marycatelli: (Galahad)
marycatelli ([personal profile] marycatelli) wrote2015-05-10 12:48 am
Entry tags:

a pillar of the community

Free advice for people writing superhero works:

If you hate squeaky clean superheroes a la Superman, you can leave them out of the work.

Some writers prefer to put in a character who's arrogant and vain and quite frequently the villain of the piece.  The problem with this is that it does not undermine the character type.  It always shows, in shining colors, that you hate the character type.

You do not want the hand of the author to show in the work.  It undermines the whole story on the same principle as a deus ex machina.

[identity profile] headnoises.livejournal.com 2015-05-11 01:06 pm (UTC)(link)
"Muwhahaha! I can make an obvious rip off of a character that bugs me, and just make him evil!!1!!"

Even "showing" why you dislike a character can be a bad idea, too often it is...ah... unpersuasive to anyone who doesn't already agree. Showing "that's unrealistic" usually involves being...unrealistic.