"Twelve-Times-A-Day Man? You can't just start making up terrible new characters!"
Mary Sue is perfect. The hero of the story pales into insignificance beside her... or would, if he wasn't crazy in love with her. The villain can harm her (perhaps) but will
never break her magnificent spirit - and even if she
needs rescuing occasionally (got to give the hero something to do), she will in the end save the day.
All of her
friends are colorful. Or, alternately, they may be the palest of shadows next to the glow of her magnificence. She speaks at least seven languages and
can communicate with small woodland creatures. She knows all about quantum physics. She has an excellent singing voice and plays at least one instrument -- probably guitar, violin, or flute, even in worlds where these instruments do not exist. She becomes, without effort, a
world-class expert at anything she puts her hand to. In fanfic she is often better than the
canon hero in the hero's field of expertise -- even, or perhaps especially, if he is
canonically described as being the world's best.
She will lecture
canon heroes and
canon villains on how to overcome their flaws, and can singlehandedly convert an
Evil Overlord to the side of light simply by the power of her Goodness. (Alternatively, she's the
Evil Overlord's rebellious daughter, even if there is no logical way for the villain to ever have fathered a daughter.) She can act snottily towards an established powerful
canon character and get away with it; worse, everyone will love her even more for her "
spunkiness".
She travels in a cloud of free-floating adjectives and purple prose. Where anyone else might simply raise her hands to her face, Mary Sue raises her slender, delicate, yet work-hardened hands to her exquisite heart-shaped face. She has long flowing hair and large eyes,
both in colors that are
not generally found in nature. (Purple is a favorite. For both. Or eyes that magically change color depending on her emotional state, like a mood ring.)
She dies tragically or
heroically so everyone can mourn her and say how amazing she was. And all too often, she
comes back to life afterwards, conveniently raised from the dead by a
mystical pendant or some other plot device. And everyone rejoices.
As a character type, Mary Sue has been around for as long as there's been fiction. However, the name is more recent, coming out of the early history of
Star Trek fanfiction -- she was the central character of
"A Trekkie's Tale"
, a
parody of such stories written by Paula Smith and published in the fanzine
Menagerie #2 in 1973. However, because
the parody was so dead-on, the name stuck and became the general term for the improbably perfect character.
Some definitions say that Mary Sue must be a
stand-in for the author, but as the term has moved from fanfiction into broader usage, Mary Sue has become a description of the character type rather than the writer's issues. Since most fictional characters tend to include at least an element of the author's personality in them, a character that reflects the author isn't necessarily a Mary Sue - however, if the character both (a) is very obviously a thinly-veiled stand-in for the author and (b) is highly idealized and perfect to a fault, then you can be fairly sure you're in Mary Sue territory.
Important note: While phantasmagorical eye color and a plethora of talents and abilities tend to indicate a Mary Sue, a character is not one simply by possessing said traits; however, with the astronomical number of Mary Sues that exist in all fandoms, it is undoubtedly the easiest way to do so. The final determinant of Mary Sue rests not in the fact that she possesses certain qualities, but rather, that the author relies on the qualities to make the character look attractive to the audience and, in short, invoke cheap
Character Development.
Sometimes, she is male, and goes by the name
Marty Stu (alternately Gary Stu or Marty Sam). Not everybody bothers with that distinction, though. Far and away more frequently the character type is called a Mary Sue without regard to gender.
Wesley Crusher from
Star Trek The Next Generation started out as an example of a
Marty Stu.
Magical Girlfriends, while very similar, are technically not Mary Sues, as they reflect more on the type of character one wants to be
with rather than who one wants to
be.
Some fans feel unintentional
Canonical Mary Sues on television -- especially in some animated series featuring a Strong Female Character™ -- are creative backlash against the stereotypically bland and ineffectual female characters of decades before -- a case of good intentions gone astray. If she's the result of a poorly-written attempt at a modern, realistic heroine, she may be a
Faux Action Girl.
As
Wesley proves, a
Mary Sue of either gender can easily fall into
The Scrappy.
The Mary Sue's worst enemy would be the
Fatal Flaw, which would be the antithesis for this trope. However, when people misunderstand what that really means, they end up with
Suetiful All Along.
