We all love creating characters, and we want to make them feel like they could be real people. But at the end of the day, characters aren’t real people - they act as tools to help tell our stories, while hopefully still coming across as having a three-dimensional history and personality. Today we wanted to talk about how to interpret characters as storytelling tools - and what to do when your audience gets a little too invested.

In this Episode:




• How important is it to you in figuring out the purpose of your characters in the narrative?
• Has there been a character in your work - OR in another work you love - where you think readers treat their behavior as if they were real? What do people think of them, and why do you think that is?
• What are some pitfalls you see writers fall into when they treat characters too much like people in their story?

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Episode Release Date: March 18, 2026

Episode Credits:

Ally Rom Colthoff (@varethane) - she/they, chirault.sevensmith.net wychwoodcomic.com

Rae Baade - they/them, https://empyreancomic.com

Star Prichard - she/her, https://thestarfishface.com/ https://castoff-comic.com/

Claire Niebergall (Clam) - she/her, https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.

Transcription

This transcript is auto generated by our recording software.
people in their story?

Notes:

Lead Out TEMPLATE

Host: [comment relevant to what the last person said]. Anyway, that is a roasted red pepper and goat cheese wrap, thank you so much for listening! I’ve been your host, [name], and you can check out my work at [comic title or URL].’

[Other participants repeat their names and comic titles]

Host: And well see ya later, slappers!

Transcript:

00:00.86

Varethane

Hello and welcome to Screen Tones, where we talk anything and everything webcomics. Today we're going to be talking about what makes a character real, or maybe not real enough, and what that means when you're engaging with them as a reader. I'm Varethane, my pronouns are she/they, and I make the webcomics Wychwood and Chirault.

00:20.56

Claire

I'm Claire, also known as Clam, my pronouns are she/her. I make the webcomic Phantomarine.

00:27.48

Rae

And I'm Rae, my pronouns are they/them, and I make the webcomics On Empyrean High and Overlord of Ravenfell.

00:36.18

Star

And I'm Star, I use she/her pronouns, and my webcomic is Castoff.

00:41.91

Varethane

So we all love creating characters. I know I'm speaking for myself here, but possibly for a lot of other folks that the characters are kind of what make me get really excited about my comic.

00:53.34

Varethane

And while you're writing them, we want to make them feel as if they could be real people. But at the end of the day, characters are not actually real people. They act as tools to help us tell our stories, but still hopefully can come across as having a three-dimensional history and personality and be a complex person.

01:13.78

Varethane

So today we wanted to talk about how to interpret characters as storytelling tools and what to do if your audience gets a little too invested and just kind of talk about the subject overall because… it's interesting, there's some interesting stuff here! So I'm going to go into the first question, which is: how important is it to you to figure out the purpose of your characters in the narrative?

01:39.42

Varethane

And that'll be Clam first.

01:42.22

Claire

Okay. I think I run into this problem where I feel bad because I actually try to think about characters as tools first versus like, what's their personality? What do they look like? Like I—there's a few of my characters that have kind of sprung whole cloth from my brain as like, this is a real person and I know exactly how they talk and I know what they're all about. And I know, I already know why they're there in the story, but there's more of them where I'm like, I don't know everything about you yet, but I know why you're here.

02:17.21

Claire

And I think there's—it doesn't happen too often, but I do notice some shows, movies, games, even, where sometimes I look at a character, I'm like, why are you here? Like, I might like you, I might realize that the author really likes you and clearly, like, wants you to be here. But at the end of the story, I kind of look back and I'm like, I don't know what purpose you served. Like, what were you trying to say? How did you reflect on the theme? What were you kind of in relation to the other characters? I think there's plenty of room sometimes for just a character for character's sake because you just think that this would be fun or you think that it's appropriate. But even that is itself a tool. Like having fun with a character and creating them as...kind of way to spice up the story is itself a tool. So I don't know. I think a lot about like starting from the storytelling viewpoint of like, why do I want this character here? But then as a story goes on, like every character that I've made that started that way has blossomed into something else, something more complex as the story went on. So I think, I don't know, I find it kind of a nice starting point to be like, what is your purpose? What do I want you to be? And how can I get you to be that, but then also a little bit more?

03:51.84

Varethane

Yeah, it can be an interesting concept because there's definitely a balance between figuring out their utility for the story, but also making them still feel like you have that passion and personality and investment. And sometimes these things might jar up against each other. Before I get going on this too much, let's hear Rae's answer.

04:17.24

Rae

So for me, I do think it's very important to figure out what the purpose of your characters are in your narrative. A lot of my characters stem from RPs, so sometimes I have to pare them down to fit the narrative, or even sometimes I cut them depending on how much of my story is based off of the original roleplay. So I'll often look at it and go, you know, this is kind of bogging down the story. I need to cut this entire character from here because they aren't really contributing in other ways for what I want to be the main story. So I definitely think it's important in that aspect. And also you don't really want to be like those multi-season shounen where certain characters finish their purpose, but they kind of just hang around there and cheer on the main character, but don't really do much else.

05:13.56

Rae

I do actually find it more frustrating when a character hangs around with nothing to do rather than being written out of the story some way. Because there's really nothing wrong with having certain characters take a backseat in the narrative once they've fulfilled their purpose.

05:36.60

Varethane

Yeah, I feel like we've all read stories like that in a lot of mainstream media and manga tends to be awful for it because I think a lot of the publishers of those types of stories that are marketed to such a huge—like they expect big numbers from those series and they'll run those polls with the readership to determine what the favorite characters are, like basically a popularity contest among the cast of the story. And whoever wins it, they get to stick around for the next season or the next arc or the next batch of chapters. But sometimes, like, what if a character that is not the author's favorite wins the popularity contest and now they have to keep them around, but they don't actually...

06:19.31

Varethane

like them that much. So they're just kind of there. They're still in the story, but they don't have anything to do. It's definitely a thing that can happen. I see it and it's very frustrating.

