Original Characters versus Mary Sues

[kaitou]

So I've been working on this a bit, though it's not as coherent as it ought to be yet. But when I was at Anime Boston, and going to all the writing panels, I was really struck by how much people wanted to talk about OCs and Mary Sues. When twigcollins and I briefly touched on it, that's when all the hands went up. And then the next day at another panel, a huge chunk of time was eaten up by discussing OCs. So obviously this is something People Want To Know About.

And so when I was in Japan and stuck in a waiting room before I was allowed to go visit a plant, and after I'd made a list of all the knitting projects I have planned, I started to write up My Thoughts on Yaoi Original Characters.



I think Twig really, really nailed it on the head at our panel when she said that the role of an Original Character (OC) is to illuminate the main characters or to move the plot along. Really, you could stop right here, which I think is what she tried to do, but everyone wanted clarification. Everyone wants to know that their precious OCs, the characters that they actually came up with using their own imaginations are not dreaded Mary Sues, and that they have done a Good Job. Which is only natural. When you're writing fanfic you don't have to worry that someone thinks Kamui is a stupid character...that would be CLAMP's fault, not yours (as long as you haven't made him too OOC).

I tend to think there are 3 types of characters in any story, Main, Supporting and Bit. There's a bit of a sliding scale here, but it's roughly true.

Main characters - These are the reason you're writing the story. Without the main characters, your story goes nowhere.

Supporting characters - These characters will be part of the main plot, and can carry a subplot of their own. Gloucester is a supporting character in King Lear. He interacts with Lear, but you could cut out the whole bit with Edgar and Edmund without significantly impacting Lear's story. (Though it would hurt me, because I love Edmund)

Bit Characters - These are your RPG shopkeepers. They are only in the story to help your Main and Supporting characters get from point A to point B, or to illuminate a point (is this sounding familiar?).

When you're writing fanfic your OCs should be in the same vein as Bit Characters. This isn't to say that they can't have personality, and that readers might not love them....it's just that, frankly, they're not the point. It's not even to say that they can't be POV characters, it's just that the reason they're a POV character is because they're highlighting some aspect of the Canon Character (CC) that we wouldn't get otherwise. There are plenty of Star Trek fics that use McCoy's daughter Joanna this way.

Speaking of Joanna, ask yourself...do I really NEED to create an OC? Try to use Canon Characters where possible. There are probably bit characters that already fit what you want, or have so little character development that they can be made to fit what you want without distorting the character. This has been pretty well done in HP fandom. Since JK likes to give out names and then not develop them. Plenty of fic writers have done great things with Pansy, the Patil twins, the Creevey brothers, the house ghosts...

This was pretty badly handled by Squeenix in Advent Children. There really isn't any reason for Denzel to exist. No no, I know the latest version did a lot to improve the movie, but there's nothing that you need Denzel for that couldn't be accomplished by a canon character, say...Marlene. The audience would have had a much bigger emotional attachment to Marlene suffering from Geostigma and going evil than some kid we've never seen before. Also, we never really needed 3 Sephiroth wannabes either. (Amazingly not one of the three even rates his own wiki page).


But in this case you've decided that you really need an Original Character, a minor canon character just isn't going to cut it. And you want your OC to be awesome OC, but you don't want them to become Mary Sues. How do you accomplish it? Not that I'm an expert, but here's what I think it's important to keep in mind when you're writing OCs.

1. Careful on the appearances. Honestly it doesn't matter if they have highlighter-green hair, or mousy brown...that's not the important thing. The important thing is how much time you spend on it. The only reason you want to be descriptive of OC appearance is as a characterization shortcut. The accountant with the bow tie and sweater vest is not comfortable with the CC suggesting get in on an embezzling scheme. The chick with the Celtic Knotwork Pentacle tattoo can tell your CC which park has the fairy ring you're looking for. In this way appearance is a shortcut to character, so you can show not tell (not that subverting these things isn't awesome).

Compare two of the heroines in Tamora Pierce's Tortall books. The Song of the Lioness Quartet follows Alanna, a girl who goes undercover as a boy to become a knight. She's tiny, with flaming red hair and amethyst purple eyes. And those eyes are brought up a LOT. Physical description wise, Alanna hits a lot of Mary Sue buttons. Then the Protector of the Small series brings in Kel, the first girl to follow openly in Alanna's footsteps. The things that your remember about Kel's appearance after reading the books is that she's built like a tank, and has a fantastic poker face. You could give Alanna raven black hair and silver eyes, and it wouldn't really change anything about who she is. If Kel were slender and her eyes reflected every thought...she wouldn't be the same character.

tl:dr don't waste words on an OC's appearance. The reader doesn't care, and will fill in the blanks with their own imagination. The only reason to elaborate at all is if something about their appearance will automatically tell the reader about who the OC is.

2. Your OC doesn't exist to be awesome. I really get where the super talented, cool, amazing, nice, kickass, selfless OCs come from. You think to yourself, they've got to be pretty amazing to hang with the CC. If my OC is going to interact with Aang and crew, then they must also be some kind of Bender or Warrior, right? Eh. Maybe. Whatever.

