James Bond could get away with it in the 1960 and 70s. The women practically jumped into Sean Connery's lap. The gad guys were caught with ease. And I don't even think he got some of his suits dirty dirty a fight.
Even Super Heros has Flaws
But you can't get away with that if you want to sell your spec script. Your characters need to have dimension and that means they have to have flaws. Even Indiana Jones, who was practically a super hero without the powers, had has flaws. He couldn't stop following his artifacts, even at the cost of life and limb. He had to learn that maybe some people (namely Marion) were more important artifacts.
So while you're creating your characters, don't forget the main ingredient — flaws. They need them.
Posts
3 comments:
Okay it's hilarious you bring this up now. My good friend M and I have been having an ongoing discussion about this for the last week or so.
We came to the following conclusion:
No Flaws = okay characters
Flaws = great characters
Also there is a name for this:
The main character was perfect. He was bullet proof. I call it the "I'm cool and chicks dig me" syndrome.
It's called "Mary-sue" (or in the male case "Mary-Stu") The character is perfect usually to the fault of all others.
{also can I just mention you're kind of weirding me out a bit? I was seriously going to email you and ask you a question about characters and flaws and you just managed to answer the entire thing without me asking}
That is kind of weird you were going to ask me about this. Chalk it up to creepy Halloween stuff. :-)
Hmmm may have to do that. It is funny though how it worked out. ;)
Post a Comment