06:32.19

Claire

That's my nightmare.

06:33.73

Varethane

I know, right?

06:37.62

Varethane

But yeah, characters as marketing tools is definitely one way in which they can fulfill utility. I got more thoughts on that one, but I'm going to let Star answer first.

06:48.86

Star

Yeah, so I actually have kind of a fun story for this one because I would say that most of my characters, not just in Castoff, but also just in general, are created as like, I have a purpose for them first. I don't necessarily remember every single character. Okay, Vector, my main character, actually was...

07:14.22

Star

He came to me in a dream, quite literally. I still cringe a little bit telling that story, but so obvious...

07:19.92

Varethane

That's amazing.

07:20.79

Star

Thank you I fever dream in college after a color theory class. Anyway... But yeah, so it's like I just—this Blorbo descended from the heavens and was like, “Make a webcomic about me.”

07:32.51

Star

And I was like, “Give me like four years.”

07:35.38

Varethane

Yes, master.

07:35.61

Star

And so, you know, sometimes that happens. And I have other characters where it's like, okay, I need this character—this character needs someone to talk to in this scene. And so I just make up a weird little dude.

07:53.05

Star

And then what usually happens nine times out of 10 is that weird little dude will evolve into this whole actual character. Like I'll have just like, I need you for one scene. And they're like, what if I was one of your favorite characters actually? And I'm like, Oh no. Well now I have to keep you around because you've entered Blorbo status.

08:13.78

Star

I think the weirdest way a character has ever wormed their way into a story...

08:23.65

Star

Actually, if we go really far back, this has happened multiple times in Castoff. Because the thing was, when I was first developing Castoff, I had another webcomic going at the time. And Castoff's storyline was, I made up this character, and they're too weird and fantastic like fantasy to fit in my current like modern day setting webcomic. So I'm going to put them in this side project that I've been working on forever and I'll find a spot for them. And if I can't, I'll put them somewhere else. And that's how Frankie made it into the story.

08:57.17

Star

One of like, I would say probably the most popular character in the comic came from an art collaboration I did with friends. Have you guys ever done the thing where you like—one person sketches a character and then one person inks it and then one person draws it and you like go around in a circle and you do that?

09:18.39

Star

Frankie came from one of those.

09:18.66

Rae

Yep.

09:20.99

Star

I just drew this character with like this weird clock robot eye. And then I was like, I like him. I'm going to keep him. And I just yeeted him into the story and I was like, I'll find a use for you.

09:31.47

Star

And now he is legitimately one of the most popular characters in the comic. I don't control this.

09:38.74

Varethane

Whomst among us does?

09:38.84

Star

So the answer is, it's like a 50-50 shot. Sometimes it's important. Sometimes I just catch Blorbo disease and I'm like, well, you live here now. I will find a use for you.

09:50.52

Rae

A lot of my characters, since they were from RPs, also came like, well, I need my character to talk to this person. And then suddenly they have a personality, so I have to name them.

10:03.13

Rae

And then I have to draw them.

10:05.78

Star

Well, if you're gonna name them, then you gotta do this thing.

10:06.29

Rae

Yeah, right.

10:08.50

Star

And if you're gonna do this thing, then you might as well, like, do that thing. you might as well...

10:11.51

Varethane

It's like when you take home a stray, you've named it. It's too late.

10:14.55

Rae

Yeah.

10:14.94

Star

You got attached.

10:15.66

Rae

The cat distribution services. Sometimes there's just a Blorbo distribution service.

10:21.85

Star

Yes!

10:25.47

Varethane

The Blorbo adopts you. You don't have a choice.

10:29.34

Star

This is what Foster's Home for Imaginary Friends was about.

10:32.48

Varethane

Oh god.

10:36.65

Varethane

For my own stuff, um I think that that whole thing actually—similar to Ray, a lot of my characters started in some way from some kind of like, if not RP, something kind of adjacent to it, like playing... Some of them come all the way back from playing pretend in elementary school and just getting these little seeds, seeds of characters who evolved in a totally organic setting where there was no real plan. Like there wasn't a framework of story to put them into. They were just kind of like, oh, I have this little person just kind of at the back of my mind who I think, you know, well, here's what their personality is like and here's kind of what they look like, and they have a name.

11:22.02

Varethane

And I would just kind of pull them out when I was hanging out with other people. The main duo in Chirault evolved out of a paint chat RP where I would draw a character on the screen and then other people would interact with them and poke them, bother them and draw bugs beside them. And then like, oops, turns out that they're afraid of bugs. That's where Kieran's fear of bugs came from fundamentally,

11:45.47

Varethane

is because people were interacting with this guy in a paint chat setting. There was no utility, there's no plot that I was trying to put this character into initially. And then I was like, but I like this guy. I like this dynamic that I've kind of built up with these other interactions. So maybe I'll think of a way that I could put them into a story. And I started constructing Chirault.

12:07.38

Varethane

And I feel like the beginning of a lot of my story starts that way, where I'm sort of seeing them more as people and not thinking about them as tools in a narrative. But then the more elaborate the story gets,

12:21.39

Varethane

it needs more characters. And I mean, like you guys were saying, like, well, they need somebody to talk to in this scene or somebody has to come and initiate this next plot device. Because if they're just alone in a room with nobody to talk to, that's not a story. They need things to do, which probably includes other people.

12:40.10

Varethane

And a lot—some of those other people would enter the story as tools and then slowly get more and more fleshed out. But I feel like the farther along in the story

12:51.15

Varethane

it gets, the further the needle swings towards the tool side of it. A character introduced in like chapter three is more likely to be one of the Blorbos who's been repurposed for it or someone who I kind of put in and I'm like, I'm going to leave room for this person to evolve organically.

