Tag: writing

Counts, Part 3: Why Are We Meant To Like You, Again?

These are for whenever characters act like awful people and we’re expected to like them anyway. Comes in a few variations, including those listed in the All The Isms post.

While I’m familiar with the terms “Mary Sue” and “Marty/Gary Stu”, I will avoid using them, because they’re very subjective and rather loaded, plus they don’t give a good idea of what the problem with the character actually is. Instead, I’m going to get specific.

ABUSE AS LOVE / RAPE AS LOVE / STALKING AS LOVE – self-explanatory. When a character treats the object of their affection abominably, and we’re supposed to think this means they love them more.

EAT THE RICH – in almost everything I’ve read, a character who displays excessive consumerism and pointlessly destroys or wastes expensive things would be a villain. This is for when this behaviour is portrayed as good and desirable; connected to classism. I understand the appeal behind a fantasy of wealth and power, but there’s a point at which I just want to paste anticapitalist bumper stickers all over the writer’s monitor screen.

GET AWAY WITH MURDER – when the character acts like a brat, a criminal, or an outright monster, this is acknowledged in-story, and yet they never receive any punishment or consequences for it.

GOD MODING – when the character solves plot problems with powers they really shouldn’t reasonably have, up to and including literally punching out God (yes, I have seen this, long story).

SIN THINE ASS OFF – from Das Sporking’s Twilight dissection: “Bella will tell the whole world how bad and wrong and stupid and idiotic her actions are. For some reason, in this world, that means you can keep doing what you’re doing with impunity. So long as you acknowledge it’s bad? It’s okay!” Related to my own count “Oops, I Did It Again”.

SOAPBOXING – when the story halts so a character can deliver a long lecture on the author’s personal opinions, or worse still, when the character appears to only exist for the purpose of getting across the author’s personal opinions with no thought put into telling an actual story.

TOO STUPID TO LIVE – particularly endemic in horror, this is when a character walks right into a dangerous situation that they really, really should have seen coming. Walking down a dark alley alone when they know a serial killer is on the loose. Blackmailing a murderer without making backup copies of the evidence. Pressing the big red button. You’ll know it when you see it.

Counts, Part 2: Department of Redundancy Department

Redundancy: (noun) the state of being no longer needed or useful.

This issue can manifest in multiple ways, which can all be fixed with good editing. It’s natural for this to happen in first drafts, but if you want your work to be as good as it can be, it’s a good idea to check for these.

From the Turkey City Lexicon:

AS YOU KNOW, BOB – “A pernicious form of info-dump through dialogue, in which characters tell each other things they already know, for the sake of getting the reader up-to-speed. This very common technique is also known as “Rod and Don dialogue” (attr. Damon Knight) or “maid and butler dialogue” (attr Algis Budrys).”

COUNTERSINKING – “A form of expositional redundancy in which the action clearly implied in dialogue is made explicit. “‘Let’s get out of here,’ he said, urging her to leave.””

From How Not To Write A Novel:

THE CLONE ENTOURAGE – “If the protagonist is going to have more than one friend, they should serve more than one purpose and have more than one personality. Most crucially, they must be distinguishable by more than the names that have been assigned to them. Generally, if they can be collectively referred to as ‘the guys’, ‘the gals’, or ‘the gang’ with no harm to the plot, there doesn’t need to be more than one of them.”

THE SECOND ARGUMENT IN THE LAUNDROMAT – “NEVER use two scenes to establish the same thing. We do not, under any circumstances, want a series of scenes in which the character goes to job interviews but fails to get the job, or has a string of unsuccessful dates to illustrate bad luck in love.”

THE REDUNDANT TAUTOLOGY – “If you have made a point in one way, resist the temptation to reinforce it by making it again. Do not reexpress it in more flowery terms, and do not have the character reaffirm it in dialogue[…] This point is worth repeating: don’t reiterate.”

THE SKIPPING RECORD – “Give us the thought once. We will assume that the character’s opinion remains the same until you tell us otherwise.”

And one of my own:

OOPS, I DID IT AGAIN – the character suffers negative consequences from a choice, demonstrates that they know they should have learned a lesson from this, possibly explains in detail how they should change their behaviour after it, and proceeds to do the exact same thing again. Overlaps with “Too Stupid To Live”, which I’ll discuss in a later post.