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thecorteztwins · 5 years ago

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Character Flaws: How To Do Them (And How Not To)

Hi there, I’m going to talk about character flaws today! And I’m going to start with a very unpopular statement----I think flawless characters, or characters with minimal flaws, are just fine. It just depends on what kind of character you want to portray. Some character roles are SUPPOSED to be paragons of virtue or sweet innocent angels, just as some characters are SUPPOSED to be dastardly evil-doers or complex nuanced grimdark antiheroes. What matters is whether it’s what you INTEND, and how to pull it off. Also, I’m not an expert. These are opinions. Feel free to agree or disagree, take what you like and leave the rest, etc. I am not an authority in ANY way, and your thoughts are just as valid as mine. That said, let’s start. Strap in, this got long, I’m sorry.

There are three general types of flaws that you can give to a character: INTERVIEW FLAWS aka CINNAMON ROLL FLAWS aka NON-FLAWS I call them this because they’re the sort of “flaws” that you would say you have at a job interview when asked what your flaws are. They’re “flaws” that make someone actually sound better---more moral, or more endearing, or more sympathetic, etc. Things like “too loyal” or “kind to a fault” or “too protective of his friends��. They’re the sort of flaws that “cinnamon roll” characters typically have. These actually can become very damning mega-flaws if taken to the extreme, but more on that later; this paragraph is for when they’re still solidly in “interview flaw” territory. A big aspect of these “flaws” is that they only hurt the character, if anyone. They will seldom, if ever, negatively affect another person. If they do hurt someone else, it will often be in a way that is totally justified to the reader (the character who is “too protective” beating up someone who was being a jerk to his friends) or really not the character’s fault at all (a naive character being manipulated by a bad guy into revealing something important) Whatever trouble they get in will usually be done in a way that is meant to make the reader either feel bad for them, or see them in a positive light for it. If this is the sort of character you want to go for, that is a-okay! Cinnamon rolls have their place in a story, and they can be just as beloved by fans as more grimdark characters. The only problem comes is when someone tries to sell their character as “flawed” when actually they’re just one of these. Or, alternatively, tries to sell the character as one of these when actually they’re one of the categories below. But if it’s exactly what you intended? Great! NORMAL FLAWS Exactly what it says---flaws that a normal person would have. Things like jealousy, snobbery, misanthropy, negativity, bad tempers, irresponsibility, laziness, not taking things seriously when they should, the list goes on and on. This is probably the widest category, since what flaw you pick and how it manifests can span the range from being almost a non-flaw but not quite, to nearly a mega-flaw. It also depends on the character who has it, what they’re like otherwise, and why they have it. For instance, someone who is unjustly hostile to someone trying to help them because they’re suspicious due to being tricked, exploited, or abused in the past by people pretending to be well-meaning, is a lot more sympathetic than someone who just doesn’t think they need help because they see themselves as perfect and don’t like correction. Both still fall under the “normal” category most of the time, but are coming from very different places, and will be perceived differently by most readers. So, which to use? It all depends what you’re going for with your character! MEGA FLAWS The big ones. The ones that will really make others dislike your character. Things like real-life bigotry (as in, being homophobic, not hating elves), gleeful bullying and abusiveness, toxic egomania, blaming others (especially innocent characters) for their mistakes, sexual misconduct, and kicking puppies, to name a few. Sometimes, these can be used to make audiences hate the characters instantly, but that’s actually not always guaranteed. A great many characters that are among the most popular in their respective fandoms have one or more of these traits. Sometimes, that’s just because people love a good villain, but other times it’s because the character’s reasons for these flaws, or the character’s overall personality in general apart from the flaws, are very compelling and interesting. Just as some people love cinnamon rolls, some people prefer darker characters like these, and much like preferring different ice cream flavors, neither is superior to the other. These kinds of flaws also don’t always translate to truly inhuman, awful people either. Sometimes a character may actually be MORE human for them. The protagonist in a novel I once read was raised by his grandparents because his mother, who gave birth to him as a teen, hated him. She