How I approach character writing

Behind the Scenes 09.2024

Worldbuilding is cool and all, but writing characters is what I really love. It’s a really special kind of satisfaction to figure out what a character is “about”, that little eureka moment when things really fall into place and you know exactly the sort of interesting stuff you can do with them.

I don’t necessarily have any strict rules for character writing, but I’ve laid out some core principles I tend to resort to when growing my homunculi.

Referencing real life

It's always apparent when a writer is influenced almost exclusively by other pieces of fiction, especially those limited to a specific genre. Whether it's due to the lack of personal life experiences or just general interest in IRL people, a lot of beginner storytellers fall into this trap. I say that because I was guilty of that as well. 

But there are multiple ways of preventing that from happening.

Direct reference

These days whenever I write character personalities, attitudes and especially interactions, I try to reference real life people that seem similar in one way or another. Doesn't even have to be anyone close.

For example, when writing Yura, I tend to reference 4+ different guys I've been acquaintances with during different stages of my life. Each provides good reference material for different situations.

• Yura's general smug but aimless demeanour, ostracisation from his classmates and relationship with his sister are similar to my childhood friend’s older brother;

• the way he makes fun of Tsar or talks to teachers is based on the way a smart bully from our class would speak;

• his ability to be jokingly self-deprecating without making others uncomfortable is based on the style of humour a charismatic guy from uni used a lot;

• etc. 

Of course, once you have a good grasp on a particular character, you don't need to keep imagining other people in their stead for every little interaction. But it's best to still do that occasionally, just to keep them grounded. 

You need to pay actual attention to the people around you to do this in the first place. Everyone and everything can be good material, from specific interactions you witness or become part of to just general behavioural patterns that aren't usually represented in media.

To this day I’m surprised how I’m yet to see the love teenage boys have for LiveLeak vids represented in any way… maybe I should add a scene of beautiful male bonding like that to PAFL, make it real heartwarming.

Okay but what if I don't leave my house

That's sad, please do. 

But you can gather grounded reference material from sources other than real life. Sure, these won’t be as naturalistic, but it’s still better than referencing only fictional characters from, say, anime.

• Interviews with non-famous people. These are extremely useful for writing grounded characters based on their in-story circumstances. Arthur’s entire character was basically fully rewritten after I read several interviews about the lives of children in low-end orphanages. Similarly, you can seek out interviews (video interviews, if possible) of people living in conditions relevant to your stories.

• Youtubers (unscripted content). Yes, unironically. Of course, every Youtuber puts on a persona to some extent. But unscripted content can still provide a good glimpse into what kinds of speech patterns a type of person can have, or which kinds of jokes they may come up with in response to different situations. Even better when it’s a group of people interacting with each other.

• Watch a variety of movies. Movies aren’t the most realistic form of media by a long shot, but the keyword here is variety. Once you venture outside the realm of the most popular American blockbusters, there is a lot of great subtle and naturalistic stuff out there. For example, I tend to use soviet films as reference when writing some older characters’ dialogue, since I’ve always enjoyed the subdued quality a lot of those scripts and performances have. 

I’m mentioning movies specifically, because unrealistic behaviours are a lot more apparent when you see them on IRL actors. Also, let’s be real, the vast majority of popular animation is aimed at children and teenagers, which means it’s going to follow certain tropes and exaggerate the characters’ behaviours a lot. A realistic panic attack won’t negate that.

Plus, watching things other than cartoons is good for the palate.

Tropes are GOOD

I’m not saying you should avoid using tropes or exaggerating your characters altogether, though. Doing those things consciously is what makes fiction fun!

In general, tropes are great for establishing the basic role your character will play in a story. It’ll also serve as a foundation for their further characterisation. Pretty much every character in PAFL can be boiled down to a simple trope.

Once you place these tropes into the circumstances of the story, you can start fleshing them out as actual characters. This is where cross referencing real life really comes in handy. We can take Yana for example.

Let’s build!

Yana’s baseline trope is the smart girlboss to her dumb comic relief boyfriend. Nothing revolutionary. Now let’s look at her in-story circumstances: she is a university student with a rather sophisticated background; her parents are fairly rich and both hold respectable positions in the setting’s totalitarian government; despite that, she hangs out with what her circle would consider lowlifes.