But just like how cool the OC looks, it doesn't matter how cool the OC is. It's not about them, it's about the CCs. If your OC is an astrophysicist working for the Stargate program, well, they work for the Stargate program. That's all the reader cares to know. They don't care how many degrees, or credentials the OC has, or that they take judo and and paint watercolor landscapes on the weekends. They're going to get their plot point done, and move on. As the writer you may know how great they are, but telling the reader is going to slow down your story, and set off Mary Sue alarms.

3. Instant BFFs set off warning bells. CCs are actually allowed to like your OC. It's just that an OC becoming an instant best friend and love interest has been so overdone that it sets off a reader's alarm pretty quickly. This is one of the places you should really try and see if there isn't a bit CC you can use instead.  Anyone that important, the ex they never quite got over, the beloved childhood friend, you would expect the canon to have mentioned already exactly because of how important they are.  But when you write the OC interacting with a CC the two important things to remember are:

a.) There has to be a reason why the CCs like or dislike your OC. They're funny, thoughtful, condescending, passive-aggressive...something. It's not just 'cause.

b.) The intensity of an CC's feelings for the OC is in direct proportion to the role they serve in the story. The ex-girlfriend OC that serves to prove to the CC how much they really love whoever you have them set up with is going to evoke a much stronger emotion from them than the waitress OC that tells them 'yeah, I think I saw so-and-so here earlier.' This also works vice versa. Depending on the universe and characters your working with, your OCs may be utterly indifferent to the CCs.

Variations on a Theme

Original Villains - You do have more leeway with Original Villains, they clock in more like supporting characters than bit characters. So they can have more scenes to themselves, more descriptions and more eccentricity.

Kid Fic - Kids are pretty popular OCs, because we like to see the CCs being all mushy and parental. And the younger the kid the more you can play with the above rules without risking Mary Sue territory. Baby means you can get away with lavishing more descriptions, specialness, and the CCs will be naturally besotted with the tyke. But a teenager? Forget it, you're straight back in Mary Sue territory. Yes, even if you remember to make the kid yell things like 'I hate you, you're not my real dad!'

But with kid fic more than most types of OCs, you DO have to make sure that they have a distinct character. Let me make that more specific...they should have a character that is not an exact copy of a parent or caregiver. Think about it, how much did you have in common with your parents at age 7? And more important than anything, remember that a kid is a kid, not a small adult. I don't care how precocious they are. (And if there's magic or superpowers or anything involved, please don't make the kid...the most powerful being in the universe. TV Tropes calls it Goo Goo Godlike. Unless you're playing it for laughs, it feels like you've jumped the shark.)

All World, no CCs - Using the canon world, but not necessarily any of its characters. This can overlap with Kid Fic, in that this is often 'The Next Generation' featuring all the CCs kids or grandkids. I think this is mostly popular with things like Star Trek and Star Wars where there's a huge, extremely detailed universe to go play with. Honestly I don't have much advice for you here, because this isn't a subgenre I'm at all interested in. It's not a subgenre that many people are interested in at all, really. But you should write fanfic to make you happy, and if this is what does it for you, go for it.


Examples of Kickass Original Characters:

cesperanza is consistently amazing at everything she does, and OCs are no exception. 'The Bodyguard' is a Due South fic featuring an aging Russian ballerina who is doing her best to get in Fraser's pants. She's an antagonistic force that pushes Fraser and Ray K together (moving plot forward) and forces the characters to examine not only sexual harassment, but the effects of being a honest person in the closet and how that effects your life and relationships. And Olga also manages to be bitchy, haughty, selfish...forgiving, brave, funny and smart in her own right.

You could name any of her fic, and I should stop at one, but I'm going to give you one more, because 'With Six You Get Eggroll' is the epitome of well done Kid Fic. This is another Fraser/RayK Due South story, and in this one there are 6 OC children...and every last one of them has their own personality, and is an utterly real kid. And they all tell you something about Fraser, something about Ray, something about their relationship with each other... it just rocks.

Another fabulous writer is sam_storyteller, and in his Torchwood story 'the Rules of Torchwood Three' he goes one further and makes the OC the POV character. Now Nicholas starts off as a bit of a Ianto expy, which is a bit weird because Ianto is the character Nicholas is illuminating the most. But he really comes into his own as a character, that you care about, even though the point of him is to see how the rest of Torchwood functions and interacts with each other, both with and without Jack. Also interesting as he's an OC that grows and changes as a character.

In out_there's Jeeves and the Tennis Coach, from Wodehouse's Jeeves and Wooster series, Bertie assumes that Jeeves is attracted to the handsome, kind and French! Tennis Coach OC, and has to decide what to do about his own attraction to Jeeves. Facet (the titular Tennis Coach) isn't an extremely well rounded character himself, but he serves the needs of the fic perfectly well to keep the plot tumbling forward. And then in the last chapter, Bertie meets up with bit canon characters Mabel and Biffy, who help highlight exactly what Jeeves sees in Bertie.

Obsession_inc has written a Iron Man Movie!Verse story, Concession, which is a dark, creepy look at Tony/Pepper. Bit Canon characters have been fleshed out...reporter Christine Everhart is our POV character, with Rhodey and Agent Coulson appearing. And Obsession_inc has created some smart, interesting original characters to show you Pepper's non-Stark life. In fact, neither Tony nor Pepper appear in the story at all, but the story is entirely about them.

