Shouldn't this be divided into several levels like most of the sliding scales? That might also counteract the other issues mentioned here
Edited by YPS88
A lot of people seem to be saying their favorite things are character-driven in some sort of attempt to prove that the things they like are smart enough to sit at the grown-up's table. No. It's okay to be plot-driven, it's okay to be character-driven, it's okay to be 50/50, it's okay to be 20/80 either way... it's not okay to say you like a show and pretend it's something else. If you love it, love it for what it is, and don't be ashamed just because someone else things character-driven things are smarter. Half the people that do watch character-driven things don't get them anyway, have radically different interpretations, and just generally make a mess of things there, too, so they're not any smarter.
Okay... I'm a little confused.
It's my understanding that this Sliding Scale is about stories that have an over-arching story with smaller, character-centric stories within it. At one end of the scale you have works with more focus on the over-arching story than the characters, and at the other hand you have works that are the opposite (more focus on characters than over-arching story). Plus, there are the work that have more of a balance between the two.
Now, is this based on audience perception or the focus of the work? It would make sense for it to be based on the focus of the work, but the descriptions mention memorable vs. boring — which is more audience perception.
Anyway, my real confusion stems from the examples. Most of them just contain plot summaries that reflect how there is a larger story as well as smaller stories that relate to characters within that large story — which isn't really helpful in a sliding scale. The examples should really reflect where on the scale the works fall.
For example, "The Simpsons is powerfully notable for this." For "this"? What is "this"? Is it notable for falling on the story focus end or the character focus end? The example doesn't say. It just talks about Bart and Lisa's performance at school — which is hardly the focus of most of the stories anyway.
Most of the examples are like this, they don't reflect the scale at all! Instead we just seem to have a list of plots that have character based subplots.
Perhaps, I've just misunderstood this whole thing (and if I have I'm sorry) but I think this whole thing is in need of some clarification.
Hide / Show Replies
I get what you're saying, and I agree with you. You have to be somewhere on the scale; you can't just be an example of it.
To my understanding, examples should read like these (but with explanations):
Show X is on the plot-centric side of the scale. The focus is on the plot of each episode, and there's not much character development.
Edited by Biscuit
I agree with this, and believe that the examples should indicate where they are on the scale. Perhaps they could be separated into sections with "More characters than plot" "More plot than characters" or "Equal mix of both".
I agree with the above posts, which is why I just removed a lot of "examples" that didn't place the work on the spectrum, but rather said "[Story] has both plot and character development" and gave a laundry list of characters and subplots.
Supposing that there was a story that fell on the extreme characters end (an anti-Starfleet Magic, if you will), or a supplemental material that explained the personalities of characters but lacked an actual story and a trope page was made 4 that work, would it be a hypothetical example where the work doesn’t need a main trope page?