Let it never be said we don't know how to poke fun at ourselves.

Peter's Evil Overlord List

"Being an Evil Overlord seems to be a good career choice. It pays well, there are all sorts of perks and you can set your own hours. However every Evil Overlord I've read about in books or seen in movies invariably gets overthrown and destroyed in the end. I've noticed that no matter whether they are barbarian lords, deranged wizards, mad scientists or alien invaders, they always seem to make the same basic mistakes every single time. With that in mind, allow me to present..."

The Grand List of Fantasy Cliches

"This list, like the SF list that inspired it, is intended only to list various cliches common to the fantasy genre. It is not our intention to say these ideas should never see the light of day again (though some we could do without). Rather, we've compiled this list to amuse and educate."

The Not So Grand list of Overused Fantasy Cliches

"Inspired by John Van Sickle's Grand list of Overused Science Fiction Cliches, which is a writer's guide to ideas and plot devices in Science Fiction which might have been a good idea at one point but, to quote Van Sickle, "have become hackneyed from overuse by the unimaginative," unquote. I have sought to create a similar list for ideas and plot devices pertaining specifically to the Fantasy genre, (although I have decided I will not rate the cliches or try to categorize them. Suffice to say, this is simply a list of characterizations, ideas, and plot elements which have a tendency to crop up in Fantasy Fiction on a continual basis.)"

The Grand List of Overused Science Fiction Clichés

"Those of us who have read or seen a lot of science fiction have seen certain story elements pop up over and over and over. Some of these elements were actually pretty good ideas, and when handled well make for a pretty entertaining story, but have become hackneyed from overuse by the unimaginative. Others came into being through the deliberate effort to avoid another cliché. Still other ideas were lame from the get-go, and should have been dismissed from the author's thinking.

Clichés are not in themselves necessarily bad, but their overuse shows that the writer has forgotten what separates the strong tale from the hollow: "the human heart in conflict with itself," as Faulkner said. Where there is this conflict, the tale stands; where the conflict is absent, the tale falls flat, and in neither case does it matter how many ships get blown up.

The sophisticated reader (one who reads more than just SF) will note that some of these clichés are not found solely in SF, but in other genres as well, and of course the lampooning of clichés is a time-honored part of good comedy."

Fantasy Cliché Meters: The Good Guys and The Bad Guys

By winterfox: "This test shares characteristics with Mary Sue litmus tests found scattered across the Intraweb, but it measures not Sueish qualities, so there are no sections dealing with elements of self-insertion/wish-fulfillment. The focus is on how overdone your character is. Some of the choices subtract from your total score.

Note that the test is not the be-all, end-all measure of quality or lack thereof. Good authors can pull off very nearly anything; a character may score over a hundred and still be interesting to read about (though highly unlikely). Likewise, a character may score negative and yet be completely dull. Nothing is definite. All this test does is a reminder to keep your character's traits/origins/plot involvement in mind."