What do you find is the biggest single problem with fanfics?

[Zekurom]

There are many common problems with lots of fanfics, a lot of which have become tropes, such as the Mary Sue (which I still refuse to acknowledge), flat storylines, et cetera.

Personally, I feel that a single problem trumps any other major problem by a mile. This problem is a problem that I term "skipping".

In a nutshell, this problem is a lack of detailed description of events, making a story seem more like a summary. Almost any fic that I determined to be "boring" or "badly written" was a fic with this problem, or tried to correct this problem by inserting in a lot of unnecessary details, which simply makes the story seem like it's jerking from one place to the next while moving at the same speed as a slow but smoothly flowing fic should. (If you've ever tried speeding up a video 3x and then slowing the sped-up video back down, you'll know what I mean. The story seems choppy and turbulent.) Hell, my own fics had this problem at first.

But I realize that other people may have differing opinions. What do you feel is the biggest problem in fanfics, if at all there is one?

 

[Caitlin]

One of the biggest problems I have with fanfiction in general (which I guess is blaming the authors, but it still applies to the works themselves) is that they almost never stray from norms and precedents set by the media they're trying to imitate. The usually offer nothing new for an average fan of the franchise, sticking to the same old characters, the same old locations, the same old stories and even the same old character-to-character relationships.

There are a lot of good fictional works out there with unique and original characters, settings and plots but they're always overshadowed by what I mentioned above. I should stop myself before this turns into a rant against the readers next.

 

[Phoenix502]

One of the biggest problems I have with fanfiction in general (which I guess is blaming the authors, but it still applies to the works themselves) is that they almost never stray from norms and precedents set by the media they're trying to imitate. The usually offer nothing new for an average fan of the franchise, sticking to the same old characters, the same old locations, the same old stories and even the same old character-to-character relationships.

There are a lot of good fictional works out there with unique and original characters, settings and plots but they're always overshadowed by what I mentioned above. I should stop myself before this turns into a rant against the readers next.

I... can really understand why... it's usually the more notable stories that aren't quite the "My character in place of the player person" variety. I haven't exactly read any of the stories here, but many stories I've come acrossed on FF.net tend to fall under either of the previously mentioned idea... or perhaps with the "Pokemorph hybrid characters with a simple hollywood outline" and...err, over-the-top sort of stuff to process.

as for problems, on the few times I actually go out to read fanfiction, one I come across is in the battle scenes. in other Pokemon media (the anime and Special will be my examples), you often have plenty of details placed into a battle that will make it seem at LEAST somewhat reasonable for an action sequence. in the few stories I've read, most of a battle is person A shouts a command, and one of four things happen:

1) Pokemon responds and the Attack hits.
2) Pokemon responds, but attack misses.
3) Pokemon doesn't respond in time and something interrupts it, like getting hit by an opponent's attack.
4) Opposing Pokemon gets knocked out.

it's a simple thing between person A and his/her opponent, and not a whole lot of detail is put into it... the only thing missing that would make it close to exactly like the battles in the games is how much damage is dealt.

someone asked me on FF.net to read through his story and give constructive feedback... the first thing I said in the review was that "the story felt more like a script to something, you aught to rewrite each chapter with a little more detail." unfortunately, "a little more detail" is an understatement now that I think about it.

 

[Drakon]

One of the biggest problems I find is when battle scenes are glossed over.

 

[zakisrage]

I personally think fangirl wank is the worst. You know, the kind written by 12-year-old fangirls whose lives revolve around yaoi, make songfics with One Direction/Justin Bieber/Taylor Swift songs, and high school AUs. Every major fandom gets some.

I heard from a user I met on FF.net that he is tired of slash fiction. I think that a little is fine, but when it dominates a fanfiction type it gets bad. Because this is a male fanfic writer we're talking about, I can see why. You might remember when there was Legolas/Aragorn slash fiction everywhere because of LOTR's popularity.

There is a website called the PPC Wiki. They list a lot of common charges for bad fanfic writing in their charges category. Other than the obvious Mary Sue, the charges include Cute Animal Friend (a cute or fantastic critter accompanying a Mary Sue to emphasize her/his Sueness), Tenth Walker (a fanfic where a fan inserts an OC or themself in a Fellowship of the Ring fanfic), male pregnancy, out of character, complete disregard of canon, and many more.