13:09.37

Varethane

But the characters who get introduced in like chapter 15 or 16, I need to have a plan at that point. I'm entering like the main thrust of the plot. I'm starting to think about how I'm going to end this thing. And any piece that I put into that puzzle, which is already huge and sprawling, I can't let it— can't let it grow too much.

13:28.96

Varethane

Otherwise, it's just going to explode the story and add another hundred pages to it. And so I'm a lot more strict with those later characters who are definitely much more introduced to be a—to serve a function.

13:45.05

Rae

How many hundreds of pages have you added to your stories, Thane?

13:50.99

Varethane

Redacted. It's a multiple number.

13:56.04

Claire

A few hundred

13:57.36

Star

What's 100 pages? What could it hurt?

14:00.48

Varethane

You know, it's just 100 pages. a big deal.

14:02.95

Star

What's the harm?

14:04.74

Star

It's fine. Do it for your blorbos.

14:07.97

Varethane

I won't say how much was added over my initial plan because I didn't really have a concrete picture of how long Chirault was going to be when I started, but it clocked in 1267 pages.

14:19.61

Varethane

And Wychwood is at about 700 right now with probably another 500 to go. And I did plan on having that one be like 500 pages when I started. I don't know what I was thinking. I don't think my brain works that way.

14:33.26

Varethane

I can't make things short.

14:36.35

Star

What's a short story? I've never seen one before.

14:39.47

Varethane

Yep.

14:39.83

Star

I don't think they exist.

14:40.19

Varethane

Yep. Oh, there is one other thing that I did want to mention before I go into the next question, um which is that the characters who do get introduced, regardless of whether they're a tool or whether they're people, I feel like there still has to be some seed of passion to them if they're not just going to be like they appear for one scene if they're a part of the main cast. And there's one example of a character who fails kind of on both metrics, which is unfortunately the main character of Final Fantasy XII, Vaughn.

15:18.00

Varethane

And the story of that game's production was a little bit troubled. It was sort of written by a whole bunch of committees who all had different ideas of where they wanted the plot to go. And each of those kind of committees, they had their favorite characters. So they would get a lot of development and investment. And so you had some really strong characters in the primary cast.

15:39.67

Varethane

But then the executives of the company itself needed to have a marketable teenager for the audience to latch on to because that was the target demographic of the game. And they required that the writers add a young, relatable protagonist to be the figurehead of the whole project. And then the trouble was, like, they did—the developers, the creators did it, they had to.

16:05.13

Varethane

But I feel like you can kind of tell that none of them had a plan for this character. So they're just, they're there the whole time. They have a little bit of a setup connecting them to the plot very loosely. But then no further development. And so they're the main character, but they feel like a footnote, like they could just exist in the background of a scene. And I feel like that's a situation that I would really want to avoid. Like, so regardless of what the character is for, if you have to force them in, it's probably going to be a problem.

16:37.94

Claire

My favorite redeemed version of a character like that is actually one that I know you will absolutely be like, yes, yes, that one. And it's Enzo Matrix from Reboot.

16:47.86

Varethane

Yes, yes!

16:47.93

Claire

I know they, like, the original story is they had to put in like a kid character. This is a Saturday morning cartoon. There are adult characters that are like the heroes and the villains, but the producers were very specific.

17:02.16

Claire

They're like, we need a kid character that's like the focal point for the audience because, of course, the kids aren't looking at the adults being like, they're so cool. They need like a kid to tell them to look at the adults and think that they're cool for some reason.

17:15.90

Claire

And so like, Enzo, if you've never seen Reboot, Enzo starts out as this super hyperactive kid. He's super into everything. He's excited.

17:24.47

Varethane

It's like the plucky little brother.

17:24.82

Claire

Yeah, he's the plucky little brother. But as the show goes on, like, the things that they do with this character are so interesting and so fascinating. And they take what was originally like a studio mandate and they make him into one of the most complex characters on the show.

17:46.68

Claire

They hurt him like emotionally. And then he grows from that. And then he has to grow even more from the growing of that. Like he's—there's so many layers to just one character that originally was just like, you have to include this. And I'm so happy that they did that in the end.

18:08.97

Star

I've never seen this show, and so hearing out of context, they took this child and they hurt him and just sounding so excited about that.

18:18.48

Star

I was like, whoa, what's going on up there?

18:20.57

Claire

I promise I promise, I promise it's actually like, it's really good.

18:24.72

Varethane

It's really good. Time travel is involved.

18:26.84

Claire

Yes, time travel is involved.

18:30.04

Star

I see.

18:31.19

Varethane

So I guess I guess kind of the moral of this story, I mean, the whole idea of a studio mandate is not something that most webcomic artists are going to have to be dealing with, generally by virtue of like all of us are doing this kind of on our own impetus. But I think there are—sometimes the pressure of trying to make something that will become popular. It is possible that people might feel like they need to have something shaped like this in the story in order to become popular, and I feel like, just make sure that you like the thing if you're going to do anything like that.

19:07.32

Rae

So what you're saying I shouldn't do a redeemed villainous

19:11.22

Varethane

I mean if you really want that, if you love it, if you love it and want to do it, then do it.

19:17.39

Varethane

But if you don't love it and you feel like you have to do it just because it's going to be popular, I don't know, maybe think about that one.

19:26.81

Varethane

So I do want to start getting into the next question, which is, has there been a character in your work or in another work that you love where you think readers treat their behavior as if they're real? And what do people think of them?

19:43.19

Varethane

And why do you think that that is? I'm going to toss this one over to Clam.

19:47.29

Claire

Yes, yes, I have those. And it's simultaneously like, it's an honor to have readers become that invested in a character.

20:01.02

Claire

But also, there have been a couple of occasions where I'm just like, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa. whoa whoa whoa whoa, like, I'm very glad that you are thinking this deeply and feeling this deeply about what this character is doing. But I also—I want to gently take your hand and like, let's go get a coffee. Let's go calm down. Like this, this character is not real.

