Deleted
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Post by Deleted on Jun 22, 2014 17:37:17 GMT -5
Don't ask me why the subject came to me. We'd be here all night.
When you think of a "Mary Sue character" who comes to mind? Can there be canon Mary Sues or is it just purely for bad fanfics?
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Malcolm
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Post by Malcolm on Jun 22, 2014 17:42:08 GMT -5
Mary sue. A lot of people keep using that word but I don't think it means what they think it means.
It's usually supposed to mean someone who has every power, is better at everything, and is loved by everyone as soon as they meet them(even villains). Though people seem to use it as "a character I don't like".
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Post by A Platypus Rave is Correct on Jun 22, 2014 17:53:09 GMT -5
Don't ask me why the subject came to me. We'd be here all night. When you think of a "Mary Sue character" who comes to mind? Can there be canon Mary Sues or is it just purely for bad fanfics? Wesley Crusher could probably be considered Mary Sueish. |
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Post by Red Impact on Jun 22, 2014 17:53:39 GMT -5
I look at a Mary Sue as a fan character who essentially does everything better than the main characters and usually has some sort of connection to the main characters that doesn't make sense. So they'd be a better hero than Harry Potter, be related by blood to both Snape and Dumbledore, and have a Patronus of a reverse skunk dragon with a rocket launcher.
So I don't really think really think there can be a canon Mary Sue. The closest you'd get would be a character like Neo, Goku or Superman, but even they have practical faults and weaknesses.
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Post by Red Impact on Jun 22, 2014 17:58:02 GMT -5
Don't ask me why the subject came to me. We'd be here all night. When you think of a "Mary Sue character" who comes to mind? Can there be canon Mary Sues or is it just purely for bad fanfics? Wesley Crusher could probably be considered Mary Sueish. I think the canon version of a Mary Sue would be an author surrogate, and that's where Bella would fall in to. But in that case you sort of open the realm to a lot of characters to get saddled with the label when I don't think they should be. |
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Post by Hit Girl on Jun 22, 2014 17:58:06 GMT -5
Bella Swan
She's a Mary Sue and an author insert.
She hates all her schoolmates, but they love her. She's disrespectful to her father with no consequences, she is supposedly a straight A student despite never showing any exceptional intelligence, two men described as looking like Greek gods both love her for no reason, everyone goes out of their way to protect her for no reason, when she becomes a vampire, she's more powerful than other vampires, and then gives birth to a Mary Sue child.
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Post by Amazing Kitsune on Jun 22, 2014 18:05:42 GMT -5
Does Alice from the Resident Evil films fall into this?
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Post by HMARK Center on Jun 22, 2014 18:05:44 GMT -5
I subscribe to the PopArena YouTube channel because the guy who runs it does in-depth reviews and critiques of the Animorphs book series...any fellow 90s kids who were into the series, it's highly recommended.
Anyway, in the last review the guy discussed the topic of Mary Sues, since the volume he was reviewing has a character some fans have given that label. He does a great job of tracing the history of the term, how it evolved, and how it often gets misused.
I think, by and large, characters like that (male or female variety) tend to exist in the realm of fan creations, but it's hard to argue with at least some aspects of the characterization of Bella in the Twilight series coming off that way.
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Post by BayleyTiffyCodyCenaJudyHopps on Jun 22, 2014 18:08:23 GMT -5
True Mary Sues are rare, and outside of maybe Wesley Crusher or Bella Swan, there aren't many other names you could come up with that won't spark pages upon pages of tedious debates. Malcolm got it right, it's thrown around way too often to demean characters that people dislike.
And that dislike's not just from allegedly poor writing, most of the time people tend to fire the Sue arrow at characters they don't like just out of personal taste.
I especially hate the term "Mary Sue" because there are so many memorable and interesting characters in fiction that still have "Sue-ish" traits (Chosen ones, badasses, determinators, woobies, etc). What makes them work is that they don't go overboard with the writer forcing their audiences to like them. But based on the various fanraging I've seen, all you apparently need to qualify for Mary Suedom is to simply be an ordinary protagonist.
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Post by Amazing Kitsune on Jun 22, 2014 18:11:00 GMT -5
Does Rebecca Chambers in those Resident Evil novelizations count?