One of the most notorious badly-written fanfiction is "Celebrian", a LOTR fanfic about Elrond's wife. In it, she serves at the Orcs' prostitute and eats ice cream that makes her weirdly coloured privates grow. Read it to believe it - it is one of the most disgusting things ever written.

 

[Fengor]

There are many common problems with lots of fanfics, a lot of which have become tropes, such as the Mary Sue (which I still refuse to acknowledge), flat storylines, et cetera.

Personally, I feel that a single problem trumps any other major problem by a mile. This problem is a problem that I term "skipping".

In a nutshell, this problem is a lack of detailed description of events, making a story seem more like a summary. Almost any fic that I determined to be "boring" or "badly written" was a fic with this problem, or tried to correct this problem by inserting in a lot of unnecessary details, which simply makes the story seem like it's jerking from one place to the next while moving at the same speed as a slow but smoothly flowing fic should. (If you've ever tried speeding up a video 3x and then slowing the sped-up video back down, you'll know what I mean. The story seems choppy and turbulent.) Hell, my own fics had this problem at first.

I'm inclined to agree, but what do you consider unnecessary details? I ask because this seems to be a perception of pacing that varies from story to story and person to person. Pacing is a very vague and frustrating phrase for me when it comes to writing. Everyone seems to know what makes for good pacing but me, and that fine line between too much and too little detail seems to be the root of my problem.

 

[zakisrage]

In the topic of "fangirl wank": when it comes to Pokemon, they are almost always written for the anime. But since Black and White, due to N's popularity they are appearing for game-based fanfics too. It typically involves hurt/comfort between a male and female character (the female character ALWAYS being one of Ash's traveling partners or sometimes a female game protagonist; NEVER anyone else) or two male characters (because yaoi is everywhere). Which brings me to my next rant...

What I hate is the belief that two male characters who are close friends apparently MUST be gay. I am close with a lot of my male friends and I am not sexually attracted to any of them. But to fangirls, because Morty and Eusine (for example) are such good friends, they have to be a couple because they are friends. Let the fangirls know that bishonen male characters are not confined to yaoi.

And people never want to create OCs unless it's a Replacement Sue for the player character or a Pokemorph. OCs are fun. You get to be creative with them and do anything you want with them! What's so bad about using an original character? You can go your own way with things. (Just don't take it too far, otherwise the Mary Sue police will hunt you down.)

I refuse to read any Pokemorph fanfics because they are all the same. And the Pokemorphs have a tendency to be from the Eevee family - or another Pokemon that looks like a cute mammal. Or rarely it will be a fanservice Pokemon like Gardevoir. Ever notice there are pretty much no Pokemorphs of Venomoth, Camerupt, Skuntank, Mamoswine, or Bisharp? It's because this comes into play: What Measure Is a Non-Cute? - Television Tropes & Idioms

Yep, in fanfics cute Pokemon are designated heroes, while ugly ones are usually marked "evil". If they're Poison or Dark, it's pretty much automatic (Absol and Umbreon are exceptions). Wouldn't it be refreshing to see a heroic Grimer or a selfish Minccino in a fanfic?

 

[Master Cyrus]

My biggest single complaint is bad grammar and formatting.

 

[Caitlin]

And people never want to create OCs unless it's a Replacement Sue for the player character or a Pokemorph. OCs are fun. You get to be creative with them and do anything you want with them! What's so bad about using an original character? You can go your own way with things. (Just don't take it too far, otherwise the Mary Sue police will hunt you down.)

I think the issue is that most people, both authors and readers alike, are afraid to leave their comfort zone. It's kind of devastating to people like me who pour so much effort into crafting original and well though out characters to see them fall flat and largely ignored compared to official characters which are often poorly handled (IE, they don't act in character or ignore facts that have already been established about the character.)

Yep, in fanfics cute Pokemon are designated heroes, while ugly ones are usually marked "evil". If they're Poison or Dark, it's pretty much automatic (Absol and Umbreon are exceptions). Wouldn't it be refreshing to see a heroic Grimer or a selfish Minccino in a fanfic?

Just wait. I do have plans for a Mightyena in my own fanfic Granted he's kinda cute and furry, but not as much as say, Pikachu or Cyndaquil.

 

[Legacy]

For me personally, I agree with Zekurom. I have trouble with flow and time skipping and all that. I'd like to improve on that.

