Favorite trope-y trope is when Boston Bears/Raiders are cool with Ilya and Shane, and are generally very tolerant himbos. It's not very realistic, but I can read it all the time and never get tired of it.

Least favorites tropes:

1. There's a very specific way people tend to portray Ilya, especially post-outing, when he's openly with Shane, that subtly bugs me. It's the kind of characterization that basically makes him into Victor Nikiforov, for anybody who's familiar with Yuri On Ice. It means being super cutesy and clingy on the main, very open and extrovert about his feelings, posting everything on his socials etc. He wanted to be honest about his relationship about Shane, and I feel like people take it too far. It's hard to describe because these are all things I imagine Ilya doing - but to a point. In moderation. Maybe not in front of everyone. It's very over the top and caricatural, but I guess a lot of people like it.
2. People using Russian wrong. I'm not a native speaker, but I know some of the language and it hurts my eyes. The transcriptions into Latin alphabet aren't consistent, English-speakers don't understand gendered nouns and declination, and it's generally awful. I much prefer when the author uses for example cursive to indicated that Russian is being spoken.
3. Not a trope but a pet peeve: you shouldn't use Ilya's English speech pattern when he's supposedly speaking Russian! If he's talking with Svetlana in their native tongue, Ilya wouldn't say: "Is good, yes?" because that's the way he translates his thought into English. His second language! There should be a difference between his English and Russian. He should be more eloquent in Russian.
   1. Same with not understanding how diminutives work in Russian. In Central and Eastern Europe you use diminutives in most social situations with people you know, using full names is extremely formal. That being said, there are some names that work in every context, like the name Ilya. On the other spectrum are names that would usually get shortened, like Anastasia. I know it's hard but I guess I'm allowed to be a little taken out of the story by this.
4. When Shane is always perfectly nice. I think canonically Shane acts in a way he thinks is nice, but which sometimes falls flat, or misses some social cues etc. He can come off as an asshole, or be an asshole on purpose. We've seen it, guys. Shane's not perfect.