See
Canon Sue for
Mary Sue in canonical works.
Examples:
- A parody of this character trope appears in the Frasier episode "The Show Where Diane Comes Back"; Diane Chambers has written an extremely self-indulgent play (based heavily on her experiences in Cheers) featuring a waitress character called 'Mary-Anne' clearly based on her -- who, surprise surprise, is loved and adored by all the male characters, is the smartest person in the bar and who is so wonderful that her ex-fiance "Franklin" doesn't mind that she left him at the altar for another man. Needless to say, upon seeing the play Frasier -- upon whom Franklin is based, right down to the incident at the altar -- has some criticisms to raise.
- Animorphs fanfic is fraught with ultrapowerful long-lost siblings of Ax or Tobias. Count on the team, whose need for absolute secrecy is a major point in nearly all of the books, to trust them completely in under two paragraphs.
- There are roughly 18 trillion Naruto fanfics that revolve around either A) Naruto having long lost family, or B) Some incredibly powerful ninja coming out of the woodwork to train him. The only variation is whether this new character is the Mary Sue, or they godmode Naruto so much that they turn him into Marty Stu.
- The Girl Genius webcomic has an Affectionate Parody called Fan Fiction that mines all the Mary Sue tropes including eyes that change color, and Mary coming back from the dead.
- This Harry Potter fan comic famously parodies the Mary Sue trope as well as introducing the nickname of "House Sparklypoo" for such characters.
- Dagny Taggart from Atlas Shrugged is a somewhat scary example of the fully grown Mary Sue in a serious, influential piece of work. She is and has everything Ayn Rand could ever hope for, a total personification of her values -- she's a brilliant though underestimated businesswoman, more beautiful than anyone else in the room without even trying, to the point that even the simplest of dresses seems 'indecent' on her. She is the hingepin of all the important changes in the world, the last and most important part of the puzzle, the one everyone wishes they could reach, the one everyone looks to. She has multiple lovers, moving on from one to the next without any warning or explanation given -- or needed, apparently, as each of these lovers peacefully acknowledges the others without the slightest surprise or jealousy, with the impression given that they're going to quietly bear never-again-requited candles for her indefinitely.
- Amazingly, an infamous Mary Sue from the Star Trek setting hasn't been listed: Stephen Ratliff's prized Marissa Amber Flores Picard. She started her career in Enterprized, taking command of the Enterprise ... at 11 years old. During the series she ends up carving embarrassing defeat messages on Cardassian warships, inflicting The Worf Effect on Worf, rewriting Starfleet regulations, and getting adopted by the Captain (hence the name). This series turned into a popular MST target ... to the point where Ratliff himself started joining the MS Ters.
- What's so amazing about her not being remembered until now? Doesn't every reader of those fanfics pray for the sweet, sweet tingle of neuralyzation?
- Of course, it bears mentioning that her actual appearance in the show (Season 5 episode "Disaster") was as a painfully shy kid who gained some confidence through her experiences. Somehow, in transition to fanfiction, the effects became amplified...
- Actually, this troper even enjoyed the un-MS Ted version, under the So Bad Its Good category. Of course, this troper isn't really a Trekkie...
- Princess Aara, the goddess main character from the anime Mega Crossover Fan Fic series Otherworld, is pretty much a classic example. Aara's job is to protect several dimensions from evil demons by turning a bunch of good demons and half-demons into her love slaves... in a series that is passed off as a continuation of Rurouni Kenshin. There is also a lot of Intimate Healing and one mind-boggling scene where Aara painlessly gives birth to the Cain And Abel twin daughters of Vash from Trigun through an orb of light, amongst other things.
- Rei: A New Kind of Princess is an incredible example of this in Avatar fanfiction. A popular MST target, it is still unclear whether this is just that bad or a satire. You decide.
- Thomas The Tank Engine example: Fan character ''Iolite'', who was a human (named Elizabeth Truit, after her creator), died an untimely death and was reincarnated because of it, and was assigned the job of "Guardian of the Island of Sodor". She can switch between human and engine forms, has angel wings in both, can fly, has romantic affairs with Oliver and Douglas, and has powers beyond those possessed by Lady (the Island's canon guardian angel).
