i have heard a very common twitter thread on gameoverse and this type of "millenial" stevens-universe-esque one-liners sort of issue when it comes to dialogue, and i absolutely agree that this is an evident phenomenon that kind of makes me avoidant towards a lot of indie shows
indie writers dont you sweat a bit!!! there is a solution:
use metaphors, alliteration, personification, any more of those elements you learn in elementary school. they are worthy of revisiting through a different lense as youre older and overall these contribute the most to making characters talk less like theyre meant to be in a tumblr fandom
show and not tell. perhaps your characters do not need to speak as much and rather we can draw inferences and storytelling elements from the characters actions instead. side note, indie fandoms LIVE for this stuff so your fandom will last a long time making theories if you ever do incorporate this
take in note of language in relation to your setting. if your characters are in a medieval kingdom (rare for indie media but i digress), replacing "yeah" with "aye"--a medieval term for "yeah"--can help immersive the audience into your curated world
give different characters different lingo. a character who comes from aristocratic backgrounds is more likely to speak in escalated english as opposed to any other character, and depicting that contrast between the two elevates their character differences. or lets just say you want a character to seem grim, therefore in that case, write that characters dialogue with negative, distasteful vocabulary words
reduce the cursing (i beg!!) its beyond unnecessary and ruins perfectly fine dialogue
less words we use on a daily basis
if you want any inspiration, i highly suggest incorporating various forms of media into your free time. pick up some classic literature, watch a live action show, watch movies geared towards older audiences, listen to critical podcasts about storytelling and dialogue