20:22.58

Claire

Ultimately, like, at the end of every day, these characters are not real. They represent real things. and real emotions, often ones that I've had. I think the reason that sometimes these characters do, I guess, elicit these responses is it does feel real and it comes from a real place. I've had two instances with both of my villains. One is kind of the sad, wet cat villain, and one is like the legit...

20:51.26

Claire

evil, like angry, vindictive one. And I've had such interesting responses on a couple different occasions on the moments where they really lose it. They become so emotional about their situations that they kind of break down. And it has been really interesting to see on those specific pages, like those are the ones where I get a comment where somebody gets...

21:18.97

Claire

It's like they're trying to write the rest of the character's story before I have even explained the whole thing, because they've seen a kernel of truth in that character's response that they then relate to their own experience with other people. And they're like, oh, this must be what's going on.

21:40.50

Claire

And unfortunately for me, sometimes that kind of A to B to C throughline goes in a direction that I don't intend in their head. And I can't control that. Sometimes you know, I think like, oh, did I write it wrong? Did I give the wrong impression? Oftentimes I think, from the comment itself, I usually just get the sense that this person has a history and I've unlocked that history a little bit.

22:07.86

Claire

And part of me is like, I'm amazed that that happened, but I also... I almost feel sorry because I'm like, I didn't mean to, you know, bring out this memory for you or this interpretation. like I'm just sitting here making my Barbie dolls angry, like realistically. But for you, it was something much more. So I think about it a lot where like, I love that people would interpret a character as like, this is a real person with a real emotion that I am reacting to.

22:43.16

Claire

But you also have to look back and see, you know, me doing the little you know shadow puppets on the cave wall and be like, oh, wait, like Claire's doing this. Claire is in control of this. because these characters are not real. like Maybe I should just be talking to Claire and being like, hey, what do you mean with this? Before I launch into a tirade about like, this character is, interpreting this poorly, or this character shouldn't be behaving like this, when I'm like, hang on, I have more to say.

23:11.67

Claire

Please don't go too far with it. But yeah, I don't know. I'm of two minds. I'm like, thank you for caring that much. But also, you don't need to care that much, please.

23:23.39

Varethane

It feels all too easy for people to forget that with webcomics or any serialized thing that isn't complete yet, you're only ever seeing a part of the picture, I guess, so depending on the work itself, because I see people do it with TV shows as well.

23:38.72

Varethane

Like an episode comes out and it's like, oh, this is so problematic or something like that.

23:39.00

Claire

Yes.

23:43.12

Varethane

And it's like, well, it's not done.

23:43.38

Claire

It gets explained like two weeks later and you're like, oh, but people don't apologize for jumping too far ahead. So like, I don't know.

23:53.05

Varethane

You want to be like, well, don't you feel silly now? But like, no, social media has moved on.

23:57.02

Claire

Yeah, exactly. Yeah.

24:01.86

Varethane

How about you, Rae?

24:04.91

Rae

Unfortunately, I do think a lot of people tend to take characters as real people way too seriously a lot these days.

24:17.02

Rae

I do think some of it stems from purity culture and belief that your morals are reflected in the kinds of media that you read. But, you know, sadly, that's something that a lot of times just has to be cured by time. I do think that a lot of people also need to give a bit more grace in the types of stories that these characters appear in. You know, the people that always comment in a theater about for like a horror movie, “Oh, why are they going in that dark hallway? Don't they know that they're going to be murdered?” It's like, no, no, they don't. That's the kind of story that this is.

25:04.22

Rae

But I also think that treating characters as real people often especially seems to affect villains. Because you get a lot of people that just hate villains. They don't understand why people like them.

25:21.69

Rae

And a lot of people that tend to like them are people that appreciate them as narrative tools because they tend to be very active parts of the story rather than reactive and I especially appreciate them doing everything in the story in service of their goal and the people that reduced them to like oh this character is just a war criminal. It's like, yes, but he's actually giving the protagonist something to do because he's a war criminal.

25:58.07

Rae

So I definitely do think that sometimes just treating these characters as people doesn't consider the genre or their role a lot of the time.

26:15.38

Varethane

Yeah, it definitely can get awkward with certain genres too. Like, especially if readers need to like the characters in the things that they're reading, like the additional assumption would be that the person making it also has to like and agree with all the characters in it. But I think if that were the case, then the whole horror genre, especially the slasher genre, would just have to not exist.

26:40.31

Varethane

Like you can't really reconcile it with that worldview.

26:44.73

Star

Yes, I definitely have several things to say about that. But first, one of the things that I wanted to say was, I feel like as humans, we are prone to looking at something that is not human and applying human traits to it, which is one of the reasons why this happens so often.

27:02.01

Star

I mean, how often have you been like taking a walk and you see a tree and there's like just... the perfect shape of just like some knots in the tree and it looks like a face. It's just, it's literally three circles and you and your brain assign it a face and say, oh, it's a character now.

27:21.14

Rae

Like the people that put googly eyes on their Roombas and call it pet names and then they get sad when they get stuck.

27:29.78

Star

Yeah, Divine Beast Va-Roomba.

27:30.36

Varethane

I do love those photos.

27:34.19

Star

That's what mine is called. He's been broken for several months.

27:37.04

Claire

That's amazing.

27:37.29

Rae

Poor Roomba.

27:37.33

Varethane

Beautiful.

27:38.21

Rae

Oh, wait, no, I'm characterizing him now.

27:40.02

Star

Yeah, exactly. You've done it. You've done the thing. You just did. Do you see? We've done a live demonstration for you, podcast listener. But yeah, just kind of feeding off what Thane says is that sometimes people just, they see a character in a work who was designed as a tool. They were designed to tell a story. And maybe the tool is not always morally correct. Maybe the villain character needs to do bad things in order to be a villain. Now that on its own is not necessarily a bad thing because that's how the story happens is that bad things happen. Protagonist, you know, in general wants to set out to stop the bad thing from happening. That can be any scale from like massive save the world fantasy to just more nuanced small stuff is like, “Oh, my, this guy stole my friend's dog and I have to go get it back.” That kind of thing.