I'm actually asking these questions. I'm not a follower of either the novelizations or the movies, but I recall them getting brought up a lot.
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Crimson
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Post by Crimson on Jun 22, 2014 18:23:40 GMT -5
I think Bella Swan is the closest you'll get to an undisputed example.
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Capt Lunatic
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Post by Capt Lunatic on Jun 22, 2014 18:24:27 GMT -5
Can I say Brienne of Tarth?
1-Loras Tyrell is one of the best tournament knights in the land...she beats him in a tournament
2-Jamie Lannister is the best swordsman and biggest asshole in the land...she beats him in a swordfight and he turns over a new leaf from being around her.
3-The Hound is the toughest SOB in the land...she beats him in a deathmatch.
4-Every person she has sworn to protect gets killed...people still seek out her service.
Still one of my favorite GOT characters.
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Post by Cela on Jun 22, 2014 19:55:43 GMT -5
Can I say Brienne of Tarth? 1-Loras Tyrell is one of the best tournament knights in the land...she beats him in a tournament 2-Jamie Lannister is the best swordsman and biggest asshole in the land...she beats him in a swordfight and he turns over a new leaf from being around her. 3-The Hound is the toughest SOB in the land...she beats him in a deathmatch. 4-Every person she has sworn to protect gets killed...people still seek out her service. Still one of my favorite GOT characters. Nah, she's overly trusting and way too into chivalry. She's basically a Sansa that can fight. |
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Post by BorneAgain on Jun 22, 2014 20:12:22 GMT -5
A lot of the traditional Mary Sues fall in to this description: a story revolves around a protagonist, a universe revolves around a mary sue.
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Post by Raskovnik on Jun 22, 2014 20:23:53 GMT -5
Shallan Davar in Words of Radiance.
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Deleted
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Post by Deleted on Jun 22, 2014 20:30:15 GMT -5
Bella Swan She's a Mary Sue and an author insert. She hates all her schoolmates, but they love her. She's disrespectful to her father with no consequences, she is supposedly a straight A student despite never showing any exceptional intelligence, two men described as looking like Greek gods both love her for no reason, everyone goes out of their way to protect her for no reason, when she becomes a vampire, she's more powerful than other vampires, and then gives birth to a Mary Sue child. This. This. This. Whenever I feel like a character might be a Mary Sue, I compare them to Bella. And I haven't seen a character on her level yet. Only Alice from the Resident Evil series comes close. |
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Heartbreaker
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Post by Heartbreaker on Jun 22, 2014 20:35:53 GMT -5
John Cena?  |
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Post by angryfan on Jun 22, 2014 20:39:23 GMT -5
I've got a character that actually became a Mary Sue over a series of novels, but who might be a bit obscure now (despite being in like 18 books). Laurel Hamelton's Anita Blake. Started off as a necromancer who killed supernatural beings on the side. Became a pan-morphic almost vampire human who had all the powers of everyone else only better and who everyone wante4d to f***. Oh, and that last part, that's both figurative and literal, since one of her powers was, to quote Pam Poovey, being a chupcabra but for dicks.
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Post by Citizen Snips on Jun 22, 2014 21:05:20 GMT -5
Can I say Brienne of Tarth? 1-Loras Tyrell is one of the best tournament knights in the land...she beats him in a tournament 2-Jamie Lannister is the best swordsman and biggest asshole in the land...she beats him in a swordfight and he turns over a new leaf from being around her. 3-The Hound is the toughest SOB in the land...she beats him in a deathmatch. 4-Every person she has sworn to protect gets killed...people still seek out her service. Still one of my favorite GOT characters. She was only able to duel Jaime because he'd been chained up for an extended period of time and was nowhere close to being in fighting condition. Haven't seen the finale but The Hound was also not anywhere close to his peak form when he ran across her. Also, she's constantly ridiculed by nearly every character she meets for his unattractive looks and unrequited crushes on Renly and Jaime. |
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Post by Deleted on Jun 22, 2014 21:27:06 GMT -5
I'm actually surprised that there wasn't a Mary Sue character in either Star Trek movie. If done right she would be fantastic.
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