And for non-fanfic examples (I know, weird, right?) check out Doctor Who. Doctor Who has some fantastic characters that only appear for an episode or two...which is similar to an OC that appears only in one fic. Nancy in 'The Empty Child/The Doctor Dances'... Madame de Pompadour in 'The Girl in the Fireplace'...The Doctor in 'The Next Doctor'...and of course Thomas Kincade Brannigan in 'Gridlock.' We'll never see these characters again (probably) but they're incredibly rich without taking your attention away from The Doctor and his companion.

In books check out Dorothy Sayers' Lord Peter Wimsey mysteries for incredibly rich and three dimensional bit characters. She also has a total Mary Sue hero, and an Author Avatar love interest. But they're GOOD. I know, I still can't believe it myself.



So there it is. I'd like to hear your opinions on all of this. I usually figure out my own opinions to things socratically, so it would be really helpful to me too. And I'd like to hear about any good examples of OCs you know of as well. Thanks to twigcollins for inspiring this, and to flidgetjerome for going over it and reminding me of things like villains.

Comments

[aphelion-orion.livejournal.com]

Definitely agreed on all points (though I can't say anything about the examples given, since I don't share the fandoms XD). The kid fic thing bothers me especially because a lot of canons don't bother to remember that the kid doesn't need to look/act/have exactly the same adventures as the parent(s), either. So you can kind of argue that a lot of people have bad examples to go by in addition to misguided ideas/judgment.

[kaitou1412.livejournal.com]

Yay! a comment!

Yeah, I can't remember what we were talking about specifically at the Boston panel, but there was some piece of advice one of us gave, and a guy was like 'But that's kind of obvious.' and I was like 'Then you, sir, know more about writing than many published authors.'

Flidget's Commentary

[flidgetjerome.livejournal.com]

(Ann and I have been discussing this post via gmail for a while now and she asked me to post some of my emails as comments. I’ll be using a lot of comicbook examples because comicbooks function on a sort of time-delayed canon, where changes and updates will need to survive for several years before they’ll be accepted as permanent, for a given value of permanent.)

Additional Variations on a Theme

The Jonas Quinns - Sometimes a canon wraps-up and not all the CCs are going to be active or even alive by the end of it. That leaves a valid and often necessary slot to fill, especially in canons with ensemble casts. For example, Harry Potter kidfic that’s going to take place in Hogwarts and in the epilogue continuity is going to need a whole swath of OCs just to fill the teaching positions. Okay, so you can ignore Word of God and keep McGonnagal as Headmistress but you’ll still need someone to take her place as Head of Gryffindor.

It's a sort of OC that may be necessary and may need to be a bit more fleshed-out than normal OCs because it may need to interact with the CCs to quite an extent. The audience will probably excuse you for it, though, as long as they're not too obnoxious – remember you’re replacing a character people are probably fond of and anyone who takes their place will be met with wariness on the part of the audience and will have to tread lightly to get accepted.

OCs to fill a plot hole - This can be something quite major, like the introduction of Lucius Fox into Batman canon to explain who’s doing the day-to-day running Wayne Enterprises while Bruce Wayne is busy punching things. Or it can be something pretty minor, like introducing more female characters as cannon-fodder, just because it seems strange that organisations that have female officers as main characters oddly lack female soldiers in the rank and file.

People tend to be more merciful to these guys, especially in canons where the world is essentially a character in its own right. In this case the OC is still there to support a main character, it's just that the character is the world.

Upgrading OCs to Main Character Status

This is incredibly difficult, one mis-step and you’ve stuck with a Mary Sue again, and while I think it can be done I think it can only, ONLY be done if you’re writing a long-running series. The amount of time involved is critical, you need to have enough between the beginning and end of the story to get feedback and find out that the OC actually has garnered a lot of the affection of the fandom and they'd like to see more of them. Without that audience support this is going to go horribly wrong.

Amadeus Cho from Marvel comics is a good example of how this works. He was originally created to fill a logic hole ("Why are there no goddamn Asian-American heroes except Jubilee?") and to be a new side-kick for the Hulk (Cho's intelligence highlights the savagery of the Hulk and the equal intelligence of Bruce Banner). The latter ended up not happening as the World War Hulk crossover was in process soon after and Hulk was either off-planet/invading/in-stasis for the next couple of years and so they made him Hercules' side-kick instead. A few years on, while Hercules is temporarily dead, he's now headlining the book and Bruce Banner is now one of his supporting characters.

I really need to emphasise getting feedback from the readership first and giving it time. A lot of people hated Amadeus and thought he was a Mary-Sue when he first appeared because he's way way smart and something of a huge brat. Part of his story with Herc, and again, this was serving to highlight a side of Hercules that’s there but usually neglected, Hercules the father, was getting him over all this anger he had. For comic books this went very fast, Amadeus went from supporting to main in 4 years, but there were still over three years of actual stories in between. Power Girl, who follows a similar development path, took 12 years to get her first miniseries and 33 years to finally get her own series.

Re: Flidget's Commentary

[kaitou1412.livejournal.com]

*nodnod* well said. Like we talked about in e-mails, I wasn't planning on getting into why you'd be using an OC. But this is good stuff and should go up.

[aphelion-orion.livejournal.com]

*laughs* Yeah, sounds true. I did a rant a little while ago on "sequel children," who are usually boys, and who usually look exactly like their father, have the same adventures as their father, and hate their father as some kind of "issue" to angst about. It's terrifying how many I could come up with on the spot.