I think for fics in general, my biggest pet peeve is fics that use canon characters and totally ruin or miss the essence of that character. I see this in a lot of HP fics, where the author makes Ron evil or something. It really distracts me from reading.

 

[Phoenix502]

For me personally, I agree with Zekurom. I have trouble with flow and time skipping and all that. I'd like to improve on that.

I think for fics in general, my biggest pet peeve is fics that use canon characters and totally ruin or miss the essence of that character. I see this in a lot of HP fics, where the author makes Ron evil or something. It really distracts me from reading.

it named this trope for a reason after all.

meanwhile, I've personally had the habit of reading a few books and perhaps now and then take note of how they're written. as a result of my reading the entire series of "the Dresden Files" (which stars a genre savvy wizard who loves referencing Star Wars), my still-being-cleaned-up-of-formatting-problems story is written in first person, with an equally genre savvy and even TV/Movie buff Trainer (who is depicted as my avatar as of this post).

 

[Dorothy LaRouge]

Cut-and-paste journey fics are the worst kind of Pokemon fic, to me. By cut-and-paste I mean fics that follow a formula of Trainer gets starter (often a "special" starter like Eevee or Pikachu), then travels from town to town getting badges with very little plot in between. I fell victim to some of these cliches myself when I was writing a journey fic, but I also tried to avoid others by doing things such as giving my protagonist a "plain" starter (a Bulbasaur), and creating an overarching plot.

I suppose the biggest problem with fanfiction in my opinion is lack of originality. Don't be afraid to be bold and do new things with the franchise you're using! Think outside the box and take chances! You might just end up with a hit.

 

[Zekurom]

I'm inclined to agree, but what do you consider unnecessary details? I ask because this seems to be a perception of pacing that varies from story to story and person to person. Pacing is a very vague and frustrating phrase for me when it comes to writing. Everyone seems to know what makes for good pacing but me, and that fine line between too much and too little detail seems to be the root of my problem.

It's really hard to answer that question impersonally, because first it's a relatively preferential thing, and secondly, it's somewhat of a "you know it when you see it" thing.

But one example that actually is clear cut is this: an endless narrative exposition of the main character's looks. This just screams "the writer is trying to shove all these details in in order to make it look like he's fleshing a character out". It doesn't flesh your character out, it crams him back in!

Cut-and-paste journey fics are the worst kind of Pokemon fic, to me. By cut-and-paste I mean fics that follow a formula of Trainer gets starter (often a "special" starter like Eevee or Pikachu), then travels from town to town getting badges with very little plot in between. I fell victim to some of these cliches myself when I was writing a journey fic, but I also tried to avoid others by doing things such as giving my protagonist a "plain" starter (a Bulbasaur), and creating an overarching plot.

Heheh. Back when I was writing that sort of fic, I had all the plot in between but no badges. Still turned out pretty badly now that I look back at it because I was inexperienced.

I think for fics in general, my biggest pet peeve is fics that use canon characters and totally ruin or miss the essence of that character. I see this in a lot of HP fics, where the author makes Ron evil or something. It really distracts me from reading.

Canon characters do not have to act canon in a fanfic. It may not be your cup of tea, but for somebody like me, I very much like reading about (and writing) alternate interpretations of "canon" characters, even ones that make the character out to be completely the opposite of what he is in canon. I mean, what fun is fanfic if you don't play around with things? It may just be my creative fandom tendencies, but it's my opinion that things are only sacred to consumer fandom.

And people never want to create OCs unless it's a Replacement Sue for the player character or a Pokemorph. OCs are fun. You get to be creative with them and do anything you want with them! What's so bad about using an original character? You can go your own way with things. (Just don't take it too far, otherwise the Mary Sue police will hunt you down.)

First, what's so bad about interpreting an official character as if they were an OC? Do you think it disrespects the original work? Are certain things off-limits just because they're "canon" and "oh no, we can't have the characters acting inconsistently in a work that's not even in continuity with the original work!"

Secondly, what do you mean by "taking it too far"? Making it too original? Is that even possible? Also, what are these "Mary Sue Police"? Do they actually have any authority?

(Excuse me if I sound too blunt or harsh. I get really excited when talking about stuff like this.)

 

[Caitlin]

First, what's so bad about interpreting an official character as if they were an OC? Do you think it disrespects the original work? Are certain things off-limits just because they're "canon" and "oh no, we can't have the characters acting inconsistently in a work that's not even in continuity with the original work!"

