Text Mary Sue Litmus Test

[Dave 5,715]

http://www.springhole.net/writing/marysue.htm

 

I think this is a good tool for all writers to use, to try and gauge your characters and how you're putting them together. I get caught on a couple of these traps myself, and it's good just to run your work through and see how you come out, just to get a second opinion.

[Oishii 3,987]

I disagree.  I hate the whole Mary Sue complex the fanfiction community has created.  It's just a way to use name calling on a person's story.  But the whole notion of what dictates a Mary Sue doesn't get at the real problem.  It doesn't matter if a character has purple hair, a funny name, and can spontaneously generate flaming bunnies.  If the writer is good at their craft, they can sell it.  If they didn't write it well, people will be critical.  Unfortunately, the fanfiction community has been turned into a high school where name calling and labeling is the first go to solution.  It doesn't help the writer find the flaws in their character development, plot, universe construction, ect. where the true problem is.

 

Sorry if I'm a bit harsh, but I've seen too many young writers feel afraid to write because they worry about their characters being labeled a Mary Sue.  It's killing writers that could grow to have a real talent someday.

[Javelin434 3,164]

I just might add this for TvTropes!

[Henne 150]

It doesn't matter if a character has purple hair, a funny name, and can spontaneously generate flaming bunnies.  If the writer is good at their craft, they can sell it.

 

It depends on the FF.

If you write one where no character can have purple hair but still does, it is "wrong".

It's the same with names. I find it annoying whenever I read a Naruto FF and then there are characters with names like "Christina". Sure, a name does not make a Mary Sue.

[Oishii 3,987]

It depends on the FF.

If you write one where no character can have purple hair but still does, it is "wrong".

It's the same with names. I find it annoying whenever I read a Naruto FF and then there are characters with names like "Christina". Sure, a name does not make a Mary Sue.

Then that's a problem with the world development and FF has the problem where you are already given a universe with set rules.  But then you could make a story where national powers are taking interest in the events taking place in Japan. A US based organization has sent a group of martial artist to infiltrate and find out their source of power and bring back what intel they gather.  I spunky girl named Christina who took to dying her hair purple would be sell-able under that context (granted I don't know much about Naruto but you get what I'm saying).  This could turn into an interesting story, but under the great laws of Mary Sueness, she is already a horrible character, how dare she exist.

[Dave 5,715]

I disagree.  I hate the whole Mary Sue complex the fanfiction community has created.  It's just a way to use name calling on a person's story.  But the whole notion of what dictates a Mary Sue doesn't get at the real problem.  It doesn't matter if a character has purple hair, a funny name, and can spontaneously generate flaming bunnies.  If the writer is good at their craft, they can sell it.  If they didn't write it well, people will be critical.  Unfortunately, the fanfiction community has been turned into a high school where name calling and labeling is the first go to solution.  It doesn't help the writer find the flaws in their character development, plot, universe construction, ect. where the true problem is.

 

Sorry if I'm a bit harsh, but I've seen too many young writers feel afraid to write because they worry about their characters being labeled a Mary Sue.  It's killing writers that could grow to have a real talent someday.

 

While I do think the term gets thrown around freely, I still think there's a good reason why people view a Mary Sue character as a problem in writing. It isn't just a matter of aesthetics: a Mary Sue presents problems for the story, how its told, and what it contains:

 

-Hinderances: A good story will make it so the character will have to overcome some kind of obstacle that challenges them, because if the main character is already the master of something essential that will dictate whether he succeeds or not, then there isn't much of a quest for him or her to go on. For instance, if Frodo was a great fighter with the ability to fly or defeat the Nazgul by himself, then his quest to get to Mordor would have been much less compelling. What made his story interesting was that the going was hard, and he had an extremely difficult time overcoming it. If the main character has the power to defeat any and all obstacles in his/her way without a hitch, the story loses a great deal of suspense.

 

-Character Arc: Continuing off that idea, if the writer has made a character who is essentially at the peak of everything they can be, then there is no where for that character to go, emotionally or physically. They can't develop this character, because they are already perfect (or, at least, are where the writer wants them to be already), so the character becomes stagnant. And with there being nothing for the character to work for, there's no real story at all.

 

Character interaction: There's a tendency to simplify the world around the Mary Sue: Since this character is always right, any character who does not agree immediately with the protagonist is portrayed as unsympathetic or foolish, while anyone who is on their side is championed. That doesn't make for good character interaction, because it creates a very flat and uninteresting world within the story, where there are no differing dynamics in between people.

 

 

 

Creating a Mary Sue isn't necessarily the end-all of a story, but it doesn't do the story itself a whole lot of favors.

[Oishii 3,987]

 

 

I'm not excusing that there are writers who will make a story that lacks an adequate plot curve, character development, or lack thereof.  I have a problem with the term Mary Sue as it is meant to be insulting.  There are stereotypes of a "Mary Sue" and what this kind of character is can vary from person to person.  But in the end it's labeling.  It's mean to go to a person and say, "Your story is full of Mary Sues, here is what's wrong with them and how you can fix it", the same way as it's mean to say, "You're a bastard, here is what is wrong with you and how you can fix it." It's hurtful to people to have their characters insulted with labels just as it is to label a person.

[Zola 3,038]

Genius.  o.o

[Philip Ellwell 5,487]

I'd shoot myself before writing such a bad enough character to get it labeled a " Mary Sue": My characters are gonna suffer, and it ain't nevah gonna be easy to deal with it.

[RoxSox 3,593]

Oh man, Shuriken got eighty. 

[Philip Ellwell 5,487]

They say Xion's a Mary Sue.....

O.O

Please don't kill me.

[Anonn0000 3,525]

LOL I was gonna take this quiz as myself just now then thought "nooooo bad idea".

 

I toke this test with my fake pokemon girl once.

 

It didn't turn out TOO bad.....whether or not you can believe me, kh13 fans, i guess thats all up ta you lol...

[Shana09 5,769]

The only problem about this is that sometimes the characters aren't really Mary Sues, I mean there are 50 billion ways for the character to do something or get something but this test a bit too general.