wanted nothing to do with him as a child, and outright told him she hated him when he was just barely an adult. The protagonist didn’t know why for most of his life, but eventually found out it was because he was born a twin, and his twin brother died when they were babies. He was born big, healthy, and strong, whereas his brother had been tiny and weak and sick, probably because he sapped the bulk of the nutrients in the womb, which sadly is something that sometimes happens. The mother was devastated by the death of her weaker son, and blamed the surviving one, feeling he was a monster baby that killed his sibling, not to mention resented how he was fawned over by the rest of her family when they had treated her like dirt, including her own parents. This woman was not meant as sympathetic to readers. It was pretty clear to me that the writer wanted us to see her as horrible. And what she did was completely horrible indeed. She blamed an innocent baby for something not possibly his fault, and held that against him his whole life. That’s unforgivably awful, and there’s no excuse for it. Yet it’s such a human reaction that it made me feel for her. People often are illogical and awful in ways like this, it’s very believable to me that a human being would feel this way. It was meant to make her an irredeemable strawman, but my reaction was to see her now as less of a 2D “bad mother” cutout, and more of a person. Sometimes, it’s the worst in people that can win us over, because that can sometimes be the most human part of them. Note that this will often be divisive; I’m sure a lot of readers actually did hate this woman all the more for this, and that’s a totally valid reaction too. However, if you wish to make your character truly despicable, hurting children or cute animals is generally a good way to go; most readers won’t forgive that (though I’ve seen it happen) That said, be warned that making your character sexy or tragic (especially in combination) will inevitably make some fans fawn over them regardless of how evil they are, and there’s not much you can do about it. Someone is ALWAYS going to find the bad guy hot/sympathetic even when you’re not SUPPOSED to. Now that we’ve covered the different categories of GOOD ways to write flaws, here are some ways that I see people failing at writing flaws: INFORMED FLAWS Informed flaws are flaws that the writer CLAIMS the character has, but never actually show up. For instance, they SAY that this character is standoffish, has a temper, and can be cruel, but only ever write him as being lovably surly at worst, and typically very tolerant and patient with others (especially cute children or cinnamon bun types) Or they claim that the character is shy and insecure, but here they are trying out for the lead in the school play without anyone pushing them to do it. This is often due to the author being overly affectionate towards their character. In the first example, they want their character to be a tough guy, but an ENDEARING tough guy, and not risk him doing anything that the audience might possibly dislike him for. So they go overboard with showing his “soft” moments, while never showing the “hard” ones that are what would make the “soft” ones actually special and unusual. In the second example, maybe the character is just shy and insecure in a different way (like they’re comfortable on-stage because there’s no actual interaction with people, and crumble when in real conversations) but more likely, they’re just acting out-of-character because the author WANTS them to be the lead in the play, regardless of how little sense it makes for them to try out and get the part. Informed flaws are basically a failure of a “show, don’t tell” rule. We’re TOLD that this character has a flaw, but we’re either never shown it, or shown the exact opposite. For instance, we may be told that this character never opens up to people because of her dark past, but it sure doesn’t seem that way if she immediately starts talking about that dark past to first man who shows interest in her as she falls into his arms. And it’s hard to take a writer’s claim that their character is “humble” with any seriousness if that character has a habit of bringing up his numerous talents and accomplishments in every conversation. And you may SAY that a character tends to get jealous, but how do we KNOW if she never encounters anyone she’s jealous of? INCONSEQUENTIAL FLAWS The character is a rude abrasive jerk, but everyone likes her immediately anyway! Maybe they can instantly see past her snarky surface to the sensitive soul beneath, or maybe they respect her toughness and candor. Some people have a problem with her attitude, but they’re either prudish sticks-in-the-mod, overly sensitive namby-pambies, sexists who are threatened by a strong woman, or they come around to respecting/liking her in the end! The character hates breaking rules and getting into trouble; he craves approval from authority, and will tell on his friends to get it. Fortunately, he’s never put in this position, or, if he does, his friends understand and