Characterization Marches On: The Thread

Has anybody had that happen here? The realization that as you write the character you know and love (or love to hate) at the point you're at in writing is unrecognizable or at least certainly greatly changed compared to earlier presentations in the same work?

I'm beginning to think this way about my main characters in Endless Conflict. The hero Captain Mathias Watkins has recently (as in over the last 6ish chapters) become completely different in many ways compared to his Act 1 persona. For instance presently he's a lot more hot blooded, a lot more forward acting and disciplined and a lot more knowledgeable. He asks far less questions because he knows more and has come to rely, depend and trust his longtime friend Tenchi Yamanaka (who the two of them would spar over everything in Act 1) and generally acts a lot more competent and capable than he did early in the book. Likewise Tenchi has been dropping the sparring routine and become much more of a true friend among other things.

Compared to their Act 1 presentations they've changed between night and day. Funny enough, I recently re-read Act 2 and it shows the transition in how they act. The first few seem very much like their Act 1 depictions but starting right before the "Counterattack! Two Great Armies Clash!" chapter they've begun to take on their Act 3 personas in full.

Am I alone in this? In that I've forced (or rather it developed kinda on its own) Characterization Marches On onto my work?

edited 23rd Apr '12 6:11:57 PM by MajorTom

Eeeeeeyup. I can't think of any at the moment, but I knew it has happened.

This has certainly happened to me, though only with my comics and not nearly as often as I might have expected.

Interesting thread! I've been thinking a bit about this myself.

In my latest novel, the protagonist demonstrates mild agoraphobia in the first couple of chapters (while I was still trying to figure out her character), upon which it's never referred to again. She does remain a bit of a loner, though. On a smaller note, she's said to be into model-building, which again never crops up.

Another of the protagonists seems purely heterosexual in early chapters (for example, he thinks of a handsome geeky-looking man as "a female nerd's dream"), which kind of clashes given that I later decided that he was bi.

I'm sure this has happened to me many more times, but these are the ones that stand out.

edited 24th Apr '12 1:52:41 AM by DoktorvonEurotrash

It's happened to me. It happens to a lot of people. No matter how much pre-planning you do, how much character and world building, something will happen in the midst of writing, a spark of inspiration, that will introduce new concepts, new characterizations, and even a new plot. Some people say it's the characters coming to life and dictating the story, though I like to believe it's the writer's inner instincts taking control from the brain.

I've been writing a novel a couple years back, and had a very bare bones plot. The characters were pretty generic, but that didn't matter to me because the setting and the plot were supposed to be the focus. But as I was writing the characters, they became more complex and compelling, and took the story in their own direction. I ended up scrapping my original plot altogether and just let the characters tell their story.

@ Major Tom: I'd like to say that yes, you are alone in writing your stories straightforward from start to finish and then not bothering to go back and edit them properly for character consistency. Sadly, I know that you're not actually alone there.

edited 24th Apr '12 1:47:16 PM by ALibrarianofBabel

To the point where I worry if the characters don't change as I go.

Sometimes, to the point of a total rewrite, which sometimes impacts major plot-points. Oh, well. <shrugs>

Might I ask what does this mean? If it means I should re-write the first 2/3rds of the book so that my characters never change or develop in the name of consistency I refuse. Character Development and Hidden Depths are in full effect in my series and there is quite a bit of both in just the first book.

Character Development and Characterization Marches On are different concepts, though - although admittedly the border can get fuzzy in certain cases (like Took a Level in Badass). So while it would be a case-by-case thing, there's definitely reason to go back and edit inconsistent characterization away.

I'd say that if it can be justified by what happens in the story then it's development, if not then it's inconsistency, but as the writer the prerogative to draw the line is yours.

Of course that only applies to things like novels where you can go back and change material, if it's a serial you're stuck with it and hence, Characterization Marches On.

edited 24th Apr '12 3:20:55 PM by Kesteven

Not necessarily - it depends on how far in advance you're writing. I certainly plan serial works extensively.

And considering how much time Major Tom has spent making trope pages for his military fanfic and obsessing over details like the exact size of each gun and the exact caliber of each bullet, I'm pretty sure it's planned well in advance too. Unless, of course, the actual characters were neglected in favor of details like the precise mass of each planet, but that's quite unlikely for any writer to do.

True, I meant serial in the sense that you're still working on it even after bits have been released. A lot of TV shows especially seem to start off with a very strong sense of direction and then get more and more confused as they extend beyond the arcs envisaged before production. LOST comes to mind.