- Ebony Dark'ness Dementia Raven Way, the "goffik" girl from the infamous Harry Potter fanfic ''My Immortal''. Even though most people, including (supposedly) the story's own author, consider it to be a trollfic, people still flock to it to tell the author how much it sucks whenever someone posts a link to it.
- The fic is so well known that it has even spawned a few weak imitators.
- Since she has been spotted on IMDB and other sites well before she wrote her fic, she is not a troll. Not to mention her friend Raven is like her, minus the troll aspects.
- The jury is out on DJ Croft from the infamous Neon Exodus Evangelion. Is he a Deconstruction and subversion of the Marty Stu archetype? Is he a straightforward example with a few laughably poor attempts at deconstruction and subverting it? Or is the story so dotted with pacing problems and poor dialogue that matters of subversion and deconstruction don't matter? You make the call.
- Homestar Runner sends up the Mary Sue concept (along with many fan fiction tropes) in the Strong Bad Email fan club where Strong Sad inserts himself into a "SBEmail fan fic" as Twelve-Times-A-Day Man.
- Weiss Kreuz fanfic is absolutely rife with new, female members being inserted into the series's four-man team of Hit Men With Hearts, or Distressed Damsels being taken in by them. As with the Animorphs example above, expect Weiss's secrecy to be cheerfully discarded within about two paragraphs, in spite of the fact that their work as assassins gets every single comparable female character in canon either killed or given the Its Not You Its My Enemies treatment.
- Parodied (sort of) in Johnny Test, where the titular hero has Teen Genius twin sisters named "Mary" and "Susan", who are uber-competent inventors, capable of building physics-defying machines in hours, and are both in love with the same guy.
- How in the world did Jenna Silverblade of The Legend Of Zelda: Ocarina of Time fame not get mentioned yet? Her hilariously sprawling "epic" My Inner Life has Link reduced to fighting like a pansy compared to his Sue-wife's powers, multiple births, every canon female in the OoT universe submitting themselves to the fact that Link is hers now, and more bad sex scenes than you can shake a stick at. Needless to say, it still remains a popular MST target.
- And accordingly, the author has placed a long rant—much of it in capital letters—in front of the story, reviling anyone who dares criticize her work or call Jenna a Mary Sue. (Ironically enough, she accuses detractors of being "childish" and "immature.")
- Sailor Universe/Princess Sakura, from the fanart of Ashleigh Brett, a very very popular target for trolls. Universe is essentially just a Pluto recolour, but is more powerful than all the other Sailor Scouts put together, hence the name.
- Chihuatlan (NSFW), the Jenna Silverblade of the Gargoyles fan world, deserves mention: Her Sparklypoo credentials include being a dragon princess blessed with the gift of shapeshifting, a healing touch, and hair like "multicolored shades of brown silk." She struts onto the scene and immediately lays claim on Brooklyn—who is only to be the first member of her orientation-bending harem—and is adored by everyone except Angela, who quickly deteriorates into a spoiled, jealous, power-hungry brat.
- As soon as Teen Titans aired on Cartoon Network, a tide of preteen girls suddenly appeared on the scene of DCU fanfiction. The eventual outcome was a swarm of fanfiction that introduced Darker And Edgier characters who joined the Titans within a paragraph of being introduced and always came with a Wangsty past. For some reason, they are always named Shadow.
- It became such a problem that a Mary Sue Test was even created on fanfiction.net. The genre is aptly listed as "Tragedy/Horror".
- The Mary Sue is such a pervasive character type that an online writer's resource has been created - The Mary Sue Generator! Randomly create a Mary Sue, and watch the fluff accumulate!
- Go to a Doctor Who fanfiction archive and open up a story which features an author-created companion to the Doctor. Nine times out of town, his/her name might as well be Mary Sue.
- The character who appears to be the Doctor's daughter in "The Doctor's Daughter" was declared to be a Mary Sue by someone within minutes of the On The Next trailer.
- An awful lot of female!Revan fiction is written as Self Insert Fic in the Mary Sue mould. Given a certain fact about Revan this isn't entirely surprising. The trend is adeptly skewered in this fic.
