Whether it’s playing games like Dungeons and Dragons, writing stories or movies, or simply appreciating books and movies already written, I’m a sucker for character development. I might go into more detail about each of these points in later posts, but I will attempt to lay out here some of the major character archetypes. And I mean “major”. These will be very broad, so they should apply to the media you are enjoying or creating.
Mary Sue/Gary Stu
I put the Mary Sue first because it is the pratfall of many a writer, myself included. Let me start with an example. When I started writing my superhero universe (which is in desperate need of a fifth or sixth rewrite), the main-est of the characters was born in my hometown, looked like me (except he was in shape), held a high position in the Boy Scouts that I had tried to obtain, was immediately made the leader of his team, and by the end of the first big story arc, was romantically attached to the attractive blonde teammate.
The term Mary Sue was coined 40 years ago, when a writer sent a story into a Star Trek magazine about Lieutenant Mary Sue, the youngest Star Fleet officer who could do no wrong. It now refers to a character who is unnaturally good at their position, and doesn’t have to work very hard to get to that position. This is bad character design, because that’s not how the real world works for most people. We want to see characters struggle and overcome, because that’s what we understand life to be about.
Many people say Rey from Star Wars 7 as a Mary Sue, since she kinda shortcuts all the usual Jedi training and just does it instead. Feel free to think upon that yourself instead of posting in the comments about how I’m a chauvinist because I don’t like a strong female lead.
Background characters
This is another pratfall of writers. Background characters are still characters, and sometimes need just as much development as the main characters. Example time!
In the Harry Potter books/movies, Harry Potter is the main character. We know that because the stories revolve around his actions, and because his name’s in the title. (Note that having your name in the title doesn’t make you the main character. See: The Legend of Zelda.) We understand Harry’s goals easily: he wants to be a wizard. He wants to win the Triwizard Tournament. He wants to not get killed by He Who Must Not Be Named.
But Harry isn’t the only character. He’s flanked by Ron and Hermione, opposed by Draco and Snape, and mentored by Dumbledore and Hagrid. Each of these characters has their own goals. Ron is trying to be unique among a giant family full of wizards. Hermione wants to prove that her ordinary parentage won’t stop her from succeeding. Draco spends all his time thinking he’s better than everyone else, and he’s mostly right. Snape’s motivations are difficult to nail down, but they’re definitely there. Dumbledore and Hagrid both want to see Harry succeed, from different angles.
What makes all these characters work in a series ostensibly about Harry Potter is how their goals align or contrast. Ron and Hermione ally themselves with Harry because they see each other as comrades in obscurity, who all have to work extra hard to achieve their own goals. Draco quickly learns that Harry is not to be messed with, which only makes him mess with Harry more to prove his own superiority. Snape has history with Harry, and works very hard to make sure he will be there for him when the time comes. And Dumbledore and Hagrid are giant softies who want to see everyone succeed.
Give background characters goals, figure out how they work with the main character’s goals, and you will have much more compelling characters.
People who are Too Cool
Switching gears back to characters that are Not Good, beware of characters who have room to grow, but start out with too much character development. This limits how far the character can actually grow before you have to expand your world to make room for the character.
Two good examples of this are Superman and the recent Call of Duty games as wholes. Superman, in his early days, just did basic superhuman things. High jump, immune to bullets, hears really good. Nowadays, he’s practically invincible. It’s hard to find a challenge for Superman to overcome, because he’s so powerful. Yes, such threats exist, but they aren’t on the scale that normal people could possibly mirror in their life.
Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare was a good game. The story was a bit bombastic, but it made sense. The most recent “modern” installment, Infinite Warfare, opens with one character single-handedly storming a space station, killing basically everyone before being taken out by the big bad guy. If that’s the opening scene, escalation from there is difficult.
That’s not to say that starting big can’t work. It’s all a matter of context and scale. In Saints Row 4, Earth is destroyed within the first hour of play. However, since the context of the game has galactic proportions, Earth is actually pretty small on the scale. It’s only a big deal to us because we live on Earth.
OK, that’s enough typing for today. Later, I’ll either dive deeper into one of these, or come up with some more archetypes to talk about.
That's Pretty NEET 