The Problem of Underage Heroes

^ You can write YA without having lame ass teenage protagonists. Quite a few YA books have been written that have non-teenage protagonists.

edited 27th Oct '12 6:01:32 AM by MajorTom

But is it me or does literature about non-teenage protagonists tend to be Darker and Edgier than the ones with teenage protagonists? I mean, is it really possible to write a hero over 20 without making the story dark?

edited 27th Oct '12 6:48:34 AM by judasmartel

Yes.

Is that a Mathematician's Answer?

Okay, serious. Like what? I really don't know any show past The '90s with a 20+ hero with a non-dark story.

edited 27th Oct '12 6:55:43 AM by judasmartel

Then you are reading the wrong stories.

(And that's just one demographic. I bet there are plenty of light fantasies and science fiction or even a few cozy mysteries that aren't dark past the fact that someone died...)

edited 27th Oct '12 7:42:31 AM by chihuahua0

Cozy mysteries are definitely a genre that's not "darker and edgier" yet tend to feature older protagonists. But seriously you're just reading the wrong books.

In the book I am writing, most of the characters are young. But that is a result of medieval health and aging, being trained from youth as a holy warrior, and being trained from birth as an assassin. Thirteen is the youngest, the aforementioned assassin, and the oldest (human) is late 20s, the oldest and most experienced.

There is another improbably young guy, but they have Viking aging, and was engaged to be married. I think he is 19, 20 years old.

edited 27th Oct '12 12:16:11 PM by Ninjaxenomorph

A Redtail's Dream has a 24-year-old protagonist and could easily be converted to a children's book.

I understand that you may feel the need to write teenage characters to connect with a teenage audience, but that is when I will ask you why you're so interested in a teenage audience. But maybe that's because I don't understand why YA exists except to make money.

And honestly, it's harder to convince me that a sixteen-year-old is emotionally mature enough to handle the responsibilities that are often shoved onto a protagonist than to convince me that he/ she got his/ her mad skills through intensive training through childhood.

edited 27th Oct '12 12:25:49 PM by LeungBaiFang

@Major Tom: While not a reason I'd approve of, "pandering to the target demographic" is a reason. All I was doing was arguing against "if YA, then teenage protagonist(s)", not trying to start a full-fledged debate.

A while back I started a story titled "Fireworks Season" that had primarily teenaged protagonists because (for purposes of the story) psychic powers kick in sometime during puberty, but will kill the esper within a few years, regardless of how little they're used. So the government recruits them as quickly as they're spotted to make use of them and also to keep them from going Carrie on normals.

However, their handlers and bodyguards (one of whom was a protagonist) are in their twenties and thirties because they have actual military and/or combat training. They can't do the neat psychic stuff, but take care of realistic threats and logistical matters.

Well, this is, admittedly, a concern for one of my books, this reality that kids are not really equipped for the situations well trained adults are put into.

Especially Book 4, which centers around 4 PMC's going full Blackwater and isolating the setting from the rest of the area due to a horrible magic plague, and trying to get rid of the remaining citizens, which mostly consist of around 600 high school students and their parents and siblings, the kids being all that remain from the previously very large local high school.

The parents and other adults are a plot point, one that would spoil a huge section of the book if I shared it.

So we have desperate teenagers who know they have no future unless they join up with Matthew, who had been press ganged into leading an army regiment of the Esper Organization (think Omniscient Morality License Magic Using UN, and you have it), namely, the 317th. So, most of them decide to go through with it. Matthew himself wanted no part of it, instead wanting a quieter Guerilla campaign while secreting the other teens underground , but this would not have ended well. Shane made the choice for him.

I do have something of a solution, namely, that the process of becoming part of this army involved "Psychic Synchronization" with its current leader, and due to certain factors in Matthew's mind, this leads to them gaining some of his traits. Including elements of the darker ones.

I'd mostly like to know what else I might be able to do in order to display the problems teenagers and kids have in situations like these, and:

• How to go about showing a conflict between their old, peaceful life, and their violent life as, basically, a Super-Soldier. This book is largely about identifying problems in the Kid Hero and Teenage Hero characters. Three characters go different routes with this.
• Would these kids have leadership clashes with their designated superiors?
• What would be some innovative ways to present them trying to adjust to their situation?
• Which kids might have an easier time about it? Who would have a harder time?

edited 27th Oct '12 10:05:44 PM by NickTheSwing

And I'm offering diversity of stuff. If "If YA then TEENAGERS!" is the defining characteristic, there's a lot of otherwise very well done YA works classic or modern that need declassified from the YA genre because they don't contain teenager protagonists or casts.

edited 27th Oct '12 9:43:54 PM by MajorTom

It's not so much that I am reading the wrong books, it's rather that I haven't read the right books so far.

