 Action/Adventure: May 21, 2025 Issue [#13141] |
This week: The Self-Insert Character Edited by: Kit  
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Placing yourself into the plot of the story can be fun, but it's a risky move... your attachment may lead to a lack of realism.
Who is the biggest Mary Sue or Gary Stu you've ever come across?
This week's Action/Adventure Newsletter is all about self-inserts, Chosen Ones and that delicate balance we all must find when creating our characters.
Kit |
When I was a teenager, I wrote the most terrible self-insert fanfiction. Luckily for me, this was a few years before personal computers became widespread – all I had was a Binder of Shame, hidden under my bed. You may know the kind of stories that I’m talking about – someone remarkably like me meets their favourite singer, and it’s love at first sight, but there are these obstacles to overcome before they get their happy ending. Or someone remarkably like me finds themselves in their favourite fictional world, with their favourite fictional characters, and fixes everything that bothered them about the story. It is fun to write these stories. Sometimes it’s even fun to read them – I have enjoyed quite a few Game of Thrones fix-it fanfics after that disastrous eighth season. They aren’t written for publication, though. A professional writer needs to place themselves at a certain distance from their characters.
By this, I don’t mean that our characters must necessarily be completely different to us. It is natural for them to take on something of their creator – a trait, a hope, a dream, a fear – because they’re a part of us that insists on running around out there. However wild our imagination, it is our imagination; if you’re anything like me you may be baffled at how you came up with what you do, but it’s still yours. And that’s great. You’re unique, and your characters will be, too. Except when you turn them into a Mary Sue, or Gary Stu.
There is no exact definition of a Mary Sue, or a Gary Stu, but they are often an idealised version of the author and it shows. This character is pretty much the most perfect character to ever grace their world. Oh, they may have a few flaws, but they’re endearing ones – perhaps they’re a little shy, or clumsy, or they don’t run with the popular crowd (but the most popular guy/girl will end up with them anyway). They are incredibly smart, able to figure out situations that stump others. They’re brave to a point where it may seem foolish until their plot armour reveals itself, and possess skills and abilities that don’t make sense considering their background or circumstances. Others gravitate towards them and show them a loyalty that doesn’t feel entirely earned – they may soon become a mere extension of the main character. The main character doesn’t show much actual character development other than to grow ever more powerful. In the end they are the strongest, wisest, very bestest character around. This specialness is highlighted over and over again – is there a cat or dog who is a nightmare to handle? It’ll love our main character. Is there something that will take years, even decades to master? They’ll have it sorted in weeks, or days, because they’re just such a natural. Indeed, it can seem as though their entire world was built around them, handing them the tools and the people to overcome whatever obstacles they may face. Anyone who does oppose them is simply unreasonable – they’ll soon come around, or our main character will exact their sweet revenge. It’s… not good reading, because of its lack of realism.
Mary Sue or Gary Stu may sound like The Chosen One, but a Chosen One is not necessarily problematic. It is true, for example, that Ron and Hermione’s lives come to revolve around Harry Potter, but they don’t follow him blindly. They have their fall-outs. They also have their own lives, and skills, and talents. They are interesting in their own right, and Harry couldn’t succeed without them. Nor is Harry perfect, or especially powerful. He’s good at a few subjects; less good at others. His signature spell is one learned by early-year students. He has well-earned issues, isn’t always nice, and can be extremely awkward. It’s sometimes joked that he’s a high school jock who marries his sweetheart and becomes a cop, and that is true, but he’s also a kid who’s been dealt a rough hand and simply trying to survive and do the right thing.
Any memorable character needs to have that realistic balance. It’s okay that they’re smart. It’s fine for them to have some special kind of power. Maybe they are the most morally upright person around. You’ve just got to make it work. Nobody becomes strong, let alone remarkably powerful without a lot of effort and training. No kid is going to face a Council of Elders and put them in their place because they’ve somehow managed to figure out what nobody else has, ever – they’re that special and morally superior. Nobody becomes a vampire in a world where vampires take ages to overcome their inbuilt cravings and just… from the moment they open their eyes resist any temptation like it’s no big deal. You need to be consistent. You need to be believable. Your characters need to function in the environment you built for them, rather than have the environment adapt itself to their needs. Unless you’re actually writing a story about a world desperately trying to figure out and fulfill its people’s every desire.
I always talk about balance in my newsletters, and the same applies here – you can go for a self-insert character if you want to, as long as you write them in the same way as you would any (main) character. No matter how close you feel to them, no matter how cathartic a release it is for them to overcome certain obstacles, they still have to be developed in a realistic way. Especially in a fantasy or sci-fi setting it may be fun to imagine how you would fare in such a place and base a character on that, but because of the close attachment you may develop it’s very easy to hand them plot armour and give them knowledge and power they haven’t earned. Hence, my advice of placing yourself at a certain distance. Allow your characters to run around, explore, and shape their own adventure.
Happy writing!
Kit
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