Writing Consistent Characters
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- เผยแพร่เมื่อ 15 ธ.ค. 2019
- Inconsistent characters can ruin a book. It can frustrate the reader, blow the twist, ruin the flow, or any other number of negative reactions. Characters should react organically in every situation and have consistent characterization and arcs based on however it is you choose to write them.
But what do you do when you have characters serving the plot, rather than the other way around? I'm talking about why inconsitent characters are bad news, and the choice you have to make if you have this problem. (Spoiler: Either way, you have to edit)
Mostly this is a dicussion/hopefully an eye opener, as it's actually challenging to give specific tips for fixing this issue as the fix tends to be very book and character specific. Part of developing your editing and writing kills is to learn what character consistency means and how to create it/fix it in your specific situation.
Ultimately, it will come down to wants/needs/motivation and personality traits.
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I think it's important to mention that sometimes a character isn't consistent with itself, just like people. The most known example is people being open with family\friends, but a bit cold or shy with strangers. It's the same person, but at different situations, one may act differently and it's fine.
I think, this would still be consistent. If you establish your character to be a very serious person around strangers and a funny guy around friends, these two things can go along with each other. On the other hand, out of character would probably be if the character is a total asshole to everyone 24/7 for a long time in the story and then suddenly and without any reason they act like the sweetest person on earth.
Still, I would agree with you that sometimes people in real life are inconsistent and do things that are just very weird or untypical for them.
Imo It does feel inconsistent,but people act that way because there's a trigger,maybe its their moral,fear,insecurity,whatever, it feel inconsistent on the surface but once you established their internal and external trigger,it makes the reader go,"huh,no wonder he/she do that".
In such a case, I'd recommend having the character, or other characters around them, react to the inconsistency so it's not just ignored. If it's addressed in the book, it'll read as much more logical. Others also thought Polly acted weird. Peter sat down afterwards to consider what he'd done. Stuff like that. But if a person does something seemingly out of character, and it's not addressed, it'll more likely read as an inconsistency (I think).
I swear to god i need 300IQ to write my Plot
Nah, you just need lots of time and effort! And maybe learn from other books by reading them.
I concur with Maddox. Its not IQ, its something you can hammer at with lots of patience.
See the thing is: If someone asks me If i Like to WRITE books i say yea i Love it! And If they ask If i Like to READ books im Like nah😂
Trust me its really really really complicated
As someone who falls in love with the villains a lot, inconsistent character development is the reason why I put down so many books or get disappointed at the ending. I find that the villains usually does something out of character or a weakness is added at the last second, so the hero has a chance at winning. I've often wondered what I could do, while I start writing my own story, to keep the characters consistent and to not do the thing that I put down books/movies for. Thank you this video!
Melissa_Wale_Official
I'd rather have the hero to loose than the villain to get a random "i am allergic to lemon juice" weakness
Villians always are flawed so the hero whose also flawed or dumber or weaker can overcome them...but it usually means they make really poor
mistakes so the fan hates the villian for being written poorly
Just establish a flaw from the beginning. Just a simple flaw, nothing too big. Then make the hero figure it out from battling or stalking or something like that and use it against the villain as much as possible.
Now, I'm just warning you now, this may make the main character unlikable. Usually my goal for my stories is that the readers get to decide who they believe is right, so my main characters usually give the villains an actual reason to hate them.
My dad (who's one of my 'read through' people) actually called me out on one of these moments where I had my fiery no-nonsense character get literally smacked across the face and she just cowered. He was really indignant about it: "Lorna would NEVER do that." he was right, of course, and i was lucky enough to not have it be a major plot device. A simple fix later and it read much more consistently for her character. Having people read your stuff is so important because as writers sometimes we just get into the process and miss really obvious things!
also hello Alexa I discovered your channel yesterday and have lowkey just been devouring your videos for inspiration so thank you :3
Please do a video on how to keep the mood consistent throughout a book! 💗 As always, very informative video!
I always pretend to be the characters and think how would they react in this situatuon. And pretend to talk to each other.
One of my least favorate moments of character inconcistency. There was one episode of the Simpsons *Simprovised* where Homer had stage fright. You mean to tell me the loud mouth imupulisve alcoholic who always speaks his mind, went to outer space, has been on tv multiple times has stage fright. It dose not add up.
I always come back to rewatch these when I need a writing refresher
I have a character whose villainous reveal is breadcrumbed (for want of an actual word), and it even has him point out that two of the heroes had begun to realise something was off about him, forcing him to accelerate his plans to avoid them intervening
teased or implyed are words I would use.
Thank you for this advice. Only a few minutes in but still so helpful
Ooooh gosh I've been eagerly waiting for this subject to be tackled! Thank you!
