You make a fascinating point about Zombieland. (I loved that film!)
I think it points to a bigger issue as well:
The emergence of The Hybrid-Genre film – as an inevitable consequence of narrative exhaustion across all Genres. It’s just a factor of time passing, and history.

Arguably, the `most interesting’ films these days, are not within a single major Genre, they are hybrid-Genre films.

It’s because we’re now 100 years into cinema…
ie – Imagine trying to do a `straight’ Western today… (It would seem odd. ie Is this a satire?)
Compare `Cowboys vs Aliens’ to that… (bearing in mind – it was Gene Autry in `The Phantom Empire’, and also `Radio Ranch’ to do this first)
eg – Radio Ranch (1935) “Singer Gene Autry discovers a race of advanced humanoid aliens living beneath the Earth.”

I also went to a brilliant `Writing The Hybrid-Genre Film’ 3-day class once, and realized that – after a while – each Genre is bound to get exhausted, which also explains your own weariness of `reading the same boring tropes’ in the various genres… It’s actually kinda tricky to `stay ahead of where each genre is at’ (but you still need to do it, as a Writer!)… There are soooo many films in each genre (there are over 500,000 feature films in existence… – Who has time – in their short life – to watch all the films that exist, both successful and not, even in: just ONE Genre? lol)

Anyway – arguably this is exactly what `Creativity’ is, anyway: Pick 2 things that haven’t been `combined’ before (at least, not in a film that was popular, otherwise it will seem cliche, before you even begin) and: See what happens. (Hybrid vigor.) Smash 2 memes (ideas) together – and: see what happens.

Random bad examples:

– A doco – and a Serial-Killer-Thriller. (Man Bites Dog)

– A Western and a space opera (whoops, Star Wars already did that, as did Buck Rogers and Flash Gordon)

– a monster movie, a cop movie, and an adultery story (whoops – JAWS – though Jaws the film, kinda `snipped’ that last adultery bit, lol)

– Coming of Age / Zombie / Period Movie – I dunno – `Pride and Prejudice & Zombies’? Maybe.

So, anyway – what you say makes perfect sense… Its not enough to use the same old Genre tropes. Gotta `mix in’ something different. (I did this in a screenplay that was optioned twice – combining: a giallo film – and a romance.)

Arguably Tarantino (just as an example) does this heaps as well. The Hybrid Genre film.

But yeah – the tropes aren’t enough now, in this age of pop culture narrative exhaustion. Its harder to do: NEW/FRESH/ORIGINAL…

(Then again, if you start by thinking `Hybrid Genre’, it’s also: incredibly easy. But it takes more research and thinking beforehand. i.e. Which 2 or 3 (or 4!) Genres to blend, and which tropes within them, to choose/use?)

Anyway, great article.

Cheers

JT Velikovsky
High ROI Film/Story/Screenplay Consultant
https://storyality.wordpress.com/

Either
Revealing too much too early – leaving no path of discovery,

or

Holding back so much that the final reveal doesnt make sense, or is ridiculously out of the blue.

Best thrillers build up with an original combination of intriguing circumstances/situations, character motivations, time critical information reveals, intelligent red herrings, twists and turns, escalating stakes etc which ultimately push thru to the lead (and therefore the audience) “knowing” who/what is the threat and attacking it head on.

Leave the Dr Evil (why I dunnit) climax speeches for Mike Myers. (unless of course you are doing a parody)

LfO

Richard Dutcher made all kinds of waves in Utah and Idaho with “God’s Army” (2000), a movie about Mormon missionaries that was both a very good movie and also very appealing to Mormon audiences; it cost something like $300,000, and was one of the biggest (could be THE biggest, can’t remember) money-maker in Utah of the year.

Dutcher followed it up with an even better, more thoughtful, more nuanced (and much, much darker) film about Mormon culture and belief–“Brigham City.” It cost quite a bit more (still low-budget, but something like a couple million) and, honestly, it’s too challenging and too dark a film to be expected to do well if it’s marketed to Mormon audiences (which it was); it’s also probably too quiet and mournful and too religious a film to have worked as a mainstream thriller. It’s a tricky movie to sell, but I’m really, really glad it was made (Dutcher’s other work is well worth checking out, too, if you like it: “States of Grace,” a slightly more grown-up sequel to “God’s Army,” and “Falling,” a crazy, unhinged force of nature kind of movie).

“Zodiac” and (especially) “Memories of Murder” are some good additions to the serial-killer-but-so-much-more genre of the past decade.

I think ‘Mr Brooks’ made an honest attempt to mess with the serial killer genre, with varying degrees of success. Whist it wasn’t sensational, it was definitely an enjoyable change.
I believe ‘Zodiac’ was an excellent take on the genre, choosing to focus on the effects a serial killer has on people not directly related to the murders. It also exposed us to the frustrating ambiguity of trying to track down such a killer and the maddening discovery that you can never really be sure you’ve caught him/her. In this vain if I’m reminded of a great Korean film called ‘Memories of Murder’. If you liked ‘Zodiac’ check it out.

Story is first. Everything else is just a consequence.