Maybe one crucial part of being a creator is intensely knowing what you want from a creative piece of work. I often cite the quote “If there’s a book you want to read but it doesn’t exist, then you must write it”, which could be read not as exaggeration of what creator people jumping to action, but that the lack of strong feelings most people have about the “what you want to read” part. They get positively surprised when the read something new, but they don’t really get annoyed after reading the same thing happen for the hundredth time, as writers might.

For sure lots of fiction readers have ideas like “I want to see trope A meets genre B!”, and they will excitedly trade plot synopses that hinge on twists. But by annoyment I mean the feelings you get after critically analyzing things you consume and becoming able to predict things that happen, while simultaneously having alternative ideas that could happen in the scenario but no writer ever does them. You start to know so well the specific things you want that it becomes clear nothing exactly like that will ever be created by someone else. In other words, more taste means more specific search criteria which naturally leads to less matches.

As a silly example from the world of romcom manga lets take the trope that “first girl always wins”. Whoever the MC meets first in the series is the girl he is destined to end up with. Now there are very good reason to do it this way, including the possibility to connect the start and end of the work in a satisfying manner, but it’s a rule that certainly could be broken for great effect. And it has been broken, albeit often in unsatisfying ways by the use of harem endings or the MC not really getting together with anyone. But until recently, I think it was very rare that an author would seriously explore a plot where the second or third girl comes and fights to break these expectations. The best example I can recall is Prison School where the author sets Hana on such a path. While the ending of that manga was quite rushed, I think it still managed to connect that ending to the start of the story, and it’s more than enough proof for me that this concept can be made to work very well.