28:36.57

Star

The problem will come in, and I have had people do this to me many times, where they see a villain or even just like a character who's not a nice person or a good person or like a morally okay person.

28:52.98

Star

They have nuance, they have flaws. And they say, wow, that person in this story just did a bad thing? That means that the person who made them is okay with people doing this bad thing, and then I get called a war criminal over something that happened in my webcomic, and I'm like, no, we've gone too far.

29:14.32

Star

I need you to turn around and figure out what road you turn down, because this is not the right one that you're supposed to be on. Just... just go away this has happened

29:23.21

Rae

But Star, you drew all those dead people. They're dead now.

29:29.75

Claire

We are dragging you to the Hague as we speak. You will stand trial.

29:36.34

Star

No, I’ll have you know I'm gonna sit, thanks. But no, like just one example of this is, I have a character in Castoff who is barely a character. I did not even give this guy a name. He is just cart guy to me. And his whole purpose in the storyline is to drive a cart that gets the characters from point A to point B and drop some exposition, be a douchebag, and then get the shit kicked out of him. Like that is the end of his character arc is he's an asshole. And then he gets the shit beat out of him. And I've had people just, you know, like make memes with this character. Cause they think he's just like, he's so shallow. He's fun to dunk on.

30:24.00

Star

And I have gotten anonymous hate comments from people being like, f—ing, wow. I can't believe that Star put this character in her comic. That must mean that she is also racist. And I'm like, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa.

30:37.02

Star

Did you not get that this is not a character we are supposed to be rooting for? Did you need me to show him getting killed on screen to make sure that you understand I'm not on his side?

30:51.33

Star

Like, what? Where? How?

30:53.40

Rae

One of the interesting things I've always found about a lot of these feelings for these characters... is they often only take like this one certain part of their personality and extrapolate from it.

31:10.81

Rae

And sometimes they don't even take the overall character development of the character in. They just take their initial first impression of it and run with that. Which I've seen it with some characters like in Final Fantasy where, oh, they're an asshole at first, but then they kind of sacrifice themselves for the greater good or something like that. But people are still going, oh, why do you like that character? He just did this one thing that ruined everything. And it's like,

31:50.46

Rae

because I like the complete arc of his character. Not just that one tiny bit where he's being a jerk.

32:02.42

Star

But he committed war crimes onscreen. That means you like war criminals.

32:06.84

Rae

Oh I guess I do, oops.

32:10.83

Star

And I will now judge you for it.

32:11.03

Varethane

Oops.

32:12.40

Star

Forever. And I will send you anonymous hate messages on Tumblr.com.

32:17.98

Varethane

Man, I feel like most of my thoughts on this subject have been pretty amply covered by everything else. But I will say that the idea that every character in a story needs to be a role model or to embody good behavior or practices or thought or whatever is just not something that I think should be applied to media that's not aimed explicitly at children.

32:43.64

Varethane

That sort of stuff is suitable for stuff aimed at a very young audience. But we should expect more from adult or older teen readers. They can think about what they're reading. They can interpret things.

32:56.92

Varethane

They should have critical thinking at that point and can be able to draw their own conclusions.

33:04.73

Star

And once you reach a certain age, you too will start to enjoy the messy mother—. And you will have fun with them and watch them screw up and be like, haha, he's just like me.

33:16.29

Varethane

But fictional!

33:17.14

Rae

Fictional.

33:17.70

Star

But fictional!

33:20.22

Claire

I just wonder how people like—I imagine the kind of people that want every character to be perfect. They must be so bored. They must reach a day where something goes off in their head and they're like, every character is the same.

33:34.36

Claire

Every character is like this perfect cocoa melon, like child of perfection. Like where is the juice?

33:41.86

Varethane

Sanitized and pure.

33:42.72

Claire

Yeah.

33:45.46

Rae

Like, I think some of it might be them wanting to get away from everything bad in the world kind of thing.

33:51.86

Claire

Yeah.

33:53.39

Rae

I've noticed cozy fantasy and stuff like that has become very, very common right now. And that's probably because... A lot of people are tired of it.

34:04.31

Rae

But at the same time, I don't know. I've never been one to stick with one kind of story. Sometimes I will want, you know, my happy brain rot that doesn't actually have any characters that are developing and turn into like a giant kaiju and eat people or something.

34:23.44

Rae

But all for fun. But sometimes I want stuff that's dark because there's that catharsis in it. But I don't know, yea.

34:37.74

Varethane

It's a big world and people like different things. Imagine that.

34:42.62

Rae

Imagine that. Yeah, it's the people that can't comprehend that people like different things my kind of makes me—yeah.

34:49.94

Varethane

Yes, definitely. So the third question that I've got for you guys is what are some pitfalls that you see writers fall into when they treat characters too much like people in their story?

35:03.84

Varethane

Start with Clam.

35:05.30

Claire

I can speak to my very early writing scenarios. Like when I was like, eight to 12 years old and I had like these forever stories that just kept going on and on that I was writing and I never thought about characters as pieces in a puzzle or in a chess game or anything like that. What I did was, I just grabbed like character archetypes that I liked from other shows and other

35:36.31

Claire

movies and games. And I was like, I like you as a character. I think you're cool. You're going in my story. And I—it was, it was a great like sandbox to play in until I started realizing like, why are they here?

35:52.63

Claire

Why are they here apart from me just thinking they're cool or their design is awesome or I like their powers or whatever. And I think it's something that I pick up on in, I guess, specifically webcomics nowadays if I read them where, like,

36:10.42

Claire

I love seeing webcomics where clearly somebody has made these characters and put them in a webcomic because they think that they're the coolest character ever. Or like, you know, oh, this character is so hot. I drew a hot guy. And now, like, I have to put him in this comic and I have to make him kiss somebody. Like, I see that and I'm like, I understand. I see you.

