Subject: Well, when we say enjoyable Sues...
Author:
Posted on: 2013-06-10 08:19:00 UTC
We really do mean characters that exhibit every other trait of Suedom, but are written well enough to be enjoyable. To some people here, that makes them not Sues.
(To me, it just makes them Parody Sues.)
Uh... according to the PPC Wiki, there actually exists enjoyable Sues like Rapunzel from "Tangled". I got a Question: Is there any other sue that are like that?
Not really sure what to say here, except that I don't really get why Rapunzel from Tangled was crowned an enjoyable Mary Sue in the first place...
For me, that kind of has to be a matter of opinion whether it's an enjoyable Sue or not. I mean, there are some Sues that we all *know* are bad, of course, like the ones we kill in missions. But (though I haven't seen that many people excited about her on the board) some people enjoy Bella Swan as a canon Sue (personally, that's not the case. However, I do have a family member who believes this). So, yes, there are other canon Sues, and even fanfiction Sues that are very enjoyable to read. But it depends on the person who those Sues happen to be.
For example, I don't know if anyone here's read 'Mirror of Maybe'? But Harry does show a lot of Character Replacement, Gary Stu-ish traits (although he might be a boarderline Stu, but I think it's a little farther than that). However, I do enjoy the story and I've read through it a couple of times.
I think in fanfic that it tends to be much easier to find a character enjoyable, if you don't know the canon that well. In my case, I don't know the canon very well at all for X-Men. I've read the character summaries for various ones that I am interested in, like Gambit. I know the bare bones of "what", but I don't know very well the "heart" of the character.
I read and enjoyed things written in that fandom that I have no doubt would make people that have read all the comics whip out their mission writing hats. And many other things that would probably make those who hold the canon dear to their hearts would find rather wrong.
Many times I think that the positive comments on stories that are basically well-written, but completely violate canon come from people that either don't know canon or just don't care. (Also think a lot of fanon gets created this way, like Denethor or Thranduil being physically abusive, which I've seen quite a lot. People that don't know the canon that well getting their info from other people that don't know it or don't care about it.)
I can think of at least one story that I wrote a mission on, because all the characters were OOC, even the physical properties of the setting were all wrong. Judged through the lens of the canon, the story was horrendously awful. But I could see that if the author had decided to call it a world of her own creation and disassociate it from the canon she was defiling, that it would probably be considered a very good story.
I don't know if this makes sense or not.
We really do mean characters that exhibit every other trait of Suedom, but are written well enough to be enjoyable. To some people here, that makes them not Sues.
(To me, it just makes them Parody Sues.)
... in that context, is, apparently, Canon Sues. The quote from the Wiki is:
Not everyone agrees that Mary Sues can exist outside of fanfiction, but enough do that it is worthwhile to mention canon Sues. These essentially share the same traits as fanfiction Sues, although naturally the details vary, since there can be no distinction between canon and non-canon. Canon characters often described as Sues by PPCers include Drizzt do'Urden, Eragon, and Bella Swan.
Canon Sues are not necessarily disliked to the same extent that fanfiction Sues are, since by definition they can't warp their own world; it never had a different shape to begin with. Drizzt, for instance, is as widely liked as disliked, and PPC Boarders have held up Rapunzel from the movie Tangled as an example of an enjoyable Mary Sue.
I think that should read 'an enjoyable Canon Sue', since the current phrasing is contradictory. I offer no opinion on the subject of the section.
Also, can something be a Parody Sue (by your definition) if it's not written as a parody?
hS
I don't think any of the antagonists in the first couple episodes of Star Trek TOS were meant to be written with Sueish powers, but the way those episodes played out almost seemed to deconstruct common occurrences in badfics that the PPC has encountered.
So in my mind, Charlie X could be a Parody Stu because while he was handled well and fairly realistically, he still did have the power and potential to warp the fabric of reality as the crew of the Enterprise knew it, and that's something Sues are known to do more blatantly and crudely.
I'm sorry I didn't get around to responding when you posted the thread.
I never thought of those specific episodes that way, but then again, I saw them before I got into fandom, so I didn't know about Sues. Now that you mention it, though, it makes sense. Also, I will always call that virus the OOC-virus now. It appeared in the third episode of TNG, and the episode is, well, now that I think about it, kind of fanfic-y. Unlike in the TOS episode where it was an interesting exploration of the characters' inner desires(Spock...*sniff*), the TNG episode did that with one character and the rest of them...either shamelessly flirted or really paired off, if you know what I mean. And the one that did the latter was the pairing where the two people had had next to zero interaction.(Ironically, they are often shipped, despite going back to next-to-no interaction after the episode.) And I'll stop before I start ranting about how much I hate that pairing, because it's irrelevant.