I've always viewed it as making your own original character, then naming him "Ash" so that the author can ride on the coattails of success, even if the character is nowhere near how Ash acts in other works. It bugs me when I see that, as so much potential feels like it's wasted, especially if the character is much more well rounded and likable than the character they're leeching off of.

And on another note, "Mary Sue Police" don't have any authority, but they have a dangerous power. They are relentlessly critical of every single nitpick they find, and when that harsh and needlessly negative criticism reaches the author, they more often than not are devastated and quit. That's why I see a lot of people (and myself as well) walking the fine line of making a believable character who has faults and weaknesses as well as strengths. That way the "Mary Sue Police" can't unleash their fangs and destroy the motivation of the author.

 

[Legacy]

First, what's so bad about interpreting an official character as if they were an OC? Do you think it disrespects the original work? Are certain things off-limits just because they're "canon" and "oh no, we can't have the characters acting inconsistently in a work that's not even in continuity with the original work!"

You are right. There's nothing "wrong" per se about it, but what's the point exactly? Like Caitlin said, if you are creating essentially an entirely new character in terms of personality, tendencies, etc., why does the author need to make him/her a "canon" character when for all intents and purposes, he/she is a new character just with a familiar name?

BTW, I'm not talking about fics where Ash, for example, is 17 years old in a fic and aged significantly since his "canon" self. Obviously, there is more room for artistic liberties in that sort of situation.

I just find it distracting to read a story that is supposed to be canon where the familiar canon characters are essentially OCs in disguise.

You are right though, Zek, it's just my opinion, and there is no "right/wrong" way.

 

[Zekurom]

I've always viewed it as making your own original character, then naming him "Ash" so that the author can ride on the coattails of success, even if the character is nowhere near how Ash acts in other works. It bugs me when I see that, as so much potential feels like it's wasted, especially if the character is much more well rounded and likable than the character they're leeching off of.

I suppose you could be annoyed at that. But often people don't have that in mind when writing these "OC replacements". Often they believe that they're improving the character, or creating a "new version" of them. (And from what I've seen on my journeys elsewhere, Ash isn't all that likeable in most places. People see his character as corny and stupid. But I understand that this applies to other characters as well.)

And on another note, "Mary Sue Police" don't have any authority, but they have a dangerous power. They are relentlessly critical of every single nitpick they find, and when that harsh and needlessly negative criticism reaches the author, they more often than not are devastated and quit.

If they have no authority, they have only as much power as you give them. The problem there is only that a new writer does not know what to expect, and is easily hurt by the Mary Sue Police's criticisms. This is, of course, not the new writer's fault, because she does not know the environment that she is getting into.

That's why I see a lot of people (and myself as well) walking the fine line of making a believable character who has faults and weaknesses as well as strengths. That way the "Mary Sue Police" can't unleash their fangs and destroy the motivation of the author.

Well, that's exactly what they want you to do - make those "believable characters" that don't go very far out and strike nerves anywhere. Such characters are their (and perhaps your) perception of a "good character". But if you do it only to avoid the Mary Sue Police, you're letting them control your writing and your perception of a "well-balanced character".

The problem here is, a new writer will almost never know what kind of fine line that is to walk. And for good reason too - that fine line is an imaginary construct, which becomes ingrained only when drilled into a newbie's head by disgruntled veterans.

If this is your main reason for "writing good, well-balanced characters", and the Mary Sue Police are the main way to guide people to write as such, then my advice to you is to completely flout their advice. You know the rules, now you can break them. Break them to your heart's content! Write with complete abandon and disregard for those self-styled "authorities on good writing" and show them just how "bad" you can make a character! Then go back and find your own motivation for writing those "good" characters. Often a metal sheet must be bent the other way before it can be straightened.

You are right. There's nothing "wrong" per se about it, but what's the point exactly? Like Caitlin said, if you are creating essentially an entirely new character in terms of personality, tendencies, etc., why does the author need to make him/her a "canon" character when for all intents and purposes, he/she is a new character just with a familiar name?

There is no point - the author just decided to do it. Is there any point in not doing so? Suppose the author just decided to say, "what if" this character was like that?

You could, of course, respond, "but it's not". But responding "but it's not" to "what if" is sacrificing creativity for faithfulness, which I'd argue should never be done without a more practical reason.