forgive him, and may even agree that he did the right thing. The character is impulsive and acts on their first thought, if they think at all. Luckily, her assumptions prove correct (or at least lead her to the right place) and her reckless actions not only don’t cause any problems, they save the day! Everyone is proud of her, and no one scolds her for anything she did along the way that might have broken protocol or endangered other people. The character is super hostile anyone breaking his routine...but then his routine never gets broke in the story or any of his interactions. He’s also terrified of animals, but luckily no animals appear in the story. And he’s an asshole at work, but none of the story takes place there and none of the other characters are his co-workers. See the problem? None of these flaws MATTER. They either don’t come up in the story at all, and thus never get a chance to affect the character, or if they do come up, they don’t cause any problems for the character, and in fact may benefit them. That’s not a flaw. It doesn’t matter if your character is a freaking SERIAL KILLER if they never face any kind of issue because of it, it’s not a flaw in the context of the story unless it works AGAINST your character in some way. ACCIDENTAL FLAWS These often overlap with inconsequential flaws, and are kind of the opposite of informed flaws. In the case of informed flaws, the author claims to us that the character has a flaw, but then fails to show it (or shows the opposite). In the case of accidental flaws, the author claims that the character DOESN’T have a certain flaw...and then proceeds to give them exactly that. For instance, how many times have you been reading a novel where the heroine INSISTS that she’s very plain and not pretty at all, then proceeded to give us an extremely flattering description of herself? How many times have you read something where the protagonist was acting like a huge jerk, but you got the impression from how it was written that the author expected us to be cheering him on, and anyone who thought he was indeed a jerk was portrayed as always unlikable and in the wrong? This is a case where the writer is either so oblivious or so in love with their own character that they become unaware of how obnoxious their darling is actually coming off. They rush to justify everything she does, they portray any opposition as simply evil or jealous or stupid, they overlook any kind of actual harm that he’s doing to anyone else, and they often make the villains end up accidentally sympathetic by comparison because the hero we’re supposed to love and admire is just so unbearable. The writer has made a very flawed character---but they didn’t mean or want to, and that’s the problem. WEAKNESSES Weaknesses aren’t flaws. Being clumsy, having a physical disability, or being a member of an oppressed/disliked group is not a flaw. Flaws are personality traits. They can be the RESULT of things like trauma or mental disorders, so they’re not always changeable or the person’s fault, but they’re still part of WHO they are, not WHAT, and something they can be held accountable for. If your character’s only “flaws” are being deaf and having PTSD and being an elf in a world that doesn’t like elves, those aren’t flaws, they’re weaknesses or drawbacks. If they’re lacking in some skill, such as fencing or shooting or flipping hamburgers, that’s also not a flaw. It could be a flaw if having the skill is important yet they refuse to work on it (ex: a police officer who doesn’t bother to improve his aim) but it is not in itself a flaw. Hell, it’s not even a weakness unless it’s relevant---I don’t know how to use a gun, but there’s no reason that it’s immediately relevant to my life to do so, so I wouldn’t count it as a weakness or a flaw. TIPS: - Try to be objective as you can about your character, even if you love them. Keep in mind that the other characters around them are people with thoughts and feelings too, and that if your character is rude, cruel, annoying, or off-putting to them, then they may have good reason for disliking or losing patience with your character, no matter what good reason your character has for being that way. If your atheist character trashes the faith of a religious character, it doesn’t matter if they grew up in a household of religious abuse, they’re still being a jerk and the religious character has a right to think so. If your character loses their temper and wrecks a store, it doesn’t matter that they were provoked or are really a nice person, the store owner is still well within their rights to press charges and demand compensation. Avoid vilifying other characters, and take their pain and personhood as seriously as you do the main character’s own. This alone will open the door to showing a lot of flaws that your character has, which will let you then decide if that’s the amount you WANT your character to have, or if you should change some things. - Any trait, including very good traits, can be bad taken to the extreme. For instance, let’s take a common “interview flaw”--- loyal no