Star Trek has done more deconstructions of Sue traits. Characters have been possessed multiple times, and there's a episode of TNG where Picard is replaced by an impostor and the rest of the crew have to figure it out before fake!Picard kills everyone. Then there's a Voyager episode that sometimes appears to be a parody of fanfiction - an alien discovers a crashed shuttlecraft and writes a play based on the logs, and when Lieutenant Torres finds out she has to fight an uphill battle to get him to write them in character. We also have the holodeck, which is a place for people to act out their self-insert-y fantasies. A minor character on TNG had a spotlight episode revolving around his "holo-addiction". In his simulations, he was a charming womanizer who got with Ms. Fanservice Deanna Troi, but in real life he was incredibly socially awkward. And then the Doctor on Voyager is a hologram, and his daydreams include being the captain and all of the three major female characters flirting with him. (It's absolutely hilarious.)
I'm sure there are more episodes, since over five series and ten movies Star Trek's covered pretty much everything. But Star Trek is no stranger to deconstructing and parodying Sue tropes.
I'd go with TV Tropes on this point: It can't really be a parody because the thing it was meant to parody didn't exist yet. They call it an Unbuilt Trope, where writers seem to be taking apart a tired cliche and examining it from new angles, except that the example predates the cliche.
Good to know.
Not all Sues are necessarily just pure evil. They're bad, but can still be fun characters.
Take DC and Marvel comics. You could say that the superheroes in them are Sues, and yet they often sold like crazy in their heydays, and media about them is still frequently made today.
If they were absolutely detestable Sues nobody liked, that probably wouldn't have happened.
I know my example might not be completely solid, but I feel the point had been made here.
As for the other end of the "enjoyable Sues" question, this is really a matter of opinion. One person may like what another doesn't.
In my opinion, Odin of Norse Mythology is a pretty cool Stu, which is sintering that could probably be said of all gods in mythology, and his DC design, he has a rocking eyepatch.
Again, just my opinion.
He doesn't fit the definition, seeing as being the "heartless father of the gods" is pretty much the perfect reason for being a pivotal figure in the stories he appears in. Besides, he's a background figure as much as he is a main character, and things certainly don't always go his way.
But gouging out your eye/tying yourself to the World Tree by your ankle to obtain infinite wisdom, and creating a planet from a dead body is still pretty Sue-sounding, don't you think?
I wouldn't call that Sueish at all. Odin leaves that eye behind forever - in fact, "One-eye" is a nickname he picks up afterwards, and it sticks with him up through today, as per American Gods. A Sue would, perhaps, do this and then regrow the eye; sacrifice is a heroic trait that Sues often seem to lack, or attempt and then sidestep. Creating a planet from a dead body is... what Neshomeh said - godlike, not Suelike. Gods weren't Speshul, they were the only game in town.
Sues often ape the powers of gods. Remember, the concept of gods existed before the concept of Sues, and the whole point of them was to explain the then-inexplicable in whatever ways people could dream up. They're under no obligation to make sense to us mere mortals, so I'd say that gives the storytellers some license for wild, fantastical imaginings.
In short, it's not cool to call Sue just because a character is powerful and doesn't work like a normal human.
~Neshomeh
So, maybe Odin was a bad example.
But definitely, some of the very-much-human heroes in mythology could be claimed to be pushing the bill just a bit.
It's important to bear in mind that the concept of a Sue is inextricably linked with the modern concept of what a good fictional character should be. The purpose and function of fictional characters has changed quite a lot since the likes of Hercules, Beowulf, and Gilgamesh were created. Particularly important, the mythical heroes weren't meant to be like real, relatable people. They were meant to represent an impossible ideal that people (read: men) were encouraged to strive for even without the expectation of actually achieving heroic status. They're also the product of their whole culture's oral traditions and values rather than just one writer with an inflated ego.
So, yes, by modern standards they are over the top and unbelievable, but they weren't written to suit modern readers, so it isn't necessarily fair to judge them by such standards. It's a bit like saying the Mona Lisa or Starry Night are inferior works of art because they doesn't look like something that was created on a computer.
~Neshomeh
Personally, I'd feel a bit arrogant laying modern definitions of 'Sue' on characters and stories that have been around since before this civilization. So many of our stories and tales today have descended out of the myths that were told generations ago - I think it's just a matter of different ways of storytelling.