Anyway I found that even in the first couple of chapters of a thing I'm working on one of the principal characters' pushy aloofness somehow morphed into outright aggression, and it worked well, but obsoleted a lot of what I'd written. Fortunately since I hadn't got very far it was easy enough to just go over what I'd done and rewrite bits here and there, and it was worth it because it brought some previously bland parts to life.

I guess that's another rule of thumb to try - if rewriting your existing work to incorporate the more developed character improves it, and you have the time, then it's probably worth doing. If not, then just call it character development and move on.

edited 24th Apr '12 4:36:16 PM by Kesteven

I have gone to extreme lengths to avoid the appearance of this, or asspulling an action, when appropriate. (I think I spent about four thousand words and every previous interaction/discussion/comment so that having one character attempt strangle another barehanded wouldn't look bizarre in In The Service.)

In general though, it's much more likely for the plot to march on than the characters for me.

This happens reasonably often enough to me. One of my characters in Midas went from an out-and-out villain (as in, a literal minion of Lucifer, irredeemably evil, etc.) to a heroic antagonist (who know longer works for the Devil), with a correspondingly drastic shift in characterization.

Characterization Marches On should only apply to continuing works. If your work is completely unreleased, then you can go back and edit so that there's more consistency throughout the story. It's different if you're releasing your work bit by bit, like fanfiction or a webcomic. Once you put up a page you can't take it down unless you betray your readers that already saw it.

After writing the outline you get a better grasp of your characters and how they will interact with the plot.

edited 25th Apr '12 9:50:46 PM by Akagikiba

That's one of the reasons why (as I said) it's probably best to have serial works written, or at least planned, in advance of what you're actually putting out.

This has happened to me from the time I started planning until now.

I had a classic Tomboy and Girly Girl duo turn into two Girl Next Door types, with the tomboy a lot more mellowed out than she originally was, and one guy who was just supposed to be quirky turn into a full blown Cloud Cuckoolander with an Ambiguous Disorder.

edited 2nd May '12 2:31:10 PM by Tidal_Wave_17

Forgotten Lore has gone through multiple revisions, with several characters changing, being removed or merged together, and new chaarcters added. Even in the final version, some characters had their chracterization change during the planning stages. Zaran's father became less of a generic evil overlord and actually gained motivation and personality outside of being evil (altough this mostly happened when I was writing the spinoff/side project so it doesn't really show in Forgotten Lore, where he makes a total of three appearances), and while Zaran's personality has remained pretty much the same since her creation, she had some traits emphasized and others downplayed.

The only true example of characterization marchin on, however, would be the character of Priest, originally a minor antagonist created to introduce a "villain" who wasn't really evil, and show that not everybody would be ok with the fact that one of the protagonists is a demon. He was originally supposed to appear in two chapters and was portrayed as a Knight Templar who believes all supernatural beings are dangerous and must be destroyed. He was also a fairly minor treath and easily defeated. At the end of his second appearance the protagonists save his ass from the mess that he's gotten himself into, and he decides they aren't all that bad and agrees to leave them alone. Originally he was supposed to vanish from the story at that point, but I decided to bring him back in a later chapter, this time helping the protagonists fight a common enemy, and made him appear more competent. I haven't written the final chapter down yet (I have most of it all planned out, but some details in the final abttle are still subject to change), but in the current version he's supposed to make another appearance in the end, and commit a Heroic Sacrifice when fighting the Big Bad.

edited 3rd May '12 12:59:16 AM by Nomic

Absolutely. I started writing a comic, and two of the main characters have changed since tyhe first strip. One, named Alfred, was originally an Adorkable Cloudcoockoolander who liked to wear silly hats, and his best friend/love interest, Brenda, was a Deadpan Snarker and a bit of a Tsundere. Then, while writing the second comic, I sort of changed their personalities. While Alfred is still retains some Cloudcoockoolander traits, he's more in tune with the rest of the world, and Brenda is a little more like me- still a Deadpan Snarker at times, but not a Tsundere; she doesn't hide the fact that she likes to be around Alfred and is genuinely happy for him when he tells her about the new friends he made. To be honest, I actually dropped her Tsundere-ness because I thought it would work better for Alfred's friend Daniel, who has a crush on his best friend, Chris, but... yeah. ^^;

edited 5th May '12 2:41:06 PM by Egghatch