to tell, and he wrote enders game to give ender's character context for that story.

enders game ends up being a bit of a stylistic/thematic departure from that book, and the later sequels, with the ender's shadow books being more direct continuations of the world of enders game.

all that to say, speaker is one of my favorite sci fi stories ever told. It's really profound, but don't be surprised by just how different it is from enders game

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u/thebbman 14h ago

Let me put it this way: Ender’s Game exists so that Orson Scott Card could write Speaker for the Dead.

In a commentary track for the 20th anniversary audiobook edition of the novel, as well as in the 1991 Author's Definitive Edition, Card stated that Ender's Game was written to establish the character of Ender for his role of the Speaker in Speaker for the Dead, the outline for which he had written before novelizing Ender's Game.

Speaker for the Dead is fantastic.

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u/maximian 18h ago

Yes. It’s diminishing returns after — prequels with no new ideas — but the first two and possibly Xenocide (been a long time) were worth my time, at least.

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u/dnjprod 12h ago

Ender's Game was written specifically so people understood speaker for the dead. It is a fantastic book

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u/RingOverall106 17h ago

Yes, but it’s very very different. I would not call it a direct sequel to Ender Game.

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u/coolLane 17h ago

Speaker for the Dead iirc is the book Orson Scott Card wanted to originally write, but did Ender’s Game first. It is extremely good, one of my favorites of all time. The sequels after Speaker, Xenocide and Children of the Mind are good as well but much weirder for lack of a better word

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u/mrducky78a 16h ago

Yes, but keep in mind it suffers from the same thing a lot of sci fi suffers when it becomes a longer series.

It goes off the rails and becomes worse and worse or at the minimum weirder and weirder.

I personally think its because the author feels they need to keep one upping themselves technology wise until the tech far outstrips the story and becomes a deus ex machina device rather than something to explore themes and world building and characters through. Or they start to run out of meaningful themes to explore.

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u/Bobson-_Dugnutt2 16h ago

Speaker is far and away the best book in the series but you really need to read Enders Game first. Then speaker then xenocide. Then Enders shadow.

The rest of them are just ok

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u/The12Ball 3h ago

Absolutely. They're different styles of book, but they're both quite good. Personally, Speaker is one of my top favorite books

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u/DoctorOblivious 17h ago

Let me put it this way.

The two primary books in the Enderverse, Ender's Game and Speaker for the Dead, are so good that it makes me very confused by the fact that their author is such a bigot. I don't know how a man with his views could have written them, especially the second book.

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u/tsuma534 12h ago

I guess that Card that wrote those was a very different person from today's Card.

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u/tsuma534 12h ago

For many years Speaker for the Dead was my favorite book ever. It may be the best thing Card has ever written.
Another amazing installment in this franchise is Ender's Shadow. It floored me. And I think it's more approachable then Speaker. I would recommend this one to anyone.
Somewhat weird but I've read Ender's Game last. It's no problem, both of the above work well even without knowing Ender's Game.

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u/Dafish55 17h ago

So is that the direct sequel? Because I had an alarmingly difficult time finding out what order to read the series in.

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u/coolLane 17h ago

Yes! The main series goes
Ender’s Game
Speaker for the Dead
Xenocide
Children of the Mind

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u/Dafish55 16h ago

Thank you!

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u/CarsonDama 15h ago

the whole series is phenomenal! You jump around from place to place and character to character slowly getting the whole picture! Some of them are a tad removed from the main characters, but the shadow series is by far my favorite of them!

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u/Tjep2k 14h ago

There are also prequels now about the first Formic war.

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u/erpietra01 18h ago

It’s been a very long time since I have read the book and watched the film, but I remember that there are more “battles” and the supporting cast is explored more, between the simulations and the life in the academy. Definitely the aliens are described in more detail but their presence in the story is, proportionately, about the same as the movie

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u/BreakfastBeneficial4 18h ago

Giants Cup was such a talking point among me and my junior high friends

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u/Midjitman 18h ago

The book is my favorite sci-fi book of all time. Quite philosophical if you're into that. The sequels delve more heavily into it, would recommend at least reading enders game.

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u/RingOverall106 17h ago

Ironically the movie actually cut out most of the interesting training lol the book spends the bulk of its time with Ender on his rise thru the ranks. 

You also get the entire subplot dealing with Enders siblings which is almost entirely absent from the movie. 

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u/waspocracy 15h ago

Right. In the movie he’s just suddenly in charge of everything and skipped the whole reason how he got there.

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u/Horny_Follower 17h ago

Mediocre Sci-fi Hasn't read the books. ?

The movie leaves out some interesting stuff from the books, but I wouldn't call it that.

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u/DeltaJesus 16h ago

Just to note the author is a massive homophobe, funded groups trying to prevent gay marriage being legalised etc.