What can these circumstances imply about her? 

Well, high-ranking officials and their families are watched very closely in totalitarian regimes. This means that Yana is under constant pressure to not just upkeep her family’s image by performing well academically, but also to stay in line for the sake of their safety. 

Then why does she hang out with Sanya’s gang and date someone like Ivan?

Well, it’s a relatively safe form of protest - at least, it’s not political enough to raise eyebrows in the government. But there is the prerequisite that Yana is smart. So she would also understand how meaningless and childish this kind of behaviour is in the grand scheme of things. She can never truly escape the feeling of being trapped.

But why would she want to protest in the first place? Why would she be against the system she’s been favoured by? 

A close person of hers could have been harmed by it. A sister would be a great fit, since it would create a clear parallel between her and Yana.

Even better to exacerbate her existing issues, Yana’s sister could have been a role model for her: someone she was already constantly compared to, someone who was always seen as the smarter one, as the one that’s set to achieve more than her - only to be cast aside by the whole family once she decided to step out of line.

Something like this would only turn more eyes towards Yana, while making her resent both her parents and sister (who she’s now supposed to see as a martyr) more than she ever had before.

So, just with this little exploration of her circumstances and potential reasons for acting the way she does, we’ve already built up multiple extra layers of complexity to Yana’s character, to her relationship with her family, her potential conflicts with both her friends and boyfriend, as well as the societal system as a whole.

But I wouldn’t be able to just come up with these ideas on the fly if I didn’t have relevant real life experience and a backlog of interviews and films watched on the topic of how systems like that operate. So stuff like that is super helpful!

No moe, no buy

Every single person has some quirks that seem to run counter to their general demeanour. Gap moe refers to the cuteness or endearment factor that arises from a character having such contrasting traits. 

I make sure to give all of my characters some form of gap moe. Sanya's probably the most obvious example, acting as both a tough street thug and a cringe anime nerd. But it doesn't always have to be this drastic. 

Little things like Yura dropping his nonchalant attitude and becoming flustered from any form of genuine affection, Olya’s love for silly humour running parallel to her cool and mysterious persona, Sergei being kind of a pushover with her and Nikita despite his normally stern disposition, even Nikita himself unconsciously reverting to his countryside accent when speaking to Kolya - that's all gap moe. 

Aside from being plain endearing to the viewer, adding some gap moe to a character makes them feel much more well-rounded and fun to work with.

Miscellaneous notes

This part isn’t really writing advice, just some random thoughts on the subject.

Weak spots

I’ve realised that certain character types are really, really difficult for me to write for. Super shy or socially awkward characters are always such a challenge for me, which is probably why I gravitate towards heroes with more assertive personalities. I suppose it makes sense, since that’s what’s closer to my own temperament. 

I remember reading this amazing Dmitry fanfiction and thinking “wow, I would never have been able to describe his internal thought process this well” – even though that’s a character I created! It’s really amazing how naturally some people can capture the stuff that I can only approximate in my head. That’s where gaps in my real life research shine through, I suppose.

Character presentation

At some point I’ve realised that I absolutely hate writing internal monologue, even for characters that I can easily relate to. I don’t mind first person narration in general, of course, but for some reason writing it myself felt like I was giving too much of the character away or not letting the viewer interpret their actions by themselves.

So I’ve been trying to avoid describing the character’s feelings more than absolutely necessary. I do my best to stick to “show, don’t tell” – as in, I’d rather do a closeup of a character making a certain expression (or describe them looking a certain way) than lay their thoughts out for the world to see.

After all, that’s how we interact with people in real life. We can only judge them from their outward actions, whatever’s going on on the inside is always a mystery to some extent. When writing songs, I do have to give characters internal voices. But when I don’t have to do that, like in prose or comics, I try not to.

I can’t say this is the only right approach, because a lot of authors pull it off wonderfully, and a character’s internal monologue can be a great narrative tool (unreliable narrators are always fun). But that’s what I’ve found feels the most satisfying to me.