matter what. A lot of people don’t realize just how dark this can get. But what if your character is so loyal to their friend that they overlook it not only when that friend treats them badly, but treats other people too? What if they discover the friend has done something terrible, like is abusing his wife? What if they’re loyal to a fault to a supervillain organization that is actively hurting or even killing people, and they KNOW this? You can take this some pretty terrible places if you want. You don’t HAVE to, it can remain in “cinnamon roll” or “normal” territory if that’s what you want, but if you’re looking to make a more dark scenario, remember that you don’t need to rely on inherently “dark” flaws like “he loves to hurt people”---the most mild and even positive traits can become disturbing and evil if taken far enough. - If you’re trying to make someone MORE flawed, look at the flaws they already have and consider how it might hurt OTHER PEOPLE instead of just the character. For instance, if your character is very insecure, perhaps instead of just thinking about how worthless or untalented they are, they are overly-critical, even mean, to people who are even less talented. Or when someone else is more talented at something they wish they were better at, they scrutinize that person to find bad things about them, or even just assume things about them---like “sure, she’s a much better artist than me, but she’s ugly and she can’t write worth a damn” or “he may have a girlfriend and be good-looking, but he’s dumb as a brick and probably a bully like all dumb jocks”. An attitude like that takes your character from simply being the purely sympathetic sort of insecure, to someone who is actually doing something wrong because of it. Again, this is if you WANT your character to have more of an edge; it doesn’t suit some characters, and that’s ok. - By the same token, if you want to take some edge OFF your character and make them less flawed, look at how their present flaws might negatively affect others, and decrease that. If the character you WANT to be a “cinnamon bun” lashes out at people who just don’t understand her pain/genius/specialness/goodness/etc, maybe reconsider that. - If you want to get ideas for flaws, look at the things other people do that annoy you. What are your pet peeves? Maybe you hate “Karen” behavior, or people who don’t take proper care of their pets, people who think they’re funny or clever when they’re not, people who interrupt you when you’re talking, people who make assumptions, people you feel are fishing for attention, people who believe or share false information without checking it first, people who never seem to listen or learn, people who are always late, people who feel entitled to something, and so on. See if any of them fit your character. Be sure to be honest with yourself---yes, you REALLY love your tough guy character, and you HATE when smokers just throw their butts on the ground...but maybe he would? And maybe he WOULD be snappish with someone who didn’t deserve it? And maybe he WOULD be quick to stereotype others, such as labeling them privileged preps based on how they dress? Think about it. - Zodiac signs are another good place to get ideas for flaws, as are Myers-Briggs personality types, and anything else that categorizes people into different personality types. Note that your character need not actually, say, have that sign for their zodiac, it’s just good places to get base personality ideas. - Try to keep your voice out of your character’s mouth, and let their actions speak for themselves. Whether you want to portray the world’s sweetest cinnamon roll (tired of that phrase yet?) or the worst dumpster fire in the universe, what works to show that isn’t for your character or those around them to TALK about how sweet/terrible your character is, what works is to actually have them do and say things that are sweet/terrible! - Get second opinions! You want to make your character MORE of a jerk? You’re worried they’re TOO MUCH of a jerk? You think your villain is too soft? You want to add moral ambiguity to your hero? Get other people to look at your work! Friends are great for this, but what’s even better is people who aren’t particularly close to you, and won’t hold back on honest advice and feedback.If you want to see how your characters come off to a set of unbiased eyes, the best way is to ask someone! - Remember that everyone is different and no matter how well you portray a character the way you intend, there will always be someone who views them in a way you didn’t want them to at all, even if it makes no sense for them to do so. Make peace with it. Don’t dismiss everyone by saying they “didn’t understand” or “read it wrong” or “are interrogating the text from the wrong perspective”, but by the same token don’t get too hung up on making sure every single reader views every single character the exact way you wanted. It just won’t happen. Just do your best.

#rp stuff #writing advice #advice #flaws #character flaws

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