BTW, I'm not talking about fics where Ash, for example, is 17 years old in a fic and aged significantly since his "canon" self. Obviously, there is more room for artistic liberties in that sort of situation.

Neither am I, although Ash being 17 years old is one of the "liberties" you could take that people might be opposed to.

I just find it distracting to read a story that is supposed to be canon where the familiar canon characters are essentially OCs in disguise.

Personally, I don't find that distracting; what I find distracting is the total lack of detail in most stories.

You are right though, Zek, it's just my opinion, and there is no "right/wrong" way.

There is a way that feels "right" and "wrong" to everybody; it is when people disagree to disagree that problems arise.

I think the issue is that most people, both authors and readers alike, are afraid to leave their comfort zone. It's kind of devastating to people like me who pour so much effort into crafting original and well though out characters to see them fall flat and largely ignored compared to official characters which are often poorly handled (IE, they don't act in character or ignore facts that have already been established about the character.)

Unfortunately, most people care only about the "canon" characters and what they get into. Often their line of reasoning is that without using canon characters but using the canon world, your work is just a ripoff.

 

[Caitlin]

Well, that's exactly what they want you to do - make those "believable characters" that don't go very far out and strike nerves anywhere. Such characters are their (and perhaps your) perception of a "good character". But if you do it only to avoid the Mary Sue Police, you're letting them control your writing and your perception of a "well-balanced character".

The problem here is, a new writer will almost never know what kind of fine line that is to walk. And for good reason too - that fine line is an imaginary construct, which becomes ingrained only when drilled into a newbie's head by disgruntled veterans.

If this is your main reason for "writing good, well-balanced characters", and the Mary Sue Police are the main way to guide people to write as such, then my advice to you is to completely flout their advice. You know the rules, now you can break them. Break them to your heart's content! Write with complete abandon and disregard for those self-styled "authorities on good writing" and show them just how "bad" you can make a character! Then go back and find your own motivation for writing those "good" characters. Often a metal sheet must be bent the other way before it can be straightened.

I suppose in a way that I am the Mary Sue police then. I like well rounded characters with believable strengths and failures. That's the kind of writing I enjoy to read. Those are the characters that feel the best to me and those are the kinds of characters I try to write. Not because I'm being forced to by invisible fairy police, but because that's just what I like. It's probably what a lot of authors like. It's easy to pile on a bunch of super powers and good fortunes and having nothing to challenge those, because it's lazy writing. When you start putting actual depth to your character, things get much more complicated and display a higher level of thought, polish and care.

When I was judging in the awards contest, I was faced with this exact situation, and I apologise in advance to Kelleo (if she's still reading this section) for bringing it up. Kelli, the main character... Not only was she described as insanely attractive and beautiful, but she was more skilled than Link at sword fighting and dispatching monsters. She spent almost no effort to send the monsters running or killing them time and time again. She held magical powers, powers that no one else in the world seemed to understand, that she said were difficult to control, yet she was seen constantly using these powers with little effort, like she had been using them for hundreds of years. Kelli had no massive downsides to her character, just positives, unless you want to count her willingness to get into arguments with Link as a negative.

I found the character extremely boring and distracting to read around. I knew that nothing could ever defeat her because she's the best at everything. I was bored during the parts that focused on her because I could see what was coming a mile away.

People often say that Mary Sue characters are alright as long as they have impossible challenges ahead of them that are meant to get in the way of their god-like status. I agree with that. If you want your character to be well loved by all, super strong, super fast, etc. Do it as long as you have an adequate challenge for them. Like being forced into a morally complex decision. Do I sacrifice this bus full of nuns dangling off of a cliff to stop the terrorists from blowing up a landmark, or do I sacrifice the landmark and the lives of the innocent to save the nuns?

Do you know how often I see that? How often I see Mary Sues challenged by impossible odds? Never. I never, ever see it. This isn't just limited to Kelli, or Link, or Mario. They always bulldoze through insignificant threats like an elephant charging through a field of grass. These characters and the situations they're put in are boring to me, and after having read through them for nearly 18 years, I've had enough and have now settled on believable characters that I can relate to, characters who don't always win. Characters who have to make choices in how to react to something. Characters who have to develop and work through their weaknesses to achieve greatness.

