This is discussion archived from a time before the current discussion method was installed.
Character Development Should Have No Examples launched as Character Development: From YKTTW
Pro-Mole:
* Any example of Character Derailment.
As in that old saying: "Never generalize".
Kizor: Point of interest. Someone with keener sight than me noticed that in Avatar, as Katara goes Well Intentionist Extremist on Zuko, he stands in light and she in shadow. This Is Not A Good Thing.
Charred Knight: Man Called True, I don't care how much you believe the FMA Manga fans have made potshots against the anime, (frankly I don't see it unless you count the mentioning of the unavoidable Fridge Logic). That doesn't mean you need to start making potshots right back. I don't want to see this become a flame war.
Austin: I don't think the Supernatural example is quite accurate. Dean doesn't start lightening up in season two, he gets progressivly worse and more frustrated at the difficulties him and Sam go through. His deal with the devil is really the logical outcome of how they were building up his character.
VAD: I think the problem is that, with their oh-so-fun game of piling as much shit onto Dean as possible until he wants to break down and kill himself, fans were really hoping for this instead of It Got Worse. And it did look like he was getting better so it was just upsetting to see him in the finale - willing to commit suicide because he's nothing without Sam.
Ry Senkari: Guy who keeps deleting the Taranee example, care to elaborate why?
{{Antheia:}} Pulled The Ultimate Mega Ultra Discussion In The Main Page and put it here instead:
- Rose Tyler in Doctor Who. Over the course of her first season, she evolved from a naive shopgirl into a strong, independent, heroic young woman. In her second season, her character became petty, possessive, jealous, and needy, and she ended her tenure on the show as an emotional wreck, crying on a beach despite being surrounded by her reunited family.
- Although that last point is pretty understandable, since after watching that episode, that's how the audience probably feels too. Anyway, aside from the last scene she was pretty capable in that episode, standing up proudly to the Daleks, competently assisting the Doctor, and handling herself pretty well in Torchwood on her own. (Not that we actually see anything of her supposed fabulous job at Torchwood. Telling rather than showing didn't really help)
- Also, Rose's petty possessiveness in regards to the Doctor is limited to less than an entire episode—she gets over it quickly and becomes fast friends with her supposed "rival." And the lesson sticks, because when the Doctor falls in love with another woman in the very next episode, she's hurt, but not angry or jealous (now, leaving them to die, that's another story). She even decides very quickly, without any jealousy, that she likes Martha and Donna, her successors. Jealous, petty, and possessive? Where?
- The Satan Pit, among others. Your Mileage May Vary, considering how she swung from commanding and independent to near-suicidal in that episode alone.
- The Christmas Invasion, in which she bitched that "her" Doctor wouldn't spend the episode unconscious, and cried all the time. All the more irritating since the whole incident was her fault to begin with.
- And earlier still, in the Children in Need special, her reaction to the Doctor's regeneration was somewhat jarring considering that she'd been given ample warning. Again, Your Mileage May Vary.
- Though perhaps worst of all is The Stolen Earth, where she gets quite snotty when Martha appears on the conference call of the Doctor's helpers, whining that she was with the Doctor first. Apparently the fact that Sarah Jane Smith is also there doesn't mean squat.
Come on, people, give the girl a break — she's in love. People in love tend not to react perfectly rationally all the time.
Cliché: Placed firmly in "purgatory," a.k.a., the talk page no one seems to know exists, mostly due to contradicting many other articles which claim good character development and lacking adequate justification, thus coming off more as a bash more than anything.
- MANY of the characters in the Pokemon anime suffer from this, particularly the ones who have stayed around so long like Ash, Brock, and Team Rocket.
Whatever: Alright, I'm a little confused. If the changes are bad ones, but done intentionally as Break the Cutie type thing, does it belong here?
Rebochan: Good lord, is this just the biggest example of flamebait disguised as a trope or what? We seriously do not need this page.
Trouser Wearing Barbarian: We could use the page, but the examples are unnecessary, considering that this is an almost universal trope.
Rebochan: See, I thought maybe that was possible, but I'm not sure a Character Development page would offer much even without examples since we already know what it is and every single story in existence has it in some respect. It might be salvageable. The examples is the main problem here.
Dragon Quest Z: You just described what we call Universal Tropes. We don't cut those for being universal.
Freezair For A Limited Time: Indeed. And given that "character ends up a different person than they started the story" is pretty much a universally recognized hallmark of fiction—AKA, what we deal in—I don't think we should cut this. Like, at all.
Cliché: Not having something akin to "dynamic character" in a wiki about fiction is basically asking to fail Language and Literature forever, so this stays. However, I can see the problem Rebochan has with the examples. We don't need examples of "bad character development" and "good character development". That's what the rest of the wiki is for.
Rebochan: Fair enough on not cutting it. Really, my main objection is the examples. They're going to be highly subjective because what constitutes good and bad character development depends entirely on the reader. They have no place here. Perhaps in their place should be a few trope links that are particularly notable.
Rebochan: I put up a YTTKW vote on the examples. I firmly believe that even in a case where it should be obvious that everyone should have a voice. I also discovered to my chagrin that these YTTK Ws tend to get more notice than the discussion pages for some reason.
Rebochan: Since the decision was nearly unanimous, I'll be taking out the examples section and this page will just be a definition with a few sub-tropes used for examples instead. Thanks for the help.
Smokie: This is sickening.
Rebochan: Care to elaborate?
Smokie: Apart from me not seeing how it wwas unanimous, the examples of Character Development could still have been kept, since, well.. it's important. A trope page that lists how characters develop over the course of the story simply is a must-have. I mean come on. I can understand the point that it shouldn't be called "good" and "bad" and I don't object that, but removing the actual examples is just stupid.
Cliché: Okay, "nearly unanimous" was definitely the wrong term to use. I initially objected to the examples because they were either "look how crappy the characters in *insert show here* are!" or "Worship the grand development of the characters in *insert show here* or you have no taste!" In other words, they were simply Complaining About Shows You Dont Like disguised as a trope. Despite the fact that without the subjective labels the examples fit better, this is a general trope, and we have the more specific subtropes already covering what Character Development looks like, so adding examples here would seem redundant.
{{Rebochan}: It was nearly unanimous. There was only one person who wanted the examples to stay. When every single response was "Keep the page, kill the examples" save one, I don't think I used a bad term at all. As previously noted, defining good or bad character development is incredibly subjective, and just listing examples of "Character Development" would require listing nearly every narrative in the history of fiction because a Flat Character is an exception, not the rule. Determining even "notable" character development would lead to the same problem of trying to figure out what is and isn't notable....which would really just turn into a list of popular shows because, again, almost every piece of fiction features character development.
Ry Senkari: Can we at least get some kind of archive page up?
Fast Eddie: It is archived in Character Development Discussion
I see you list Flanderization as one example of Character Development. However, isn't it pretty safe to say Flanderization is the polar opposite to Character Development, rather than a subtrope of it?