36:32.79

Claire

I totally get it. But I think when you get a cast that's just characters that you think are cool, and then you don't know exactly what they're doing. They're just kind of going through a world that you make that you also think is cool for whatever reason. And like, a lot of it just kind of comes down to, what moves are these game pieces making? Are they just on the page, being awesome, and you're drawing them and you think like, I just love this character. Or are you thinking like, where is this character starting? Where do you want them to get?

37:11.61

Claire

How are they going to get there? How do they bounce off of the other characters in this world? It's one thing to kind of do it like D&D, where everybody brings a character to, you know, a new campaign.

37:25.69

Claire

I think the ones where you don't have like a session zero where it's like, what is the mood of this story going to be? Where everybody kind of understands what their role is, how they might tie into what the overall vibe of the campaign is. You get a lot of like crazy stuff just kind of thrown together because people think it's cool.

37:44.41

Claire

And I think I noticed that in webcomics sometimes where... I think it's great for like a first draft of a webcomic where you're just trying stuff and you're playing with these characters that you think are just awesome. But then when—I feel like there's a lot of webcomics where I see that moment where the author is like,

38:03.99

Claire

I don't know what else they are. I don't know what they are beyond being cool. And then sometimes they either abandon the comic or they twist it into something new or they restart it.

38:17.37

Claire

But it basically is like, they've played with these cool archetypes enough where they're like, I know what kind of story I want to be telling with these characters. And I think—

38:29.17

Claire

Everybody kind of has to go through that phase where they're like, what am I doing? Like, I've made this thing. What is it for? But I think that's where it can get really cool and really beautiful being like, I like these kinds of characters.

38:44.38

Claire

What sort of stories are they good in? So yeah, it's something that I went through. I see it in other stories. I think it's—I think it's not necessarily a bad thing. I think it's just a starting point.

38:58.09

Varethane

It's like ingredients in food in a way, like you can find you can really like two separate sets of ingredients, but being able to recognize when they will pair well with each other and when they won't really maybe go together.

39:00.80

Claire

Yeah.

39:11.26

Varethane

Maybe I don't want ham and cheese in my chocolate chip cookie. I want it in a different kind of pastry.

39:19.30

Claire

Well, you have to be adventurous sometimes, but no, I think—exactly.

39:26.39

Star

Spoken like someone who's never made chocolate chip and bacon cookies.

39:30.78

Varethane

I specifically said ham and cheese. Bacon is a totally different story.

39:33.08

Star

Him is like one step away from bacon. And what is cheese if not milk is what you put cookies in? Checkmate.

39:43.74

Varethane

Right, so I expect you to make some ham and cheese and chocolate chip cookies and then mail them to me.

39:44.07

Claire

She's got a point.

40:06.80

Star

I'm just, I want cookies now.

40:09.24

Rae

With ham?

40:09.38

Varethane

Me too. Go straight to the kitchen after this.

40:13.69

Star

Oh, yes. I've got string cheese waiting for me. I'm going to put it in a cookie.

40:17.14

Varethane

You put it in a cookie.

40:20.69

Rae

My god.

40:25.35

Star

Anyway, back on topic.

40:29.62

Rae

So for me, I think a lot of the pitfalls that people fall into is not giving their character enough to do and not bouncing off of the other characters a lot because they have these, all these cool characters. They're individually cool, but a lot of times they don't think about how they interact with each other.

40:56.21

Rae

And I think—that just makes me think of this one guy who—oh, he roleplayed such a cool character, but when it came to interacting with other ones, he just sat in a corner and just, you know, glowered at everyone, and that was essentially what he what he did, because he was a really big fan of all those fantasy stories of lone wolf characters. So when it came to actually role-playing one of those, he didn't put too much thought into giving his character motivation enough to interact with other people in a roleplay.

41:42.58

Rae

And another thing that I think a lot of people fall into when they view characters a bit too much as real people and don't consider the narrative is that they're really afraid of making their character be wrong or make mistakes or do bad things when honestly a lot of these are the best opportunities for your characters to grow.

42:12.38

Rae

So, often these kinds of journeys are actually what makes a lot of characters enjoyable, but they can't do that if you won't allow them to essentially have a messy moment.

42:28.17

Varethane

Yeah, I think that thing that you were—that's definitely a great point about these things. I feel like there's a lot of stories out there where people have written in a character who they relate to on a personal level, who might be, like, unmotivated and depressed and have like this constellation of personality traits that are

42:49.61

Varethane

like a real person, they feel very relatable. But with a character like that, you have to really go out of your way as the author to constantly come up with things for them to be doing. And at a certain point to keep the story interesting, it's going to get very difficult and you're going to have a hard time getting the readers to like this character. Even if they relate to them, they might not be a great choice for a protagonist of a story if they're not active in the plot.

43:15.80

Varethane

And even if it might be realistic that way, like, this is like a real person. They're fundamentally not a real person. They're a fictional character in a story and you have to challenge them like a fictional character and not like a real person.

43:32.82

Rae

You can't have them sitting in the corner for the entire story. Even if they want to, they still need to get in the robot.

43:42.71

Varethane

At some point, yes, the robot—the robot's got to come here.

43:43.61

Rae

At some point, yes.

43:45.67

Varethane

This is my real lesson. Put a robot in there.

43:48.54

Rae

Put a robot in there. And make your protagonist get in it.

43:50.11

Star

And then put a guy in that robot. Yeah.

43:54.96

Varethane

How about you, Star?

43:55.06

Star

Yeah, so I—for me, Gosh, I'm trying to think of like—I can't think of any specific examples, but I know that I've definitely seen this.

