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Two steps backward, one step forwards
Apr. 23rd, 2007 09:38 pmI've only written 500 words tonight - and in actual fact, if I count the words I'm officially making redundant, I've gone about ten thousand into the red - but think I may have actually written more tonight than in the past week. I've pinpointed a problem I've been having and solved it, which means that masses of what I've already written will be discarded (it stays in the word count, but moves down to the end of the document where it won't be an official part of the story), but it also means that a whole set of wonderful possibilities and plot points have opened up to me.
The problem was, I'd grown to like one of my protagonists too much. I'd grown to like the way he ends up so much that I'd forgotten that he actually starts as a selfish, ungrateful, blind little shite, and the reason he's so fascinating is the learning process he goes through over the course of the story after he makes a seriously bad choice for minor, selfish, petty reasons.
But because I made him start too smart, he managed skip all the angst and do all his learning in his first on-screen appearance, never makes his character-defining bad choice, and he's been aimlessly wandering around, looking for a plot, inner monologuing about his own greatness, and being generally admired by everyone - even those who really, really shouldn't - ever since.
In other words, I've just written my very first Gary Stu. Urgh. I think I need a shower. A long shower. And then I shall write him again, but properly.
The problem was, I'd grown to like one of my protagonists too much. I'd grown to like the way he ends up so much that I'd forgotten that he actually starts as a selfish, ungrateful, blind little shite, and the reason he's so fascinating is the learning process he goes through over the course of the story after he makes a seriously bad choice for minor, selfish, petty reasons.
But because I made him start too smart, he managed skip all the angst and do all his learning in his first on-screen appearance, never makes his character-defining bad choice, and he's been aimlessly wandering around, looking for a plot, inner monologuing about his own greatness, and being generally admired by everyone - even those who really, really shouldn't - ever since.
In other words, I've just written my very first Gary Stu. Urgh. I think I need a shower. A long shower. And then I shall write him again, but properly.
