I’ve said this so often to so many people, fellow readers and writers both, that I can no longer remember if I previously mentioned this here or not. But it’s a thing that bears repeating, so I’m going to go ahead with it: good characters are everything.
I don’t care how well you write; I don’t care how intriguing your plot is; I don’t care how important the message you’re trying to convey is. If I don’t vibe with your main character(s), your story is going to be ‘meh’ for me at best.
Now, a “character vibe” is often subjective. One person’s obnoxious little brat is another person’s “edgy, misunderstood” hero. But in any case, what it really comes down to is realism. How real is your character? Are they more than two-dimensional? Do they have flaws as well as strengths? Can you confidently guess how they’re going to react to certain things?
My family is very fond of a British comedy series called Blackadder. In it, the title character Edmund Blackadder (played by the great Rowan Atkinson) is conniving, malicious, selfish, rude, snide, cynical, and even, at times throughout the series, a little murderous. But he is simultaneously witty and urbane, savvy, and (very occasionally) sincere. We laugh at the antics his negative traits prompt over the course of the series because his sardonic wit and sophistication provide his character with a strange kind of charm. We know what he is thinking just by a single expression because his character is made so clear to the audience through his actions and his words that we quickly reach a point where we don’t need either of those.
At a point in the series, he informs one of his companions: “I will return before you can say antidisestablishmentarianism.”
Now, we as an audience know for a fact that Blackadder thinks very little of his companions, and therefore idly tosses this challenge out there with the confidence that George will indeed attempt to say it and epically fail in the process. But when a title card with the words “Three Days Later” pops up, and poor George is still attempting to say “antidisestablishmentarianism,” those of us familiar with the series can also rightly imagine that cheeky Edmund Blackadder took his sweet time getting what he needed, knowing full well his companion would still be struggling with this challenge by the time he got back.
It is never revealed for certain that Blackadder purposely waited out three days when he otherwise could have been back within an hour or two—but we wouldn’t put it past him. Because we know him so well, and it is certainly the type of thing he would do.
Characters are great when they are real, no matter what traits—positive or negative—they possess. This is why it is a fairly standard practice for authors to have a character’s entire life story fleshed out, even if none of those details make it into the actual finished piece. A good character comes to life behind the scenes as well as they do within them, and this usually happens because a writer took the time to give them life behind the scenes.
I’ll say it once more: you can have the greatest plot in existence. You can have the most succinct, poignant moral lesson that audiences desperately need to have in their lives. But it all means squat if your characters can’t carry it.
Night Owls, tell me about your characters. What makes them unique? What makes them flawed? What makes them tick?