44:05.85

Star

And I feel like I definitely probably used to do this with some of my earlier writings, like when I was a wee bab that never made it onto the internet. Thank God. Where I'm going to call it world building disease, but with characters, where it's like, you write so much like interesting, crazy—you write every single thing about a character. You write their entire backstory. You fleshed out like every single human being that they have ever interacted with. And you just fall so in love with them. And you want everyone who reads your story to know everything about this character that you do. And then it's just, it's too much. And what happens is sometimes people will do that with every character in their story. And it's like, I can't start my webcomic. I don't know what my MC's favorite color is. I have to go back to the drawing board right now. And they just, they want these characters to be like...

45:10.28

Star

grounded, realistic people so badly, they're focusing on the wrong thing, I feel, where it's like you don't need to know every single thing about your character for them to feel real and interesting to an audience. And, you know, if you're just making characters...

45:29.69

Star

for funsies for them to live in your head and for you to like throw metaphysical dodgeballs at them and see what happens, then that's one thing. But you're listening to a webcomics podcast and you're 45 minutes-ish into this episode. So I assume if you've listened this far, you're interested in making a comic with that Blorbo McBorboson at some point and just...

45:52.66

Star

Your audience does not need to know every single thing. You are giving your story character bloat when you have 20 plus main characters and most of the story is them trauma dumping on each other.

46:07.06

Star

Which I feel, like I said— nothing super recently, but I do feel like I have definitely seen this and I'm just like, I am not interested in this story, please.

46:21.02

Rae

This was actually one of the problems I had with my um original comic because it was based off of a roleplay. And oh my gosh.

46:34.14

Rae

One of the people that I roleplayed with just loved having their character trauma dump on everything.

46:40.91

Star

oof

46:42.14

Rae

Everywhere. And he was such a sad, wet cat that... he didn't even have the motivation to do anything about it. And I'm just like, that's not a story, though. How am I supposed to fit him in the story? So I had to tone that back down a lot because, you know, he is a narrative tool, not a character. I mean, not a person because—he had a square shape trying to go in a round hole kind of thing that just didn't fit the story.

47:23.19

Claire

I'm imagining a webcomic that's just the author describing their therapy sessions. And it's just like, there's no story. It's just, I'm just telling you my feelings. I'm telling you them for 10 chapters at a time. Then maybe something happens.

47:38.58

Claire

Then we're back to therapy. And it's like, no, this is not, a this is not a story. This is a meditation. Like these can both exist.

47:46.71

Rae

Sometimes that can be cathartic, but it might not find an audience.

47:53.50

Star

I was going to make a self-deprecating joke is that this is what the pilot of Castoff was like.

47:58.04

Claire

Oh, do tell.

47:59.78

Varethane

Aww.

47:59.96

Star

The very, very first try at Castoff that I wrote for I wrote a one-shot that ended in a cliffhanger that was basically chapter one for a school anthology. And it was basically just...

48:17.24

Star

Like, the sequence of events was very similar to what the final version ended up being, like the one you can read online now, but it was basically just new person walks into Vector's life. He spends, like, 12 pages trauma dumping on a stranger.

48:34.81

Star

And it's like, I look back on this and I'm like, why am I here? I'm in hell.

48:41.94

Rae

Sometimes you need to get that part out, just get it out and then focus on the story/

48:49.38

Star

But see, the problem is, the problem is that my freaking readers like to fancy themselves a little bit of Sherlock Holmes, and they go digging for my art that's like 15 years old, and they post them on the Discord for everyone to see, and it's like they're showing my skivvies to everyone, and I'm like, no, put that back from where it came from or so help me.

49:11.36

Varethane

Uh-oh.

49:12.28

Rae

Oh no!

49:12.96

Claire

Must go on the Pepe Silvia wall. Everything.

49:14.74

Star

They've like they've like found my sketch dumps that I posted to DeviantArt in 2007. Those drawings are older than some of the people in my Discord, and they're just posting them in there being like, wow, look at Star’s Old Art, smiley face, and I'm like, get that shit out of here right now.

49:34.84

Star

Get that shit out of here!

49:36.89

Rae

Do not perceive me.

49:40.12

Star

There's part of me that... Okay, I'm not gonna say, oh I wish I had nuked my DeviantArt because, you know, it's an archive, it's a treasure trove, and I'm glad that I have it, but stop reminding me, random strangers in my Discord. Stop it.

49:53.91

Star

Taking your toys away.

49:56.34

Varethane

I feel like most authors have to go through some kind of a phase like that of just getting out all the id, the everything. Like, you know, that's it's the exploratory phase.

50:09.17

Varethane

You just gotta get it done and then and then move on and start honing the craft, as it were.

50:15.06

Star

You have to make bad art before you can make good art, but stop looking at the bad art!

50:20.60

Rae

I do have a question for all of you. What's your character's favorite food?

50:27.02

Star

Don't do this to me. I don't even know what my favorite food is.

50:29.59

Varethane

Cookies.

50:31.22

Star

You think I think about that shit for my Blorbos?

50:34.07

Varethane

No wait. Sandwiches.

50:36.76

Rae

Is it a ham and cheese sandwich with chocolate?

50:38.13

Varethane

No wait. No, no.

50:39.82

Star

Yeah!

50:40.69

Varethane

It's pizza. No wait. It's sushi. No wait.

50:44.31

Star

Ham and cheese cookie.

50:46.09

Varethane

It's apples.

50:46.71

Rae

You can't make a story without knowing this.

50:49.82

Claire

My favorite is when I'll do like a “ask me some questions on Tumblr” thing. And somebody is like, what is the favorite food of each of your characters? And I'm like, ugh…

50:58.55

Star

Time to make some shit up.

51:00.15

Rae

Yeah.

51:00.57

Varethane

I actually did do that.

51:01.43

Rae

I did that too when I took Tumblr asks.

51:07.59

Rae

Of course, then I get the weirdest one, like, how long does it take Razin to scoop the litter boxes of all his evil cat minions?

51:18.84

Star

Well, how long does it take?

