Over the years I've been all over the place on how to write characters. When I was young, I thought the key was to make characters explicitly flawed so that they're always tripping over those flaws. Then I thought the way to write characters was to bump them up against challenges where their strengths proved to be flaws. And for a while I thought the solution was to have them struggle with, and overcome, their flaws in new ways so it's always fresh.
These days, though, I believe dwelling on flaws is fundamentally the wrong approach. I think about the interesting people in my life, and what makes them interesting isn't the flaws, it's their unique strengths and perspectives. You don't have to make a character deliberately, explicitly flawed to give them challenges; normal human limitations will do. This doesn't mean that deliberate flaws are categorically bad, but they're not the secret answer to good storytelling.
You are right that the problem lies in focusing on "flaws" rather than simply "limitations". Old school DC Comics had it down pat; Batman, Superman, et al., weren't FLAWED; they didn't need to be to write a story where they were challenged, because they had limitations. [Okay, fine, Superman was often a bit insecure, but in general those heroes were moral psychological models.]. There were the loudly put "weakness" limitations (magic, kryptonite; fire; wood; yellow; bullets in Batman's case). But there were also clever structural limitations that writers would build into stories. For example, Superman humanizing refusal to give up being Clark Kent meant he was constantly faced with the challenge of keeping his secret identity in tact. Tossing cars around is not a challenge, but convincing people who see you weekly as both your public and secret identity that you are two different people is a HUGE challenge, one that not only cannot be SOLVED by most superpowers, but which superpowers MAKE WORSE. Just set Clark Kent on fire once and you'll know he's Superman.
It's an important life lesson to learn that your own internal flaws aren't your only problem; you can be "flawless" and still have life present difficult challenges for you to overcome and need to be ready for that.
Over the years I've been all over the place on how to write characters. When I was young, I thought the key was to make characters explicitly flawed so that they're always tripping over those flaws. Then I thought the way to write characters was to bump them up against challenges where their strengths proved to be flaws. And for a while I thought the solution was to have them struggle with, and overcome, their flaws in new ways so it's always fresh.
ReplyDeleteThese days, though, I believe dwelling on flaws is fundamentally the wrong approach. I think about the interesting people in my life, and what makes them interesting isn't the flaws, it's their unique strengths and perspectives. You don't have to make a character deliberately, explicitly flawed to give them challenges; normal human limitations will do. This doesn't mean that deliberate flaws are categorically bad, but they're not the secret answer to good storytelling.
- HJF1
You are right that the problem lies in focusing on "flaws" rather than simply "limitations". Old school DC Comics had it down pat; Batman, Superman, et al., weren't FLAWED; they didn't need to be to write a story where they were challenged, because they had limitations. [Okay, fine, Superman was often a bit insecure, but in general those heroes were moral psychological models.]. There were the loudly put "weakness" limitations (magic, kryptonite; fire; wood; yellow; bullets in Batman's case). But there were also clever structural limitations that writers would build into stories. For example, Superman humanizing refusal to give up being Clark Kent meant he was constantly faced with the challenge of keeping his secret identity in tact. Tossing cars around is not a challenge, but convincing people who see you weekly as both your public and secret identity that you are two different people is a HUGE challenge, one that not only cannot be SOLVED by most superpowers, but which superpowers MAKE WORSE. Just set Clark Kent on fire once and you'll know he's Superman.
ReplyDeleteIt's an important life lesson to learn that your own internal flaws aren't your only problem; you can be "flawless" and still have life present difficult challenges for you to overcome and need to be ready for that.
Dangit Scipio, stop saying smart things about the human condition! People will never accept you as a comic book nerd that way.
ReplyDelete- HJF1