How do I write a compelling character?

Send me a letter

*lights cigar* Just don't expect a reply..

>>8643574
heh...nothing personnel kid

>>8643574
B

>>8643570
Watch real people; consider the difference between their outward selves and inward selves, not only about what they do or say, but also how they feel about it, do they lie? are they truthful to a fault?

How do they interact with others?

Building characters in contrasting or competing sets to react off each other can be useful.

Seemingly contradicting behavior that hints towards deep reasons.
>>8643574 Exemplifies it well.

>>8643570
u could make them interesting if u give them some kind of disability, like mammary cancer?
cancer makes boring people interesting and exciting to be around

>>8644079
I rate this meme 8/10. It's somewhat funny, but lacks in subtlety.

think of yourself and write the opposite

>>8644084
sadly real people do this. im in a creative writing class now where people just make a character gay or abused or disabled or some shit because they think its some sort of characterization get out of jail free card.

>>8644095
i just made the mental exercise of figuring out this, and yes, it would be compelling. what a waste of air i am...

>>8644162
although i guess those are the people this meme spawns from. sad.

>>8643570
HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA

Make them Ezra Pound.

>>8643570
make the character want two things but they can't have both things.

>>8643570
Make them do shit. Nothing is more boring than passive characters. Contradictions are good too as are uncommon viewpoints and reasoning.

>>8644067
Most real people aren't interesting enough to be characters in media though, so I'd rather focus on famous people and other characters.

>>8644904
You will never know any of these famous figures intimately, and if you do not care to study real people in an intimate fashion then your characters will never feel real.

Basically, if you stick to that proposition you'll never write anything but children's picture books and the dumbest sort of chad thundercock adventuretard romps.

>>8644940
Due that studying real people is important, never said it isn't. One needs to get the sense of people, which helps you to interpret the information you get about celebs (preferably primary sources or at least interviews) to create something real and interesting that's not based on their PR department.

Real people are useless for actual character inspiration though, the market for books about average joe doing average things is limited for a reason. People care about chad thundercock whether irl or in media, a normal person can only compete for interest if they are surrounded by extraordinary stuff.

>>8644967
Yeah, I didn't know who JACK REACHER was until recently but there are 22 books about him being chad thundercock and being an incarnation of justice.

In my experience there are a few character types:
The 'animal'- this has to be most characters ever written. They have a simple motivation and one or two quirks that you just play over and over. What makes them interesting is that the reader can understand them, it makes them very comfortable and it works very well for genre fiction and YA. The 'animal' usually gets a few feelings that you focus on, like here's this guy he deals with fear and shame and his living situation is X. The way to make these characters the most interesting is to give them a chance to make tough decisions or react to whats going on. You give them some backstory and you don't tell the audience their full personality, the audience thinks they know who the character is but they really don't so it's a huge surprise.

Recently there was a taiwanese puppet show made in japan that had the main character not reveal his true power until the final episode, so the viewer was pleasantly tricked that he was a simple hobo type but he actually wasn't.

The 'intellectual'- There's everything wrong with this guy. He's byronic, a superfluous man, he's basically the writer masturbating about how meaningful his suffering is and you should really care because of how many complex emotions he has. Best way to deal with these guys is to shove reality in their face and watch them flounder. The Confederacy of Dunces is the best example of the type I've read, and is pretty hilarious to boot.

The 'force of nature'-Cowboys like from the movie Shane, the judge from blood meridian, anton chigur. Basically an emotions trapped in human form, you don't explain shit about them and that makes them cool.

'build your own bear'- Final type, you just keep adding this and that emotion and give little details to expand the character as you just imagine what you think that character would do. More complex than the animal, similar to the intellectual but not as stuffy, it's the most literature type of character. Making them compelling is a function of the story and the feelings you put into them. Protip: They should never be happy about something.

>>8644967
In my frank opinion modern celebrities are vapid and boring.

I'd rather read about a survivalist, criminal or guerilla commando.

>>8645134
I don't know a single book about the celeb themselves, even Justin Bieber's memoir is more about him being a kid.
Nothing more boring than fame, you have to focus on the downsides of fame to get interesting.

>>8645134
Celebrity was a stand in for every somewhat famous person, be it Trump, Al Capone, that finish sniper guy or some french guerilla in WW2. Basically real people who stand out for whatever reason (As a writer you need to find the reason and use it as inspiration). Usually big personalities or at least who did something big in their life, sometimes for interesting reasons too.