Since that bears no resemblance to what was actually said, what the hell are you talking about?

If pandering to teenage audiences through teenage characters/protagonists equates a work to YA then it is only the logical conclusion that "If YA then teenagers" comes in play.

That's what's going on. If we're objectively equating Young Adult literature as solely pandering to teenager audiences through teenaged characters then the statement stands and a lot of works need reclassified out of Young Adult because they do not have teenaged characters or teenage protagonists. One such example needing reclassified would be The Red Badge of Courage. There are no teenagers as you know them there, all characters are grown men.

That's not what I was saying - I meant that "pandering to your audience" is an actual reason as opposed to simply "because that's how the genre is".

"Pandering to teenagers" is the definition of YA; having teenage protagonists is just a result of that. Like how you could make a romance movie about a pair of octogenarians falling in love, but one with a pair of twenty-somethings is likely to do better.

Then it means a lot of YA works are in dire need of reclassification.

Ah Heinlein, brings the money quote. A hero is mature enough to understand "selfless service". Most cognitive psyche points to that developmental milestone occurring in the late teens if at all....

In the 60's and 70's the whole teen hero shtick came about as an expression of rebellion. Heroes do what's right. So a rebel hero...

My take is that teen heroes better be in school or be in a cartoony universe. If the child (super)heroes are getting hurt, can die, suffer pain, PTSD and other horrible things they are child soldiers.

There is nothing wrong with exploring the implications of children growing up too fast. I had a friend who was forced to raise her sister since her mother and stepdad were almost useless (she was still an optimist even though even Shinji would have wanted to giver her a hug).

It's when the creators try to have it both ways. Making children act like adults or fight adults. One of the scenes that ruined that new Witch Mountain movie was seeing the "hero" slam into a government sedan. The child alien hero just killed a bunch of feds. The rest of the movie was setting up the alien kids as Mary Sues who can do no wrong. I wanted the feds to cut them open. And I liked the first Disney movies!

If Children Are Innocent, then don't have them act like Wolverine or like horny college students. Child heroes can be done, but only if the creator is willing to put limits on the 'Verse hence the Kid Hero and Children's Show Tropes.

This is one case where real life sucks. I've had Drill SGT's ask me in if I was willing to shoot a kid (after talking to them about their time in Iraq, the answer is yes). Cops and judges deal with kids who've committed horrible crimes.

Here are some reasons most kid heroes belong in a cartoony 'verse:

• Shooting a cop will get you killed even if you're nine, not matter if you have sparkley eyes.
• If the kid heroes fail and the bridge still collapses, the bank robbers escape, or their efforts they will face legal consequences.
• What happens if they get crippled?
• What if their action/inaction creates a villain?
• Can a child (who cannot have responsibility) be a hero who's expected to be the embodiment of responsibility?

When Vader cut Luke's hand off in Empire, it was a pivot point in the film series. Until that point, Luke could be seen as the farm boy. It was confronting Vader, Calling the Old Man Out and having the maturity to reach Anikin that made him an adult. By not killing his father, he became a Jedi.

All too often underage heroes aren't allowed to grow up.

A hero with no sense of responsibly isn't a hero. A hero unable to grasp "selflessness" is a villain.

The reason kid heroes acting like adults rubs people the wrong way was nailed by Linkara's takedown of One More Day:

edited 29th Oct '12 7:19:40 AM by TairaMai

No, it doesn't. So long as it's targeted at teenage readers, it's YA. You can have a YA book without teenage protagonists, just as you can have an erotic romance movie about senior citizens; it's just gonna be a tougher sell, is all.

Basically, from what I understand of the term 'YA' is that it focuses on themes and issues that young adults (a catch-all term for teens and early-twenty-somethings) identify with. As such, the ones that face the same issues and that would most closely match the outlook and responses of a young adult would be, unsurprisingly, a young adult character.

Of course, you could use metaphors and analogies to translate between the age groups. However, the more indirect it is, the fewer amidst the target demographic it would resonate with.