You always manage to come directly for me x'D Thank you!
Thank you! I love your videos, they're so in depth and informative. 💗 💗 💗
Alexa! I'm so excited to watch this video. I'm always so excited to watch your videos.
A very vital reminder, I think it’s so important to put in the work to fix something rather than just let it exist knowing it could’ve been resolved. Also, would love to see some videos perhaps on the editing side, like for instance, you mentioned working with an author to help resolve their inconsistencies. Do you have advice as an editor on how best to work with or guide an author who may be resisting or outright refusing to cooperate? Of course at the end of the day it’s their book, but it’d be wonderful to hear some ideas on how best to approach a circumstance like this, since I’d like to help a friend’s novel become the best it can be (she had asked me to edit and now is very reluctant to apply anything I spent all my time on, so it’s rather unfortunate it was a waste of my time and effort - I think that’s also a great point to make to any authors out there to not seek editing or reviews if you aren’t at all intentional about receiving constructive criticism. If not, what was the point?)
Another great video as always. You have helped me out with a lot of stuff. I'm still brand new at writing, and still working on my first draft, of my first book.
This is a great reminder as I write a character twist, thanks as always! :)
This is one of the things that's so hard for me! Thank you this helped a alot.
If you need a reaction from a character that is unusual fo them or might seam out of character . . .sometimes you do not rewrite them compleatly, just find what specific criterias are needed to get the nice girl to become vicious, the snarky one to console someone . . . everyone has traits and moments that look conflicting with the rest of them, but actualy kind of make sense when you step into their mind.
Like I have a very sweet, endlessly patient, deescalating streak . . . and a vicious, impulsiv and confrontational one and it totaly depends on where and with who I am, as well as how well I am at the given moment. They are the opposites of the spectrum, but they are both very much me.
Love the vid! I have totally done this. In my manuscript, I had a sweet innocent who turned out to be a villain, but even trying to make her sympathetic, eh, it just wasnt working. So I rewrote her whole character to be a good guy and reworked what had originally been the twist of her just "secretly being a villain the whole time".
Your videos are so helpful, keep being your amazing self and happy holidays!
I think what I need to do is vomit the words out. I'm over here trying to make my vomit look pretty when the first step really is just do it and clean it up after 😂😂. There, I took the metaphor even further, some would say, too far.
I LOVE YOUR VIDEOS!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
I think that the Situation of the scene that would invoke a reaction from the character also really plays a part into the scene as well.
You also certainly need foreshadowing for things, but a few "different" reactions for some things IF the situation is right I don't really mind.
I Myself am a amateur/hobbyist writer but I do write a lot, I'm working mainly on my six-book dark fantasy series but I also write and Dungeon Master (DM) a campaign for Dungeons and dragons. According To my beta readers I'm actually pretty good with not doing inconsistent things. And I can't entirely think of many parts that would come to mind immediately. So that's good I guess.
If my novel starts from the middle of the story, should I start my synopsis from the beginning of the novel or from the beginning of the story?
beginning of novel
During the part of this video where you talked about making your antagonist consistent even before they are revealed as such, I could not help but notice that you did not seem to consider just having the antagonist be known from the start.
Thanks
How many books have you written?
How do you do foreshadowing?
I got character inconsistency feedback from a friend, and I took that and rewrote it. It was that my character was one way in my head, but on the page, it wasn't so apparent.
Yes! Nothing pulls me out of a story faster than a character acting weird Because Plot. If a socially inept character inexplicably gives a rousing speech or effortlessly gains doe-eyed admirers, the story better be a parody because I’m not buying it.
OOC happens in movies too, and it is sooooo frustrating! It always seems like I can see it in other people's work and not my own. Also frustrating.
Maybe you don't have it :)
@@sharonefee1426 That would be wonderful, wouldn't it? But I'm afraid I still have several rounds of editing to go. 😓
I SO AGREEE! WITH EVERY GACHA STORY THERE SO INCONSITANT!
I don't get far enough in my writing to have this problem but I am very worried about it.
Well, now you can be aware :)
One thing I like to do is pretend to be the characters and talk to my self and think what would they do in this situation.
Charaters are the best part of a book. I deeply value character consistency. Characters should dictate the plot rather than moving them around like chess pieces.
My go to example of a character being inconsistent is Lotor from VLD. He seems to be two different people shoved into one body. One minute he wants to protect life and hates needless slaughter. The next he commits genocide for no reason. I can’t buy for a second that the same person who saw a planet blow up would turn around and commit genocide not that long after. His motives or goals are never explained once in the story. It was revealed earlier this year that the writers intended him to be a plot twist villain, who played against the audience's perceived knowledge of ATLA, but it doesn't work due to the inconstience. Also, Celina (not bothering to spell her name right) from Throne of Glass and Kirito from SAO are also great examples of that as well. (Also, if you want examples of some of the worst villains I've seen in anime, SAO has some great examples, including one that forgot his motivation. Yes, really.)