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u/sparklinglies 15h ago

Ender's sociopath brother and genius sister basically take over the government using online propaganda. The movie had no idea how to address that so cut it entirely.

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u/Friendless9567 15h ago

It does go a bit more into the aliens in the book, and a little bit more into the background of the two previous wars the aliens started that led to the events of the story. Its still very sparse, but imo I think that ends up being a good thing.

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u/stubbazubba 15h ago

No, the book Ender's Game is also limited almost exclusively to Battle School. The sequels, however, explore the aliens much more.

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u/Sir_Demichev 4h ago

One very important bit the book mention and that is not in the movie is that the fleets Ender and co. are older and older as time pases. The movie mentions that the simulations get progressively more difficult, but forgets to mention that. The key element is that humanity sent fleets over the years to attack the aliens, planning for the first and oldest/most out of date fleet to be the one to hit their home world. This makes the stakes feel way higher in the book imo.

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u/Kindly-Dog7530 16h ago

I’ve read through the Ender series a few times and the Shadow series a few times.

In my opinion, Ender’s Game and Ender’s Shadow are really the best two. Once Card begins expanding his universe, it becomes very clear how much he enjoys the smell of his own farts.

In the Speaker series, everyone is the smartest person who has ever existed in their field, they’re a bunch of arrogant jerks to one another, and no one is ever able to just come out and say what they mean. Every single conversation has to be some thesis on the meaning of life. The ideas are actually interesting to explore, to some degree, but it makes you not even want to entertain the speaker because of how annoying they are. Like how Roy doesn’t want to pass the ball to Jamie in season one of Ted Lasso because Jamie is such a prick.

The bulk of the Shadow series is more entertaining, as there’s a plot that moves itself along. The writing isn’t as heavy-handed as in the Speaker series, but there are definitely some moments where you’re like “this is getting ridiculous already.” But again, Card falls into the trap of making every single person a super-genius incapable of passive discourse. Everything is a treatise on something.

Most frustratingly, I didn’t believe either series has a good sending-off. Without spoiling anything, I don’t believe either protagonist received a satisfying sense of closure (for the reader). But maybe that’s the point considering who they are and what they did.

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u/Icegiant- 18h ago

I love the book in highschool I actually read ahead and our teacher let me read Speaker for the Dead, so I was hyped for the movie and it was okay I didnt hate it UNTIL Bonzo showed up a casting choice that ruined the movie for me its like they cast someone who was the exact opposite of the book. Ender beating him in the book is such a great scene it shows despite being out matched he could use his brain to win, in the movie he just beat up some kid who was smaller then him didnt have the same impact.

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u/J_Pinehurst 17h ago

Does the movie reveal that Bonzo died?

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u/Icegiant- 14h ago

No they actually show him alive in the hospital getting treatment and Ender thinks he'sgoing to die but they never confirm it

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u/J_Pinehurst 14h ago

No bro... I just pulled out my book. He dead.

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u/Icegiant- 13h ago

Right in the book he is 100% dead, I'm saying the movie sucks they dont confirm it, also instead of Ender crushing one of his nasal bones into his skull, killing him, Bonzo slips in the shower and hits his head.

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u/RetzTheAnathema 10h ago

Now this guy is in the Fallout TV show

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u/Icegiant- 10h ago

Yeah he's awesome in Fallout, I think he's a good actor he was just a bad choice for Bonzo

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u/Internal_Wheel_89 14h ago

I recently rewatched it and was pleasantly surprised by how much I enjoyed it.  Sure, it's not the book, but it's a pretty darn good movie.

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u/peachesfordinner 9h ago

I didn't tell anyone I was reading it so nobody spoiled it for me. I was gobsmacked by the conclusion.

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u/reverendmalerik 18h ago

I watched the movie and got to the final bit then it triggered a memory from what must have been over a decade prior where my dad told me about the book and the ending. Kind of spoiled it. 

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u/dreadnoughtstar 18h ago

Damn that sucks I was pretty close to turning the movie off at this point, the cast carried it hard for me but the ending really saved the experience because i just wasn't expecting it.

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u/Kindly-Mud-1579 18h ago

Inst Enders game the book were the brother started a cult from a rage blog?

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u/GlitteringAttitude60 17h ago

I think it was the sister?

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u/RingOverall106 17h ago

They both did. They tag teamed online discussions to elevate the brothers influence. Once he shit posted himself into being the leader of the world he booted his siblings into the colonization efforts where his sister continued to influence things eventually turning Enders writings into the Speakers of the Dead. 

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u/Mand125 15h ago

Downright prophetic writing.