That said, I generally try to keep OCs to a minimum in my own fics simply because I figure people want to read about the canon characters more than they do OCs. And as you said, imo it should be a rule of thumb to ask what an OC can do for a plot rather than how funny/awesome/cool they could be. At least that's how I try to go about it. On the flipside, an OC who is just created to make the canon characters look cooler/prettier/smarter or whatever is just as bad.

Examples from Comicverse

[flidgetjerome.livejournal.com]

OCs as Replacements for CCs

An example of one that didn’t work and one that did.

Comicbook time moves slowly but it does move and in the mid-80s Dick Greyson, after 50 or so years of being Robin, was finally allowed to grow up and become Nightwing. The thing is Robin is a role as well as a character and the dynamics of Batman require that there be a Robin around to highlight and also lighten all the brooding and darkness he does. So they needed a replacement.

The new kid, Jason Todd, was originally introduced as Dick Greyson-lite and no one liked him because he was boring. Fans already had Dick Greyson and they liked the original better. So when DC rebooted their entire universe in the first Crisis crossover they took the opportunity to reboot Jason Todd as a character - and then everyone hated him. The new Jason Todd was basically just a little street punk who'd give Batman nothing but grief and in the end, pretty notoriously, the readership actually voted for him to die because they hated him so much.

The reason DC failed is they forgot that Robin is also a role in the story. The new kid had to be able to play off Bruce Wayne and lighten-up the story, a thuggish ex-gang kid is not going to be doing that.

They tried again and got it right this time with the third Robin, Tim Drake, who was a distinct personality, all dry wit instead of free-wheeling humour, but still fulfilled his story-function to give Batman someone to play off of.

Background Canon Characters that function as OCs

The whole existing bit character as disguised OC thing - it is SO much easier to get away with your super-special Mary Sue traits if you take that route. Why? Because you can spin it out of existing world rules.

Again, comicbook example. Fandom fucking loves Wiccan – he’s a character who’s related to half the A-List in the Marvel Universe and so powerful he's a candidate for Sorcerer Supreme at the age of 16 but this is accepted because it stems organically from the world rules.

Billy was actually created as a baby to support the "married superheroes living a suburban life" theme of the 80s Scarlet Witch and the Vision series; the Scarlet Witch is Magneto’s daughter and the Vision is Ultron’s son so the fact that Billy's related to all these important characters is logical. He was seemingly killed off a few years later but his insanely high power levels were established in Avengers Forever miniseries as a hypothetical "if these children had lived" scenario that in that story was just there to highlight how insanely powerful the Scarlet Witch herself was.

Billy as a stand-alone character is completely an OC, his adorably awkward geekiness and his sexual orientation are things the writer came up with, since he hadn't been seen in canon since the age he was just about able to sit-up by himself. But he's been dropped into a slot that was already there, with rules for his character that had already been accepted as being the way the world worked, so fandom embraced him.

[m-steelgrave.livejournal.com]

Oh man, Concession creeped the hell out of me. I almost wish it weren't fanfic, because with a slightly different premise it would make a fantastic film.

That said, I agree with pretty much everything you've said here. Whenever I think I'm veering into Mary Sue territory, I file her away to use in an original work later. It's a sort of Mary Sue graveyard.

Re: Examples from Comicverse

[m-steelgrave.livejournal.com]

I'd be interested to hear your thoughts about what they've been doing with Jason Todd lately. Bruce made him dye his hair?! WTF, stupid retcon.

I only ask because when I haven't been at the theatre this week, it's been all Robins, all the time on my computer.

[kaitou1412.livejournal.com]

I almost didn't link Concession, because it's so creepy and unsettling, and not at all how I see Tony. But you can't deny that it's well written and a good use of OCs.

It's just one of those things that I can't unread now that I've read it. Like a Kare Kano fic that painted the dad as a pedophile. Not one that *acted* on it, but...euugggh. And now it's hard to watch the show/read the manga without that in my head.

[ickaimp.livejournal.com]

Not very constructive, but as far as I can tell, you've covered all your bases.

Another good example of an OC, IMHO, Elisabeth Culmer's The Way of the Apartment Manager, if anyone's into Naruto.

As a ficcer, I'm always leering of OCs, which is why I'm a crossover queen, never make up a character when you have a logical reason to bring someone else from a different series.

Re: Examples from Comicverse

[flidgetjerome.livejournal.com]

I think Jason's a good example of how the time-delay in superhero comics canon works. He's been officially back for five years now and they still can't figure out what to do with him. He was a villain, then he went vaguely heroic in Countdown and now he's an even crazier villain. Nothing's sticking because they've yet to find anything that works. I don't think the hairdye thing will be allowed to stick, either, it makes Batman look like too much of an asshole.*

The main problem with Jason is the same problem they had with Stephanie Brown; Batman's entire thing is being the guy who's such a Chessmaster that he's on par with Wonder Woman and Superman in practical power levels. This is not a guy who's supposed to be able to screw-up to the degree that it gets children under his care killed and canon will just keep going into convulsions until people find a way to explain that (or, like with Steph, just eventually throw up their hands and go "It never happened, okay? Happy now?").