But there's a problem, how does one delineate between character inconsistency and character growth?
Growth should be comprehensible. A character experiences someting or became aware of something and changes because of that. Often, but not always, it takes time.
Inconsistency is when a character suddenly is another person (maybe just for one scene or for forever) or does something without any personal reason.
I WRITIE SAILOR MOON AND XENA SAGA AND TALE
I get so so, almost irrationaly, pissed at inconsistantly written characters! It is the worst, I feel betrayed, I feel like hunting down the author and inact revange for it . . . . a live for a good twist, but there you need set up or connecting loose threads afterwords that make sense of it. . . . there has to be a good reason
Amari in children of virtue and vengeance 😒😒😒
I think it's a pantser problem. The Enneagram can be useful for keeping a character consistent. Keeping your eye on the Enneagram FORCES you stay consistent with characters' motivations, etc. You may need to have a secondary character who forces the event-issue and pushes the action forward. (?) :)
Anyone can write an inconsistent character, outliners included.
True, anyone can write an inconsistent character. I believe that a frame, such as the Enneagram, however, gives authors firm guidance, thus helping pansters keep away from inconsistent actions.The Enneagram can also help plotters contain plotting within what is probable for a character. Still, however, if I was going to hypothesize a situation in which inconsistent character action would take place, I would still choose a planless "pantser" author.
I went away and thought and decided I was taking my personal experience and acting as if it's World Law. I am sorry. I'm grinding through my first mystery novel and feel daily that the plotted action is my best help. Bias, hmmm ... The hopefully useful tool that I was trying to suggest was to place characters asap into a framing personality tool, e.g., Astrology, Enneagram, etc. That way you can review their personality type easily and frequently and help them stay consistent. This might make inconsistency problems bob up earlier -- and pantser or plotter it's probably good to have such things reveal themselves quickly. Thanks for the video on the subject, and your response to my comment. I am very eager to read your thriller novel.
:)
My character is going to die and I don't want them to die but I can't come up with a way to keep them alive without it coming off as plot armour/deus ex machina or ooc haha :'(
What if the character played a trick on the villian to defeat him so he screws himself over?
@@icecreamhero2375 thank you for the suggestion. That wouldn't work though, the villain is a lot smarter and the story isn't one main character vs the main villian. My character gets an injury during battle that will kill them and they take a 'steroid' type booster, that is a last resort as it ends up killing the user
@@Ni-boo Lets see you can A) take out the injury and replace it with a minor injury B) time skip and have the hero come back when he is healed C) have a side character get injured instead.
@@icecreamhero2375 A) I did think about this, my character going into this battle is driven by desperation and vengeance from previous events making them reckless thus the injury of death. B) That was my most recent attempt, but the steroid booster ends with the death of the user which is why it's a last resort. I did think about having a seperate set of characters create something that can nullify the effects of the booster but it wouldnt fit into the story and world at this moment as the story is in a setting with extremely limited resources and time. C) Side characters will be injured and killed throughout the story, a support character is killed in front of MC long before the "last" battle. Unlike the other characters, MC holds a personal grudge against the group they battle making my character more driven to fight but also giving them tunnel vision.
I have sci-fi mixed into the story that is in a postapocalyptic setting and I'm planning/planned out the history of inventions and advancements along side the need and ability of the people at the time(little over 600 years since the apocalypse and roughly 300 years before). The booster was created from a medical procedure(great in small amounts but slow, deadly in large amounts but overloads, any other amount is painful death), to turn the tides, during a time where death and injury was decimating the population more than usual.
@@Ni-boo What is the plot of the story? And what are the peoples' names and stuff.
I don't have a problem with inconsistent behavior - just with lazy writing. Just make things reasonable, give them a cause, let a character suffer emotionally from their own actions and maybe use a bit of subtle foreshadowing. Then you can let characters do almost anything. Just avoid using cliches. I hate it when characters act like evil villains in the end although they were acting normal before.
I think in reality, humans are highly incongruent in their behavior. I once heard an interview of a jewish woman who was on a train full of german national socialist soldiers when she was a kid. One of them spottet her and hid her from the rest so that she could survive. Decades later, she wanted to find him, but apparently, he was already dead and she only could find his children. When she told them the story, they could not believe it. It turns out that he was a complete asshole and they hated their father.
Isn't the inconsistency what makes the stories of life so great? Even an asshole can risk his life for someone he doesn't know.
"fanfic"
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