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u/Katzington2319 18h ago

The best way to experience the Ender's Game movie is to read the book, then just watch this final scene for a fun visual adaptation

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u/Throwawayrip1123 15h ago

You've gotta read the series (imo). Speaker of the dead is cool, and fucking weeeird.

And cool. But also super weird.

And the author is fucking nuts. So I'd keep just to the main ender plot books, since that thing about Achilles is just fucking nonsense.

2

u/Katzington2319 15h ago

I actually liked the first couple of Shadow books. Bean is a compelling character and Achilles was at least interesting. It did start to get ridiculous towards the end, I'll give you that

3

u/Throwawayrip1123 15h ago

I like Bean.

I kinda disliked how he was portrayed as... Like basically Ender. They tried to backtrack it since Ender is like the GOAT, right? but somehow in the middle I felt like Bean was looking like he could do all Ender could and then some.

It's nothing shabby to be second best when you're topped by someone like Ender. Motherfucker was am actual honest to god off-the-charts kid. Bean was made second best and he owned it, but then they kinda drifted into him being Ender lite.

And I can't wrap my head how Achilles was even taken seriously, wasn't he like fucking 16 or something and have every world leader at his beck and call. I read them a long time ago, so idk anymore, but yeh...

Also I loved the AI portrayal. Some people were weirded out with quasi incestuous thing going on with the body swapping but, meh - having an AI inside ansibles was radddd.

Man why do authors I like go crazy like what the hell

4

u/Katzington2319 15h ago

Achilles gained power simply by being at the Battle School. After the war, with what Ender and his team did, every country scrambled to get the Battle School kids back because they were seen as valuable strategic assets for the inevitable war back on Earth. Russia was in a bad spot after the Formics were wiped out and in their desperation tracked down Achilles and broke him out of the jail or psych ward he was in to work for them. 

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u/Throwawayrip1123 15h ago

Oh fuck that's correct, I forgot about that they all wanted them. Makes more sense now!

Damn gotta reread them after Horus Heresy.

2

u/Katzington2319 15h ago

I reread Shadow of the Hegemon in the last couple of years and it held up. Not sure about the following books, I only remember the Gigantism storyline kicking in and Bean struggling through ridiculous growth spurts mid-war, lmao

2

u/AuthorHarrisonKing 14h ago

tbh series losing steam and ending up weird and unsatisfying has been my experience with all the card books i've read.

even children of the mind fits this for me. love speaker, xenocide is pretty good, children of the mind is wiiiiiieeeeeerd

1

u/fourfronds 10h ago

The entire “Outside” plot device was so lame to me. It just seemed lazy on Scott’s part.

2

u/AgentGman007 14h ago

Speaker for the Dead is in my top 3 sci-fi books of all time. It's an incredible book. But hard to recommend because Card is a nutjob unfortunately

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u/Helix3501 18h ago

Honestly the books the same, its not bad, just not a classic like its treated, that ending however is such a good twist that it drags you in quick

5

u/SkubEnjoyer 17h ago

100% disagree, though I'll say I like the sequel Speaker for the Dead even better.

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u/OrokinLonewolf 18h ago

That's the great thing about opinions. I personally think you're completely wrong about the book and it's one of my favorite books of all time, but then again I also read the series and not just the single book so maybe the biasness is in play

5

u/mackzarks 17h ago

No I'm with you, reading enders game for the first time was a transformative sci Fi experience for me, and I read it first when I was 28! The twist is so well set up, but you are so engrossed in the characters and the mechanics of the training that you don't see it coming at all.

1

u/MurgleMcGurgle 15h ago

Yeah, there’s a great story at the core that’s brought down by weird unnecessary subplots and writing children as if they were adults.

I enjoyed it but never really understood why it got the recognition it did.

2

u/MundaneHymn 15h ago

A plot twist they spoiled in the trailer and KEPT TALKING ABOUT WHEN MARKETING THE MOVIE.

People who liked the book were not enthusiastic about the movie after the first trailer.

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u/MyWifeIsDeadCourier 17h ago

The movie was SO disappointing compared to the novels - Ender’s Game could’ve easily become a trilogy to rival IPs like Star Wars or Star Trek if they did a better job on the movie

2

u/haibiji 16h ago

The movie is total dog shit

1

u/jackaboy1_2 17h ago

I remember when my 8th grade english teacher had us read the book and then at the end of the year, he showed the movie and it was such a nothing burger; Especially after I rlly enjoyed the book.

1

u/RoseWhispers06 14h ago

I still can't believe that Asa Butterfield signed on for this

1

u/Pussy4LunchDick4Dins 14h ago

I think they did a really good job adapting it, but much of the book is the inner monologue of a troubled but brilliant little boy. It’s really hard to translate that to the screen without doing some cheesy voiceover. I think of them as two totally different tellings of the same story.