This is why I write believable characters. Or if I do rarely venture into Mary Sue material and give my characters some sort of exceptional skill, I always make sure there's a challenge big enough for them. Something they can't steamroll. This is my way of dealing with the Mary Sue police, but cutting them completely out of the picture and doing things how I want to do them. If it makes them happy, it's a plus, but if it still pisses 'em off, fuck them.

But, yeah, you're right. It's all opinion. I'll have mine, you can have yours. I'll even fight for your right to keep yours, but I'm just putting mine out for display right now.

 

[Zekurom]

I suppose in a way that I am the Mary Sue police then. I like well rounded characters with believable strengths and failures. That's the kind of writing I enjoy to read. Those are the characters that feel the best to me and those are the kinds of characters I try to write. Not because I'm being forced to by invisible fairy police, but because that's just what I like. It's probably what a lot of authors like. It's easy to pile on a bunch of super powers and good fortunes and having nothing to challenge those, because it's lazy writing. When you start putting actual depth to your character, things get much more complicated and display a higher level of thought, polish and care.

While this is true, do you notice how you're giving more positive reasons for writing well-rounded characters? You don't do it to avoid the Mary Sue Police. You do it because it's what you feel that you should do, and to hell with anyone with who would stop you from doing it.

This is the point I've been trying to discuss with you all along. You don't improve to avoid somebody yelling at you about how you suck. You improve when you yourself feel like it's the right thing to do, and sometimes it just takes somebody to tell you how.

Secondly, you've been talking about "putting actual depth" to your character, as if any character that simply has flaws tacked onto them as well as good things is suddenly automatically "deeper" than a character without either side. But have you noticed that there are many characters that do have those (and even ones where they're all applied, not the trivial weaknesses like the clumsiness of many a Mary Sue), but do not have any perceivable depth at all? They're still one-dimensional, except now they're both sides of the one-dimensional spectrum rather than just one side (e.g. both the left and right wings of a political spectrum compared to only the left side. It's still an oversimplified, one-dimensional view of the political debate). I'd say implication doesn't entail causation; certainly a "deeper" character often does have weaknesses as well as strengths, but not every character can be made "deeper" just by tacking on strengths and weaknesses.

When I was judging in the awards contest, I was faced with this exact situation, and I apologise in advance to Kelleo (if she's still reading this section) for bringing it up. Kelli, the main character... Not only was she described as insanely attractive and beautiful, but she was more skilled than Link at sword fighting and dispatching monsters. She spent almost no effort to send the monsters running or killing them time and time again. She held magical powers, powers that no one else in the world seemed to understand, that she said were difficult to control, yet she was seen constantly using these powers with little effort, like she had been using them for hundreds of years. Kelli had no massive downsides to her character, just positives, unless you want to count her willingness to get into arguments with Link as a negative.

But again, I must emphasize that you are once again trying to split a character into "upsides" and "downsides". It's always been my theory that a character with ups and downs just stuck onto them will make for equally as boring (or "Mary-Sue-ish") a character as one with only ups or only downs. The only reason the character with both is harder to detect is because people have it ingrained to them that a "Mary Sue" is a character with only ups or only downs, and that if a character has both and still seems bad, you're probably just misinterpreting it.

I found the character extremely boring and distracting to read around. I knew that nothing could ever defeat her because she's the best at everything. I was bored during the parts that focused on her because I could see what was coming a mile away.

That's fair. A character can be distracting and boring to read because they start to get predictable. I might add once again that correlation is not necessarily causation - often the boring predictableness of a character with "too many upsides" (that I find, anyway) comes from something else - simple inexperience. The new writer is still testing out common archetypes, the like of which you've seen a million times before, which is why it seems boring. (I'm pretty sure that the first time you read a character that you now consider a "Mary Sue", you didn't think it was boring at all.) Couple that with the fact that the new writer often wants to try as many things as they want to in a single story (and does so by cramming them all in), and you get not just a disaster, but a learning experience.

People often say that Mary Sue characters are alright as long as they have impossible challenges ahead of them that are meant to get in the way of their god-like status. I agree with that. If you want your character to be well loved by all, super strong, super fast, etc. Do it as long as you have an adequate challenge for them. Like being forced into a morally complex decision. Do I sacrifice this bus full of nuns dangling off of a cliff to stop the terrorists from blowing up a landmark, or do I sacrifice the landmark and the lives of the innocent to save the nuns?