>>8645101
Sounds like a decent sum up, although I am not sure about the naming for "build your own bear" type ... although "intellectual animal" sounds even worse. I'd find all of the archetypes sans the "animal" got potential to be compelling characters; the "force of nature" one perhaps the hardest to execute in a realistic and original way.

>>8645153
>not sure about the naming for the build a bear type
How dare you. Build a Bear workshops are exactly what the writer is doing, you pick out prefabricated emotions from your memory of other people just like parts for your bear in that shop. Then you run with it, watching your frankenfuckbear character run amok.

Animals can be extremely compelling. Not in a literary sense, as I said it's your Jack Reacher, every character in Redwall, nearly every anime character, etc. They are perfect characters in a sense, and get used in literary mediums as well with the language about them being more interesting than them. I named it that way because often characters will literally be portrayed as being akin to an animal or show their instincts more for that type.

As for force of nature, that's the entire point. He's not supposed to be realistic. Anton got his arm broken at the end of No Country for Old Men for that reason. It was kind of a fuck you to his character, a 'you're not really a mythic figure, no one beat you but the world did ya bitch' kind of ending.
In 'Shane' the cowboy character literally rides off into the sunset after coming in from the sunset. He's not a real person.

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Procedural generation, then riffing on the arbitrary characteristics you have assigned your characters.
The first step is deciding how many letters are going to be in their name.

Here's a novel idea: your characters are based on the seven deadly sins. Never heard of that before.

More seriously, you could lock them in a room together, then kill off the characters that bore you, then restart with the ones that interest you. Tracks: covered.

>>8645246
>your characters are based on the seven deadly sins

Just how many stories exist like this? I can only think of two off the top of my head.

>>8645254
That's 2 too many.

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>>8645246
Danganronpa does the same thing but much, much worse. At least most Homestuck characters have a teeny tiny depth in them. DR only has like 2-3 meaningful ones.

>>8645272
Danganronpa is a creation of Japanese popular culture so you're supposed to 1. have a favourite character, 2. pick her based on whose hairdo you like the best.

>>8645272
Hussie doesn't spread his attention equally among the characters, so the grid structure recedes from view.
I think it would be better to have the grid structure in drafting and never let the audience see it, just using it as a way to force yourself to trot out ideas, and ignoring the characters you lack good ideas for.

>>8645272
All the characters are fun.
You are a horrible person.

>>8645288
That would have been good, actually. The character writing in Danganronpa is much worse in my opinion. Every character feels like a complete stock, they don't act outside their le quirky personalities. They don't feel like real people.

>>8645288
I haven't watched enough anime to pinpoint exactly what about popular Japanese media ticks me off so much. It's in Danganronpa and tons of other animes (from what I've seen), or the majority of them. There's something really obnoxious about it at all that really turns me off in getting into anime.

>>8645300
They're fun but they're not really compelling except for Komaeda, who has absolutely butchered in DR3. I feel V3 will be different, though.

>>8645303
who was*

>>8645303
>they act like stock
>they don't feel like real people
Yeah, that's the point. Anime/japanese culture in general goes back on forth on this at will but they freely like to go from stock characters to more complex characters to back to stock characters. If they don't like their specific stock character, they just add another layer to them.

It's part of the manga culture which most anime comes from. You're basically writing words to put in a character drawing, not writing a character that you then make into a drawing.

I don't blame you for not getting into it, some people like me just eat up the cliches at this point and if you don't it's hard to enjoy at all. That doesn't mean there isn't brilliant stuff there, like anything by urobutcher like Fate/Zero.

Komaeda is stock as fuck. He's just really entertaining stock.

>>8645347
It isn't Japan, it's just marketing.

A school anime has got to have short skirts and a tsundere. A fantasy book has got to have magic and dragons. The consumers love what they grew up with.

>>8645363
it's why genre fiction is genre fiction

speaking of the short skirts of schoolgirls, is it considered child pornography in the usa too or only in canada?

>>8645363
I don't understand what you're saying then. Every book has marketing, by slapping a cute animu girl on the cover for most light novels.

That's like saying 'well they want the fantasy audience because it's fantasy' well no duh, what else were they going to do? If it wasn't fantasy, they'd have to market to another demographic.
Like how they make magical girl shows for young men and little girls at the same time and sell toys to both of them.