* (Not that he isn't often that big of an asshole elsewhere but usually not in his own books and certainly not against Jason, Jason's not popular enough for that. The Bat-family in general, though, has a pretty bad case of shifting characterisations because half the members have long-running solo titles and when you've got 5 different people taking turns to be the main character everyone else's characterisation keeps shifting to make the current main character the most heroic. Which can lead to some extreme variations because of, for example, how far apart Stephanie Brown and Bruce Wayne are on crime-fighting philosophies.)

[kaitou1412.livejournal.com]

*nodnod* I generally like my fic to be self contained to the canon...though I've brought in an OC villain once or twice. I think the only time I ever had many OCs was when I shipped Kaito and Hakuba off to England.

Eh, it just struck me at the con how much people cared about the topic, which made me start to think about it. You know?

[m-steelgrave.livejournal.com]

It's just one of those things that I can't unread now that I've read it.

Yes! It's totally different from how I see Tony, but I think a Tony could get that way. I can see where she got the ideas, anyway, and I think there's enough in the text to support the AU (because I can't really call it OOC for some reason...which might be the creepy part to me).

Re: Examples from Comicverse

[m-steelgrave.livejournal.com]

I wish they'd decide what to do with him! There's so much potential there. I guess that's what they're doing by plugging him into different roles, but still.

I will say this: the only thing more daunting than catching up on decades of Avengers canon and the pertinent solo runs is trying to patch the holes in my Bat-canon knowledge. Good grief.

Re: Examples from Comicverse

[flidgetjerome.livejournal.com]

The Blessed Thing about Bat canon is at least they rebooted everything with Crisis so you only really have about 25 years there you really need to know. Everything else they'll catch you up on if they decide to homage it. :P

(Let me know if you need to get hold of any Avengers issue in particular, I own the 40 Years of Avengers DVD and rather a lot of West Coast Avengers scans oh Marvel why won't you collect all the good Hank Pym bits?)

[siliconmage.livejournal.com]

I would just like to mention Roman Gemini as an awesome OC.

[mewsrissicat.livejournal.com]

Been dying to comment on this, so I'm really sorry that I'm late to the party. *sheepish*

Reading over this, I found that overall the feel of the post was far more instructive, rather than collaborative. But then on second thought, I realized that it was exactly appropriate to the venue that you were writing it: Young/new fanfic writers are looking for a guide. They've probably gotten plenty of encouragement from friends, but not always a good critical guideline. Nicely done.

One point that I interpret differently from you: "There really isn't any reason for Denzel to exist. No no, I know the latest version did a lot to improve the movie, but there's nothing that you need Denzel for that couldn't be accomplished by a canon character, say...Marlene."

Everything you said in the first half of your post is spot-on to support the existence of Denzel. He accentuates the personal growth of Cloud in that Strife allows himself to trust - and be trusted - by another person in his life. Not Tifa, who he's known all of his life, or Marlene who has the "safety net" of her father. But someone who is really, truly dependent on Cloud for protection and guidance. Cloud's habit of running solo may seem to be a "cool" trait, but it's also a cover for him being too scared to let anyone else close to him.

Also, Denzel states that he wants to be as strong as Cloud. Just as Zack was Angeal's successor, and Cloud was the successor of Zack, a case could be built that ultimately Denzel is introduced to be Cloud's protege.

[kaitou1412.livejournal.com]

Well, for one thing, the points you raise about what makes Denzel a necessary OC only exist in the extended cut of the movie. Which is kind of like...fix it fic for a fic of the game? And it was good fix it fic. (I'm just considering it fic for the sake of the argument...I didn't want to use bad examples of actual fanfic becuase...1 possible hurt feelings, and 2 it would mean I'd have to actually go subject myself to bad Mary Sue fanfic) In the original version I'm not sure Cloud and Denzel even directly interact until the end.

I still think that Marlene would have been a better narrative choice. It would remove the Fridge logic problem of why one of the clones (can't remember) kidnaps her from the church and takes her to see the whole black water deal. Marlene didn't have Geostigma, so why go to the problem of taking her there? To make Cloud come after her? If so that would imply that Denzel is not enough.

And I'm not sure that I agree Denzel was necessary in order to provide Cloud someone that needed his protection and trust in a way that couldn't also apply to established characters. We know, like you said, that Denzel looks up to Cloud and wants to be like him, but there's not much that he does in return. Denzel may represent someone dependent on Cloud, but if you took him out of the picture altogether, it wouldn't impact the rest of Cloud's story at all. None of his decisions or actions would have been different. And honestly even if Denzel's place in the story had been taken by Marlene, Tifa, or any other character, that's still sloppy plot. But to bring in an OC for that purpose makes it worse.

You know, I didn't think I really had much of an opinion on FFVII:AC. LOL. I thought the original was OK, and I liked the extended version you showed me. But from a literary critique standpoint, I think it could have been much tighter. (And this is not as bad as my thoughts on Iron Man 2...which I also enjoyed. While I was waiting for my sandwich to arrive today at a coffee shop I wrote up copious notes on fixing plot problems with that too.)

tl;dr--I can't believe I'm defending Denzel but here it is

[soranokumo.livejournal.com]

Just hopping in here to clarify something, but the sad thing about Advent Children Complete is that it IS the complete movie. It's not a "fix-up"... it was what they were originally trying to aim for when they decided to make a full movie instead of a twenty-minute clip.

