If your story is fiction, there's a good chance that all of your characters are created in your own mind. The writer is the god of the universe they are creating, and because of that, they are entirely responsible to make sure the characters are properly fleshed out.
I'm talking about character development.
It's pretty self-evident that, in order to make a character feel real, they have to have a back story that is sometimes uncovered throughout the story. I'm not a huge fan of information dumps with back stories, but occasionally it can be useful (we will talk about this another day).
But generally speaking, a back story that is discovered by the reader makes the character feel more realistic. How can a reader empathize with the character if we know nothing about them?
Back stories aren't usually a huge problem for most writers. Even if you don't have a detailed one written out before you start (looking at you Tolkien), a story appears as you're writing. The writer always knows more about where the characters come from than the reader, and that's okay.
The biggest problem I tend to notice with character development isn't a detailed back story. It's a continuation of character development.
I'm going to use a couple of examples of poor continued character development before I go into more detail. I think a spoiler alert is necessary for the first example; unless you've seen the most recent season of Game of Thrones, I'd suggest you skip this one.
- Petyr Baelish
Lord Petyr Baelish, also known as Little Finger, was an extremely interesting character from early on. He used his main assets (which included his formidable brothel) to gather secrets of the kingdom, and bend things to fit his agenda. His obsession with Catelyn Stark was creepy, and had just a twinge of romanticism that made us slightly sympathetic towards him. He was smart, scary, and overall an excellent character (though not a very good person). As the story went on, his obsession with Sansa made us question his infatuation with the Stark women, and wonder what was up his sleeve.
Throughout most of the early series, Little Finger is one step ahead of everyone else. He's untouchable, and his rise to power is methodical. It started looking like he might end up on the Iron Throne himself.
He was a promising character. His backstory wasn't over-the-top, but it was well developed, and we knew just enough to guess at his motives. When he sold Sansa to the Boltons, it still felt like a power grab, and we knew his motives were cynical and selfish.
Then this most recent season happened, and his character stagnated. His role was mainly reduced to him looming in the shadows, and occasionally looking creepily at Sansa. We know that she distrusts him, thanks to the whole Bolton thing, but that's as far as the relationship with them goes. He's supposedly setting himself up to advise her, although at this point it's hard to say if he's obsessed because of his infatuation with the Stark women or because she's Lady of Winterfell.
Little Finger has, until this point, been famous for talking himself out of situations, sneaking around behind everyone's back easily, and being a generally nuisance for all of Westeros and beyond.
And yet for some reason, his character flatlines in season 7. He feels very much like a bland support character and (SPOILERS), when he dies, the entire situation feels contrived, forced, and not very much like the demise of Lord Petyr Baelish.
The problem is simple: they stopped developing his character. They focused heavily on the myriad of other characters and romances (which is a rant for another day), and let one of their better characters die before he was even killed.
- Love Interests
This one isn't so much a single example, as an overarching problem with a lot of stories. Some more notable than others, but the generic problem is when a developing character, sometimes an already well developed character, meets a love interest and then their personality changes, and suddenly, they're very bland and one dimensional.
An easy example of this is in the show Warehouse 13. While this show wasn't well-written in the first place, there were some interesting themes, and the characters were fun.
Myka, one of the main characters, was the epitome of a strong woman. Most of the early show taunt the idea of romance between her and her partner, Pete, which would have made sense, even if it was extremely predictable.
Rather than pursue the obvious and entirely overdone story line of partners falling in love, the writers took a turn towards something that they thought would be more fun; bringing in H.G. Wells as a woman, and throwing a potential romance between Myka and her.
Yes, the concept was ridiculous and cringe worthy, but that's not what made it so bad. Both Pete and Myka completely stopped in any character development at this point. Pete started out as a funny character, with a decent sense of humor, and a dark side that did a pretty good job of rounding him out. Myka was smart, and a little damaged thanks to the death of her partner, and occasionally that tripped her up, in spite of her iron nerves. When the H.G. Wells potential romance was introduced, Pete stopped being funny and a little dark, and instead became a bumbling idiot with ill-timed jokes. Myka started to get clumsy and sappy, like the stereotypical girl-in-love with a dash of confusion. Character development stagnated, and they became a stereotype of their former selves. The writers ceased any effort into the two main characters, and instead tried to use the tried-and-not-always-true method of throwing a love interest into the story, and tried to let that carry the future episodes.
Needless to say, I lost interest and didn't make it through the rest of the show.
These are just a smattering of examples of what happens when character development stagnates. It's all well and good to have a fleshed out back story, but when a character that was moving forward comes to a screeching halt, any situation you put them in tends to feel contrived and forced, and the character looses any empathy from the audience.
These are examples from either main characters (Pete and Myka) or important support cast (Lord Baelish, although honestly there isn't exactly a main character in GoT). Character stagnation in main characters or secondary characters is extremely dangerous to your story line, as they are the ones carrying the actual plot.
Barely-there support characters, such as the other Tributes in The Hunger Games, don't suffer as much from stagnation; mainly because they don't need to be quite as developed. For example, many of the Tributes in The Hunger Games, while important to Katniss and Peeta's character development, were written primarily for the singular purpose of being killed off. They had back stories, and sometimes you find out a little bit about them, like where they came from, but aside from that, they are support cast, and won't suffer from stagnation, because there's not enough of them to stagnate.
Quick in-and-out characters, like Rue for example, also are easy to keep from stagnating. She wasn't in the story for long, but her character was quickly and easily developed, and then killed for the sole purpose of development for Katniss. Later, as she is remembered, you can learn small bits of information about her, but as a whole, her character was built quickly, used, and then promptly disposed of.
It's important to keep the story flowing, and sometimes that means getting rid of a character. It's always better to let a character leave the main arc of the story, whether by death or actually just leaving for a while, than to let them sit and do nothing.
In the Anne of Green Gables books, Anne's potential romance with Gilbert Blythe starts early, and becomes an important plot-point later in the series. But during the periods when Gilbert is superfluous to Anne's life, especially when she is developing into a young adult, Gilbert is conveniently not around. His character is mentioned, and continues to develop behind the scenes in subtle ways, but L.M. Montgomery doesn't keep him sitting around twiddling this thumbs. He is off on his own adventures, developing into a young adult, and learning things along the way. He is a support, and then secondary character, who develops well, even when he's not directly involved in the story.
So, if you start to develop a character, make sure you keep going. There are few things that ruin the flow of a story like forgetting someone who was very important at one time. Make sure you tie things up with anyone who's life might come into question by the reader. Sometimes this means giving them a dramatic exit, other times it's gently phasing them out of the story. But always keep your characters moving forward. Much like in real life, they must either adapt and evolve, or die.
Cheers!
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