Cliche List - Harry Potter

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A * means that the cliche has a note attached.
Cliches that have a strikethough are no longer considered cliche for whatever reason. Usually this is due to them no longer being in use.

Harry Potter

A/N: Thanks again to the wonderful people on the Snorkack Yahoo group, for their many contributions to this list.

1. Harry is capable of incredibly complex magic, but something as simple as a shoe tying charm needs a girlfriend or Hermione to remind him of it.

2. Harry gets angry alot.

3. Ron is not allowed an independent thought except when someone makes the connection between chess and warfare. At which point he becomes a strategic idiot savant.

4. The Weasley Twins don’t have a serious bone in their body.

5. Molly will think that her kids are too young even when they are pushing their seventies. She is also the source of the Weasley foot in mouth disease.

6. Harry always has more money than the Weasley’s and Ron is jealous because of it.

7. Hermione reads everything.

8. Ginny’s sole purpose in the series is to torment Harry. Which is why he turns gay in so many stories. If you had a hot read head teasing you all the time and never putting out, you’d turn gay also.

9. Dumbledore knows best, even when he’s ill, crazy, or just plain evil.

10. Snape will always be an asshole. But he’s an asshole with panache.

11. Voldemort is incapable of thinking up simple plots to kill Harry Potter. Goblet of Fire is a perfect example of this. He couldn’t kidnap him, bleed him, and kill him in chapter one? No, he had to go through this convulsed and elaborate plot that was filled with possible failure points.

13. Harry falls in love with his mortal enemy, Snape, Draco, or Voldemort. Oh yeah, this makes sense, doesn’t it?

14. Harry is really Snape and/ or Riddle’s son despite DNA evidence that puts him as the son of King Kong.

15. Draco is really a nice guy who is just misunderstood, and of course it makes sense for him to fall in love with Hermione/ Ginny/ Luna, Hanna/ Susan/ Hagrid/ Harry/ Lucius/ Cornelius/ Dumbledore/ and/ or Cheesy the Wonder Monkey and Dobby. Preferably one at a time.

16. Mpreg

17. The female characters will think al the M/M characters are perfect together.

18. The incrediably conservative wizarding world sees nothing wrong with men getting married and having babies together, in fact, it is quite normal and they think the Muggleborns are weird when they don't accept it easily.

19. Its perfectly acceptable to spend multiple chapters detailing everything Harry buys on his shopping trips, even the condoms (Ribbed for her pleasure) and then use 2 paragraphs to describe the remaining 2 months of the summer.

20. Superharry is acceptable only if we give him every weapon known to man and every defensive device. Its ok if you want to put him aboard the bridge of the Starship Enterprise, but only if Hermione is there to be his Science officer.

21. And he when he receives the superpowers and weapon he MUST be able to have them under his complete control by the end of that chapter... there's no use in letting him develop it throughout the story cause that will take space away for all the yummy muscled sexiness that is Harry...

22. It takes 2 hours of training to become an expert at all martial arts and weapons

23. Once learnt, martial arts should only be used once, on Malfoy, and never on Voldemort or in a final battle.

24. Defeating Voldemort is NOT the point of your story - and he should only be referenced on rare occasions so everyone can admire your ability to do so.

25. All new professors should be American.

26. If you don't know real latin for spells, pig latin should do just as well. If not, get a dictionary and make up phrases, because latin works just like English, so literal translations are fine

27. His birthday/Christmas present from the Weasley's should be a hand for the clock.

28. While at the Burrow he should go to the creek/pond/river/lake/swimming hole to think or swim and while swimming he should notice how much Ginny/Hermione have filled out since school let out.

29. Having your father coming back to life should only upset you for a paragraph before you accept it

30. Send Harry to Azkaban for something he didn't do and only let one friend believe him

31. Beat Harry to a pulp then have him drag himself outside to do chores.

32. No matter how powerful or wealthy or whatever Harry becomes, he can still be reduced to a blushing, lip biting, stammering, stuttering mess, by one word spoken by either Ginny, Hermione, Dumbledore, or Lupin.

33. No matter how powerful or wealthy Harry becomes, and no matter how many friends and allies he gathers, he will still have almost no self confidence and will attempt suicide at least once.

34. Draco is NEVER fully human, usually being at least 1/4 Veela

35. Draco will have full access to all Veela powers no matter how little Veela blood he possesses, and he will have complete control of them.

36. Harry will always be Draco's chosen Veela mate.

37. No one but Ron and Hermione will have a problem with Cliche # 36.

38. Harry may have a problem with being Draco’s mate at first, but he’ll soon fall in love with Draco and get over it.

39. All memories of muggle technology are erased from the muggleborns' minds upon entering Hogwarts, leaving them incapable of asking Harry if he's considered using a strategic nuke against Voldemort.

40. Except for one person (See Cliche #30) no one will have any problem turning against Harry on flimsy or nonexistent evidence.

41. Even seemingly intelligent men like Author Weasley will be completely unable to grasp the concepts behinds simple things like electricity, no matter how well it is explained to him.

42. Just as your story is leading up to the scene with the explosive confrontation between Angry!Indie!Harry and Evil!Manip!Dumbledore, stop updating for a month or so, just to torment your readers.

43. Despite DNA restrictions and years of malnutrition and abuse, any kind of training regimen will cause Harry to suddenly gain a foot or so in height.

44. Harry Potter fanficcers are obsessed with all things Japanese.

45. Sirius is either an impulsive idiot or a man more sly and cunning than Slytherin himself.

46. If Sirius is sly and cunning he will only use it in regards to freeing Harry from Manip!Dumbledore.

47. If Harry and Co (or anyone else for that matter) goes back in time to meet the Founders, they will note that they are the same height as the Founders, completely ignoring that the average height back in those days was a great deal shorter than it is now.

48. Salazar Slytherin and Godric Gryffindor were lovers, and it was their bitter breakup that led to Salazar leaving Hogwarts.

49. Hermione’s culinary skills are non existent.

50. Having a girl randomly snog Harry senseless is a sure fire way to make him fall in love with her.

51. House elves will lose their magic, go insane, and eventually die if they are not bonded. Dobby is always an exception to this, usually because he sees himself as bonded to Harry.

52. Madam Pomfrey may be only the equivalent of a school nurse, but she can heal just about anything.

53. If Harry is seriously injured, he will always be treated at Hogwarts instead of St. Mungo’s.

54. Angry!Indie!Harry vs. Evil!Manip!Dumbledore

55. Harry can be utterly furious with and blow up at someone - usually with good reason - yet he will always feel guilty for it and apologize later.

56. Harry takes so many guilt trips he should qualify for frequent flyer miles. 

57. If Harry is adopted, his surname will never change. Instead his adopted name will be simply tacked onto his birth name, leaving him with a name like Harry James Potter-Evans-Snape-Dumbledore.

58. Hyphenated double surnames, e.i: Hermione Granger-Weasley.

59. Other than Hermione, female characters spend an obscene amount of time putting on pouty faces.

60. Hermione thinks she's smarter than everybody else.

61. Neville's grandmother was verbally abusive, either intentionally or unintentionally.

62. If Harry and Hermione hook up in their first year, they will make out like teenagers every chance they get.