The first release was unfortunately a problem of time and budgetary concerns caused by the higher-ups at Square, from what we can tell. They pushed the AC team to stick to that one deadline instead of giving them the time to really complete it. Actually finishing Advent Children after the first release was something Nomura and his team were forced to do on the side, which is another part of the reason why it took so long, as other projects and their deadlines took precedence.

So, arguing the always-dicey ground of authorial intent, ACC is really called Advent Children Complete because it's the Real McCoy. It IS the actual fanfic, not a fix-it fic.

As for Denzel... I can see why a lot of people, especially without having seen ACC, would not view him as a necessary character.

However... 1) Sorry, he's not an OC. By dint of the fact that Square made him, he's CC in the Advent Children storyline. So the rules don't exactly apply.

2) Denzel exists as a mental prod in Cloud's poor brainbits for a lot of things, including his survivor's guilt and, most importantly, as a living reminder of what Zack was to him.

Cloud shows concern for Denzel when he finds him collapsed outside of the church, but when you see the clip of what happens right after that, with Cloud putting him up onto Fenrir, he says that Tifa says that he should bring Denzel home. You can see that his concern is just that, and not any deeper. This is where the subtle tipping point occurs.

Denzel, practically unconscious, falls forward against Cloud, and his shaking hand attempts to reach around Cloud and can't. And Cloud, eyes widening, realizes what exactly is going on, and when you see his hand cover Denzel's you can see him going, "This is what it was like for me, too. This is exactly how it was back then." And at that point that Denzel has become important to Cloud, and Cloud, who was perfectly fine waiting for Geostigma to kill him off, suddenly has much more reason to try and find a cure.

You have that whole point where Denzel gets kidnapped/possessed for a bit, but after he comes back to himself, everything after that shows how he's looking up to Cloud as a role model and attempting to protect other people, even going out of his way to do so. And the whole ending where Cloud walks Denzel up to Zack's grave is completely a, "Here's the story, and I'm passing it on to you now" moment.

I think Marlene doesn't quite work as The Kid Who Should Get Sick because, although she's important to Cloud and he wants to protect her, she has much more of a support group, such as it is. She has a family. She has her daddy, and Elmyra, and the rest of Avalanche, all who dote on her. And, as is obvious, she knows exactly who she is and what she wants, and is pretty certain of herself for a six-year old.

Geostigma being what it is, it wouldn't have worked the same on her. There wouldn't have been her turning evil; I honestly think she's too strong of a character, in a sense, for it to have worked. The remnants took the orphans and other children precisely because they were vulnerable children without family to protect them, making them easy to exploit. Marlene got brought along because she was, frankly, in the wrong place at the wrong time, and Loz is kinda too simple to know what to do with her.

Anyway, the writers needed a victim. Someone who has lost his family, is trying to build a new one, and is stuck, confused, and uncertain. I think trying to change Marlene to fit that role would have been worse than creating a new one. So, Denzel fills that role, too.

So, yes, he 1) works to illuminate more of Cloud's character and enables Cloud to grow somewhat, as well as providing some impetus/motivation for some of his actions, whether they're right or wrong; 2) fits in the role of the future protege, which is totally how Square Enix is setting him up; 3) provides an adequate victim for Geostigma.

That said, yes the writing could have been better.

[soranokumo.livejournal.com]

Some really good advice here, though I think that you might also wish to throw in a caveat somewhere that yes, there are OCs out there that manage to bend/break the rules and still be well-loved, but generally they're by more experienced authors. Experienced authors know the rules, which is exactly why they can break them. They do it right, j0.

I can't really comment on the examples, either, sadly, but I will say Dorothy Sayers managed to make the entire Divine Comedy comprehensible and accessible in a language other than Italian... she totally deserves to do wonderfully Mary Sue heroes that still manage to be good. XD The woman was amazing.

Re: tl;dr--I can't believe I'm defending Denzel but here it is

[kaitou1412.livejournal.com]

XD We're really arguing apples and oranges here. I'm using the Original version of AC deliberately. Because in it's original state, it illustrates the argument pretty well and it's an example more people would be familiar with than...Meiling in CCS or the whole New York arc of Marmalade Boy. And again, I didn't want to track down an literal OC from a fanfic because that would mean...reading Mary Sue fanfic, and being mean to the author. For the purposes of an example, Original Flavor AC works. For the Extended, he's doing exactly what an OC ought to do, which makes him an example of it done better.

I still feel like he's shoehorned in, and the story based more on 'how we can use this character Denzel in an FF story' than 'I have a cool FF story, and I need a new character to make it work.' Honestly, Cloud and Sephiroth don't really do much for me. So personally getting a whole movie where the characters I really liked like Yuffie and Cait Sith barely appear and serve no plot purpose whatsoever, and instead I get a new kid who really doesn't have any character development (in the original) is frankly pretty disappointing. It certainly didn't make me think 'yes, I have to go see that new and improved version with more new kid.' Even though it really was improved.

[soranokumo.livejournal.com]

I by no means intended to criticize your opinion of the thing itself. I mean, it's your opinion! You can like or dislike it as you please. (And... I don't believe I even mentioned that? If I did, I'm sorry!)

I only meant to clarify some of the Unknown Bits about the differences between the initial release and the Complete release, and to discuss Denzel's character.

[velithya]

I found this (and flidget's added commentary) a great read!

