Writing Meta and pimpage

[winter]

First of all, two points of interest. One: guede_mazaka wrote a bijou Sin City/Constantine crossover. Go and bother her to write some more. Two: temve, quite apart from being a very good writer, makes customized Qui-Gon figures that had me in stitches. Go and marvel.

But it’s not all fun and games in Beth’s head today...


The curse of Mary Sue

Any fanfiction reader worth their salt knows the basic way to tell Mary Sues from legitimate original characters (OCs). They’re perfect and have the same – or better – powers as the main characters. They are or become best friends, relatives or romantic interests of the main characters. The story revolves around them.

The case in point: Will to Act (working title), also known as the Darth Qui-Gon fic. And the fact it now has a cast of three original characters, all of them Sith and (ex)apprentices to either Qui-Gon or Dooku, and all of them at some moments driving the story forward. One’s even female – if she weren’t African-Corellian, a manipulative bitch and asexual, I’d have no hopes of escaping the Mary Sue bashers.

The problem is that they’re all needed. Will to Act is a large-scale retelling of AOTC and follows its dual narrative structure, so Qui-Gon has to take care of Obi-Wan’s quest. Dooku’s too busy on Geonosis to go chasing after Anakin and Padmé. And if there’s no-one to interfere there, that plotline will take its AOTC shape, which will be boring. Then there’s a large plothole in the end that needs a Sith Infiltrator to plug it up. This means at least two OCs are needed, plus a third for Obi-Wan’s emotional reasons.

Beyond that, each of the OCs serves as a foil for a canon character. Ador is a counterpoint for Anakin and Padmé, the one who puts strange and dangerous thoughts in their heads. Damay lets Qui-Gon and later also Padmé shine: he asks them questions and gives them opportunities to articulate their own thoughts. Est... okay, Est is a pain in the arse, but a cute one. And he’s got a total of three scenes so far, in one of which he gets Dooku to open up, which alone is worth keeping him.

My question: is this too much? I’m not afraid of original characters, but out of an eight-strong main cast three are OCs. I’m wondering if it’s worth it to get creatively invested in something people will dismiss as weak origific or Sith Mary Sues.

(Even though the Qui-Gon|Obi-Wan|Anakin dynamic I’ve got set up is absolutely delicious. With lots of manly touching, natch. Am thinking of pawning Padmé off on Ador and pushing these three into bed together.)

Comments

[ariss-tenoh.livejournal.com]

Well, one OC is usually tolerated by readers in part because he/she presents an unknown variable element to the plot. 2 OCs is still okay because the writer will usually either pair them together or make them friends so they play off each other by presenting information to the reader that the main characters will not divulge or by contrasting each other's character. 3 OCs and you'll have readers wondering if you're trying to fill in the roles/plot with extra characters.

Can you see my point of view? OCs are something of a rare species and quite difficult to tame. Making sure they don't tear your story apart by their own hands is something of a challenge^^

Have you tried merging Est with another OC? Sometimes that works.

[winter]

I think I might be saved by the dual (or triple) plotlines here :) The OCs will rarely share screen time. I suppose I could have taken a "canon" EU dark Force-user (especially for Ador, she's a pain to characterize), but the problem is, I don't read EU.

I'm wondering whether to maybe write the first few sections, post them and see if people hate it as much as you seem to hate the very idea :S

[ariss-tenoh.livejournal.com]

I'm wondering whether to maybe write the first few sections, post them and see if people hate it as much as you seem to hate the very idea :S

"hate" is a strong word and I didn't mean to imply that I hated OCs. Perhaps I was a little too enthusiastic in my warning. It's a bad tendency of mine^^