>>8645371
If you're talking about the likes of Puella Magi Madoka Magica and Mawaru Penguindrum, those shows weren't really created for little girls. Innocent+edgy isn't a new twist but after Madoka it's been a wildly popular one. Madoka isn't selling toys for little girls, it didn't even air at a kids' TV slot but at night like Neon Genesis Evangelion.

>If it wasn't fantasy, they'd have to market to another demographic.
Then what is it that you don't understand? Neckbeards pay the most so you have to include their favourite tropes. And since they prefer cute girls to good writing, why include good writing at all if they're going to pay you anyway?

I will just remind you all that 99% of anime adaptations are trash and manga is a superior form of media.

>>8645388
I was talking about Precure, which airs during the day.
>And since they prefer cute girls to good writing, why include good writing at all if they're going to pay you anyway?

Because even neck bears like good writing and the people writing the stories are neck bears who love the troupes themselves. Otherwise we wouldn't get the Science Adventure series(chaos;head, robotic;notes, etc.) from Nitroplus. The best selling VN of all time was Fate/Stay Night, it was originally written in high school by the author who then developed it. While it's not 'good' in a traditional sense it's very entertaining as a work and does a lot of interesting things to get the player into the mind of the self insert character. It's almost a slice of life story as well as a historical magical battle story and romance.

These people are trying. Not to be technically better, but to entertain better, and to do that they need different concepts and skills than writers do so it's unfair to compare them as well.

Which is not to say Joyce doesn't beat them, but Joyce was going for literary in the first place. Japanese media writers aren't literary, the literary ones are in a different circle of japanese society from the beginning. Doesn't mean they don't try to get good.
As for madoka, it wasn't the dark aspect people liked but I shouldn't get into that this post is already too long.
>>8645397
That's just factually wrong. Anime takes a great deal of skill to execute right, if you're talking about a poor quality show you're right. Manga is harder to mess up than anime, which is why I think people have that opinion in the first place. Plus you always have one guy who gets to decide everything and the cost of production is very low.

>>8645347
>Komaeda is stock as fuck. He's just really entertaining stock.

Really? You mean in SDR2? or in DR3? It was only in DR3 he seemed stock-y, but SDR2 he seemed like a genuine psychopath.

>>8645410
You mean the part where he blew up the gym and every word out of his mouth was luck this luck that wasn't crazy enough for you?
I don't see the difference. Magical added evil extract happened only at the end of the despair arc, so I don't know what you were expecting. Him being more insane in the anime would have ruined his character they setup in DR3.

He was always a polite insane guy. That's very stock. Although japan does have a lot of fun with stock characters so you can get confused just remember if you put Komaeda anywhere he would probably do the exact same thing he always does.

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>>8645422
Personally, I don't agree. His character seems like an unintentional representation of a person whose entire personality is a biproduct of the Hope's Peak setting and the sheer stupidity of the hope/despair theme. His obsession with hope, his beliefs on talent and incredibly low self-esteem, etc. But I see where you're coming from.

I do believe he's the least stocky character at least, unless you have someone else in mind.

>>8645406
I agree and I don't see how it contradicts my statement.
99% of anime adaptations are worse than the original works.
Because apparently people who are responsible for those think that a simple presence of colors and voices is enough and you don't need to put thought into anything else.
I usually just ignore adaptations. Most of the time I try to watch them I get disappointed, even when I don't really expect anything. I get really upset over how much potential's wasted.

>>8645433
fair points
>>8645457
Which anime did a good adaptation in your mind? I'm curious, people on /a/ usually never respond to that. I can understand reading the manga and getting all excited about what they can do with the anime and be disappointed that it's not as good as you imagined.
I think a lot of the time its just the staff not caring about the work as much as fans do, One Punch Man and Mob Psycho 100 were great overadaptations of the original works and adapted manga.

>>8643570
>How do I write a compelling character?
Just write about a random guy working i a bookstore and pack him with the attitude of a donlad trump. or write a bout whatever and fill in donald trump like characters that just jack off themselves with words and false deep meaning

>>8645876
Jesus, you americans have donald trump coming out the ears.

>>8645930
you know, it´s kinda compelling.

>>8643570
Be a compelling human being

>>8643570
Just write about a publisher who gets sent shitty novels.

>>8644095
The opposite of me would just be Gordon Gekko.

>>8646015
DT is a tremendous character, folks, believe me. He's built a fantastic persona and his character's gonna get so big you're gonna get tired of character embiggening, folks, and I mean that big league. Think of it.