51:21.69

Varethane

Yes, tell us. We're all sitting here with steeple fingers.

51:23.83

Star

How many cats are there?

51:24.70

Rae

I have no idea.

51:25.39

Star

How many litter boxes? You know, you have to have one litter box per cat minimum.

51:30.39

Rae

No, you're technically supposed to have one more litter box than you have cats, if I recall.

51:35.86

Star

Well, I have two cats and two bathrooms, so...

51:35.86

Claire

Yes.

51:38.23

Rae

And on each level. And he lives in an evil um overlord tower. So I don't even know how many levels that is. Oh, man, I'm bad at world building and characters.

51:47.90

Star

You don't know how many levels your evil tower is?

51:51.69

Varethane

Oh boy.

51:52.03

Star

How could you start writing a comic without knowing this critical information? My god.

51:56.79

Claire

But it does surprise people, though, because like the number of people that ask me, like, oh you must have like the tome of information on every character and like know every birthday and everything. And I'm just like, I don't know.

52:10.04

Claire

I don't.

52:10.84

Rae

I'm making this up.

52:12.40

Varethane

If it's not important in my story, if it's not a plot point, if it doesn't affect the way things are going, I don't need it.

52:21.75

Rae

My brain is empty and it is smooth.

52:24.73

Claire

It doesn't mean that you're like a bad character mom or dad. Like you're just like, I don't know. I am thinking about the characters as like, I don't know. Like, what are their video game stats?

52:38.86

Claire

I'm not thinking about beyond that. And like, maybe that's, maybe that's a clue to just be like, okay, all of these little extra things that you think that authors know and very deeply care about regarding their characters, maybe it's a sign that you don't need to care about it that much.

52:57.43

Claire

Maybe think about, what are they being used for? What is the purpose of this character? Not what is their birthday? The birthday doesn't matter.

53:08.54

Claire

I'm sorry. I don't know my character's birthday.

53:09.81

Star

It sucks.

53:10.49

Varethane

I mean, maybe if their birth date is the prophecy date, which is critical to the storyline.

53:15.98

Claire

That's fine. That's perfectly fine.

53:18.01

Rae

I mean I do know a few people that use Zodiacs as a way to guide where their characters are going to interact with other characters.

53:31.24

Claire

Ooh.

53:32.63

Rae

Kind of like how some people use the blood type going like, oh, this this type of like blood type doesn't get a get along with this one, kind of thing. But...

53:44.79

Rae

That's really just superstition that can help you brainstorm. It's not really that important.

53:57.18

Rae

And I don't even know which Zodiac my characters are. Oh, my—I'm such a bad character parent.

54:02.71

Claire

Shame! Shame!

54:03.82

Star

Shame.

54:06.04

Star

I knew... So this is something that I've done with both my webcomics where my protagonist's birthday is the day the comic started and I just... That's how I remember. And then I worked that into the story in Castoff.

54:15.74

Rae

That's a good—yeah.

54:18.51

Star

That's actually a plot point. But then I was like, they wouldn't have April in this fantasy universe. So then I had to come up with a fantasy calendar. And then while I was doing that, I'm like, yeah, f— it, we ball. I'll make birthdays for the other characters.

54:30.59

Star

That was less than a year ago.

54:33.56

Star

And I've been doing this comic for almost 11 years, and I'm just like, yeah, sure, you're a Virgo, why not?

54:39.29

Rae

Yeah, I mean, as someone who has also made my own fantasy calendar, because I was just like, but Julius Caesar didn't exist in this world, so it's not going to be called July.

54:52.36

Claire

Oh, that gets so messy so quickly, oh no.

54:52.44

Star

Exactly.

54:56.63

Varethane

I feel like this is a huge can of worms, we're going to add another half hour to this episode.

55:02.84

Star

With Castoff, I just went by farming simulator rules. There's four months and they're just named after the season and they're just long.

55:11.99

Rae

I was a nerd and I made mine 10 months like the original Roman calendar.

55:20.28

Star

Tangent!

55:21.75

Rae

Oh yes yeah. Yeah. Tangent. Okay.

55:23.54

Star

Cool tangent.

55:24.73

Rae

So that does seem like a wrap.

55:30.71

Varethane

Like a good place.

55:32.85

Star

I think so, or else we're just going to keep yap and...

55:34.78

Rae

Yes.

55:35.89

Claire

I like a good rant to end the episode.

55:37.91

Rae

Is it going to be ham and cheese with chocolate?

55:40.28

Varethane

No.

55:41.18

Rae

No? Okay.

55:41.99

Varethane

no

55:42.09

Star

Please!

55:43.44

Varethane

No.

55:43.64

Star

Please, please!

55:45.07

Varethane

I've decided this.

55:45.15

Rae

What about bacon?

55:46.49

Star

No!

55:48.09

Claire

I'm adding the cheese whiz. I'm adding the cheese whiz to the baking stuff. I am doing it.

55:51.62

Star

I'm adding salami!

55:52.21

Varethane

No, I have a favorite. Oh, man. Anyway, that is a roasted red pepper and goat cheese and maybe a little ham and cheese wrap.

56:01.44

Star

Yay!

56:03.63

Varethane

Thank you so much for listening. I've been your host, Varethane. You can check out my work at chirault.sevensmith.net or wychwoodcomic.com.

56:13.59

Claire

I have been Claire Clam. You can find my work at phantomarine.com.

56:18.46

Rae

And I've been Rae and you can find my work at empyreancomic.com and Overlord of Ravenfell on Webtoon.

56:27.54

Star

And I'm Star, and you can find my comic Castoff at castoff-comic.com.

56:34.36

Varethane

And we'll see you later, slappers.

56:38.73

Claire

I thought you were going to say salami.

56:40.43

Star

Yeah, me too.

56:42.15

Star

Slap you with the salami.

56:42.49

Varethane

Oh, I should have. You're right. I should have done that.