[kaitou1412.livejournal.com]

That's an excellent point. Pretty much true of any writing...If you're awesome enough, you can break any rule. (I was just reading a book review on Slate, and the reviewer was saying basically, the writing is lousy, the plot is mediocre, but man the heroine is awesome and I love her')

Oh and you should totally read some of Sayers' mysteries. They're 'whodunnit' mysteries, and so the actual mystery bit is usually kind of ludicrous, but my god could that woman write a character.

[kaitou1412.livejournal.com]

:P Sorry, don't mean come off mean about it, I just get excited. ^^;; And it's all kind of wrapped up together, Denzel as a character and FFAC as a whole.

I am really glad you all made me sit down and watch the extended version, it really was much better and solved a lot of narrative problems. But because I wasn't really impressed with the way the original was done, I never would have held out for the extended. Oh well, I may not have gotten much Cait Sith, but there was plenty of Turks, and that's always love.

[soranokumo.livejournal.com]

Certainly not meanly about it, hon--I think we were just managing to kinda both miss the other's point, hence causing confusion all around!

I guess Denzel just seems to be a bad example for your warnings against OCs/Mary Sues because, well, even though most people haven't watched the Complete version (or care to) because the initial release doesn't manage to patch together its already patchy plot well... but for me, the Complete release is the original version, because it was what was originally intended by the AC team, so when you discuss Denzel at all it's like, "You don't waste that much time, effort, and budget on a character who is completely unnecessary." I honestly don't think Nomura would have put him in there if he hadn't had some reason to... and it has to be a reason that could back up the money required to put Denzel into the movie.

Trust me, they were griping enough already over putting the symbolic!wolf in, they would have gladly left Denzel out if they hadn't known and already felt from the beginning that he was important somehow. It's not that they didn't do a horrible job with explaining his presence in the initial release--they did, but that was a problem of deadline, not necessarily a fault of the storytellers.

Which I guess is probably what bothers me so much about this--it's a problem of deadlines and stupid company decisions, not a problem with the storytellers. (And they even tried to make up for it by making Denzel's story available online--of course, only in Japanese for the longest time--so fans in Japan could actually read more about him and get a better sense of his character and what got left out of the initial release of the film.)

(...speaking of which, don't bother reading the English translation, as it's horrible. We had you watch the Complete version of the film, and that's all you really need to know. XD)

It's kinda the flip-side of what went on with Rowling and the last set of Harry Potter books, where the character of Tonks (and others) made no sense and it was largely a fault of 1) Rowling's inexperience, which, while charming at times, also leads to obvious faults, and 2) her editors being too scared to cross her and actually call her out on the obvious problems with her storytelling.

I mean, one could say that it was a problem with deadlines for her, too, but I would say that's bullshit. The world could honestly have waited a few more years for the story to mature and get cleaned up, and Rowling should have known that she would need to allow for good editing time before unleashing her project on the world. The publishing company wouldn't have pressured her so much if she hadn't let them--the added anticipation might have just made them more money, after all.

[kaitou1412.livejournal.com]

HA! I love your icon.

We should have a podcast or something where we sit around and talk out these things. Like 'Hardball' only about Fic.

Now we're really into a whole 'nother topic of author intent. I think once it's out for commercial sale, it's a finished product. If the original version hadn't done well commercially, we never would have gotten Complete, whether it was intended or not. And then the original version would have been canon. It's a good chicken and egg conundrum. Did Han Shoot First, or not?

I think if you're going to be part of pop-culture/genre fiction, you have a few different considerations from capital L, capital C Literature and Culture. I mean, you have a little more leeway for cliches (and some are practically mandated by the genre). Aaaaaaand.....I'm sorry, I'm gonna finish my comment when I go home. I don't want to stay at work just to finish the comment, and I don't want to lose what I have written and have to rewrite it later. Please forgive me!

This is how Gackt feels when he realizes he has to purchase yet another version of the same FF.

[soranokumo.livejournal.com]

It'd probably be far more entertaining to watch, that's for sure. XD

G-cat and I were discussing the problem of "finished product" as well, and she brought up an interesting point: Square Enix doesn't treat AC like a movie... rather, their modus operandi is the same thing they've been doing for their main games since FFVII.

FFVII Original Japanese Release--Arguably a playable game, but missing stuff.
FFVII Original NA Release--More info about Zack, Ruby and Emerald inserted into the game as additional bosses, a few more fancy cutscenes, and the full version of Sephiroth's Super Nova attack... While knowing more about Zack isn't absolutely necessary, it certainly helps to fill in a huge gap of Cloud's storyline and gives the audience some idea who Zack is.
FFVII International Version--The Japanese re-release of the NA version of the game.

The same method was used for most of the FF games since then, both Kingdom Hearts, and Dissidia... and probably some of their other games, too, but those are the only ones I can say for certain. (Also, there tend to be more bugs in the original Japanese releases that get fixed in the NA/International versions. I also recall that Dissidia is much more playable and enjoyable in the NA and rerelease versions.) I'd probably hate to be a fan in Japan, because I'd want to hold off on buying the game until the eventual re-release comes out, but then you don't get the glories of having the original game... and yeah.

The funny thing is, in the US we've been left largely out of that kind of loop (merely pining after the sometimes-more-content-added Japanese re-release/International/Plus version), and AC is the first time Square screwed over their NA fans as much as their Japanese fans, with however many releases of it there have been.