But then it is a weakness of the character. The character has no hard and fast principles that would allow her to make a snap decision. But it would be a weakness of the character to have that trait too, as it would fail elsewhere where the character made a bad judgment because their principles clashed with the principles of society at large. And even then, the character could come off as "Mary-Sue-ish" if she is not criticized by anybody for the decision she does make. Do you see how complicated the characterization process is? It's not all about upsides and insurmountable challenges. Sometimes, you've just got to get a feel for what works with the story.

Of course, these considerations are nowhere in the league of a new writer, but you must understand that it is never actually that simple, and to try and tell a new author that it is will not make them improve.

Do you know how often I see that? How often I see Mary Sues challenged by impossible odds? Never. I never, ever see it. This isn't just limited to Kelli, or Link, or Mario. They always bulldoze through insignificant threats like an elephant charging through a field of grass. These characters and the situations they're put in are boring to me, and after having read through them for nearly 18 years, I've had enough and have now settled on believable characters that I can relate to, characters who don't always win. Characters who have to make choices in how to react to something. Characters who have to develop and work through their weaknesses to achieve greatness.

You and a lot of other authors. Just be advised that you shouldn't berate a new author for writing what you call "Mary Sues", at least inherently. What's important is not the characters themselves, but how they were created, their role in the story, and what happens because of them. To say that "believable characters" are the only characters an author should write is saying too much (although you don't seem to be saying it directly, it seems that you're strongly implying it).

This is why I write believable characters. Or if I do rarely venture into Mary Sue material and give my characters some sort of exceptional skill, I always make sure there's a challenge big enough for them. Something they can't steamroll. This is my way of dealing with the Mary Sue police, but cutting them completely out of the picture and doing things how I want to do them. If it makes them happy, it's a plus, but if it still pisses 'em off, fuck them.

Why do you even need to deal with the Mary Sue police? You can write big challenges for big characters without regard for them. It doesn't even need to be a plus if it makes them happy. Such self-styled authoritarians I would be happy to displease and piss off as much as I liked, by writing a character that completely flouts their guidelines.

But, yeah, you're right. It's all opinion. I'll have mine, you can have yours. I'll even fight for your right to keep yours, but I'm just putting mine out for display right now.

Your opinions are valid and interesting as well. This dialogue has been fascinating and enlightening, as it has revealed more of my own opinion.


P.S. To be honest, I also dislike stories that involve primarily canon characters, but for a much different reason. It's not so much that they're mistreated, but that they're there in the first place. I don't really like reading about stories that make reference to the actual characters of one's work, just because it feels so much like a spinoff/ripoff of the other work. Of course, I'd never dream of telling them that they should stop writing those stories, because this is only my personal preference and creative fandom tendencies at work.

 

[zakisrage]

Getting off the "Mary Sue police" discussion...

I don['t think no OCs is a problem. But OOC can be very dangerous, especially if it is really ridiculous. One example might be The Draco Trilogy, where Draco Malfoy is portrayed as a woobie who dons leather pants.

I wrote in my blog about my reaction to a nasty piece of work in the Pokemon section of FF.net that suscribed to the latter - it was the worst fanfic that I had ever read. This Pokemon fanfic portrayed Morty as a rapist and a sexual predator - in the fanfic, he is a bully who tortures Jasmine and threatens to rape her. I was very angry about that, since it is such a disgusting interpretation, and I wrote an angry review telling the writer what I thought of her fanfic.

Rape fanfiction is also a big problem. Rapefics are everywhere. A lot of bad fanfic writers throw rape around as if it's nothing. Virtually all rapefics are an eyesore. The fanfic that I mentioned earlier, "Celebrian", is considered a rapefic. (To be fair to "Crimson Storm", at least Jasmine's reaction to rape isn't as unrealistic as Celebrian's in her fanfic.)

I have yet to publish anything to FF.net, but in a way I am a little nervous about it.

 

[Sorrows Solace]

Ergh, Celebrian was disgusting. I find that I get annoyed by needless crack parodies; either in the script format or when there's just a pile of memes and chat speak to serve as humour (the only format that worked was Movies in Fifteen minutes because it was poking fun at different films.) Needless OOC's, badly done canon characters and overly flowery descriptions are just painful to read at times as well. I usually avoid self insert fics because those either cross into Sue/Stu territory or are just boring.