So I'm not sure if the same "once published, it's finished" rule applies here, because Square wasn't following those rules with AC to begin with. They were following game business rules, which unfortunately is a lot of, "Well, we have to publish it by this deadline, we'll just release patches to fix it all later."

The thing is, Square doesn't really worry that much anymore if the original version sucks, because they know they'll still get enough people buying the initial releases of their games to set up and pay out for the re-releases. It's a sucky model for us consumers, but it's worked well enough for them, and AC falls directly into that model. It'd be really nice if they'd just sacrifice more time and push games back so they can release a really well-built, unchanged, happily non-glitchy Japanese/NA/International version from the get-go--

Surprisingly, FFXIII doesn't fall into their usual trend. There are minimal changes between the Japanese and the NA/International versions, from what I've heard, and the game itself has a very smooth, happily non-glitchy experience. Dare I call it delightful?

We'll see whether or not that still holds, since now that Square actually outdid itself and didn't follow its usual release pattern, some of the critics claim FFXIII sucks, and Square is stuck wondering what they did wrong.

Hopefully they'll realize it was just bad marketing on their part and NOT the way they released the game.

THAT said and that particular point elaborated upon, I can't wait to see what you say once you get home. XD

Because Obviously FF stands for Fierce Fashion

[kaitou1412.livejournal.com]

Damn, now I feel like I have something to live up to. I do hope you realize I'm enjoying this immensely?

That is an excellent point about the way Squeenix re-releases their stuff. I feel like at this point I'm supposed to twirl my moustache, swirl my cape and go 'You've gotten away with it this time!' But it is a sucky thing to do to your consumers, and I'm glad they're not doing that to you with XIII.

Anyway...what was I going to say? Oh yes, genre and pop culture. I think of writing a lot like Project Runway...where they give the competitors a room full of car parts and say 'you have 2 days to make a fabulous dress out of stuff you found a a hardware store' and they do. (http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_FW86_jO7k_A/S5FBBVjB_uI/AAAAAAABkfw/JblSzgTvZxo/s1600-h/Project%2BRunway%2BSeason%2B7%2BEpisode%2B7%2BRunway%2BLook%2BMaya%2BLuz%2B1.jpg) Same thing with Nanowrimo, you can do some amazing things when you're working with the constraints you have. And when you work against your constraints you you get this (http://1.bp.blogspot.com/_FW86_jO7k_A/S5FE5lFzxoI/AAAAAAABkiA/dHeapV1HWqA/s1600-h/Project%2BRunway%2BSeason%2B7%2BEpisode%2B7%2BRunway%2BLook%2BEmilio%2BSosa%2B1.jpg).

Hang on, Roxy's demanding I play with her.
Back! she seems pacified for the moment.

Anyway, I think when you're doing something like FFAC...something that's an official tie in vs fic one of your constraints ought to be 'what does my fanbase want from this?' (And this only applies to things that are a follow up vs part of a planned whole. i.e. Star Wars Ep 1-3 is a follow up, the HP books are part of a whole) I'm pretty sure that's where Rufus, Reno and Rude come from in AC.

But I don't think a lot of thought was put into that beyond the the Turks, and...well, adding a bunch more silver haired men. And I don't think they did a bad job with the story that they decided to tell, but I'd be curious to know more about why they decided that that was the story that needed to be told. It's not as if Geostigma existed before AC. Eh, I know it's not really my place, but I wish they could have accomplished the 'you're not alone' theme with the friends he has instead of a new character and ghosts. I wish one of the self-constraints would be to make sure that everyone in the party played an active role in the story and Cloud's 'redemption' instead of being there to throw him.

So to use the Project Runway metaphor again, it's like they made something really, really cool, but still something that looks like it came from a hardware store (http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_FW86_jO7k_A/S5FAtGBbSAI/AAAAAAABkeY/LL9qKZFqYW8/s1600-h/Project%2BRunway%2BSeason%2B7%2BEpisode%2B7%2BRunway%2BLook%2BMila%2BHermanovski%2B3.jpg).

I'm an ungrateful fan, I know. XD XD

Not Fierce Enough!

[soranokumo.livejournal.com]

Okay, first, squeeeeeeeee Roxy. ♥ I'm glad she's been appeased!

And yes, I don't agree with the way Square has been working that particular release model... but I'm hoping, like I said, that they're changing it again. We'll have to see--they'd been making enough money the old way that there's little incentive for them to stop, from a "companies like making money so that's what they'll keep doing" perspective.

As for AC and its story, like I said, totally up to you whether you liked it or disliked it... not going to debate that, as my main purpose of debating anything here were the actual mechanics of the storytelling.

As for you and your fan status? Totally not ungrateful, hon. If you are, then so is anyone else who ever wrote a fanfic, which is more often a tribute of love to the series rather than done entirely out of spite. (I mean, you could say, "I got angry Rowling killed Sirius!" and write a huge epic fanfic in which Sirius doesn't die, but at its heart it would still be because you loved something of the original... so it still comes out of love for it.)

So nah, not ungrateful at all!

As for me, I enjoy it for the lovely eyecandy it is and I can appreciate all the hard work that went into it (they didn't use motion capture for any of the fight scenes, which equals instant amazing to me), but if I still write anything, unless it's meant specifically to address AC canon, I still pretty much write and pretend that the Compilation itself doesn't exist.