forum Have You Ever Made A Character that You Ended Up Hating?

Started September 12, 2023 by @another_Sarcastic_writer group

tune

Ok for some reason this question has been bugging me lately. I have a character that I made that I initially liked but as I developed the story more, over time her personality changed in order to add more depth to another character in the same story (her twin brother specifically). This character I like a lot better, even when I was still developing the two. I was more curious if this ever happened to anyone else. So the question is have you ever made a character you initially liked but hated over time? Or have you made a character just for the purpose of you hating them?

And feel free to add your reasoning. I want to see if Im the only one petty af with my characters, especially my favs

Yes.
Definitely has happened to me quite a bit. I tend to make characters on a whim sometimes based on the smallest things I find really interesting. It could be a general vibe I'm going for, or maybe I'll start with the style of their clothes or even their personality and go from there.
I have about four characters this year that I've gotten rid of, which is a bit rare for me since I tend to really think it through and scrap them early on if I don't like them.
I made Corin on a whim and really loved her character- I developed her for about three to four months tops and she was kind of my favorite for a while until her personality started developing more in-depth. Technically there was nothing wrong about her, she was literally perfect in my eyes but when I added her as one of my character's girlfriends and their dynamic became a bit softer I had to stop because the character with who I had paired her with was supposed to be a villain and she made him a bit "gooey"- in the sense that he was losing the "villain" aspect of him which I needed. So when I tore her away from that relationship she was just….kind of there? She used to have a purpose and now she didn't and I ended up hating her a little- though I would say I felt more unsatisfied with her character than full-on hated her.
I suppose I could have kept her and then added her into the story when I developed it more and found a place for her but at that point, she didn't feel like one of my characters anymore and I'm not sure why.

Tamryn, Casimir, and Ezekiel were are all fairly fleshed out as well and I loved Casimir for the longest time, I mean, this guy was going to be in the main cast of kids for my story but I could never figure out how to develop his personality so he became a "boring" character which I had to let go. Like, he had so many different types of relationships with my main cast since they're kind of like a family, but when I thought of taking him out it literally affected nothing so I guess that's when I kind of knew "Oh, this character brings nothing to the table and is dead weight"
It was a bit difficult for me to get rid of him since I had him for about three years now? But I think it was one of those moments where I had to clean up the characters and storyline a bit and he just did not fit anymore.

I have made characters before with the intention of hating them, they're supposed to be my villains, but even then I don't hate my villains, I still love them even though they're people I would deck in real life if I came across them.

Ah yes, him.

We all know that one particular bastard who, for whatever reason, whenever he shows up you want to toss him to the seagulls and geese. Of course, it wasn't like that at first.

For me, it wasn't a boy, but a small little lass by the name of Avary Walker.

See, she started off as a joke character. Showing up, making things exciting aand chaotic - she always lightened the mood of the more somber or angry scenes.

That is, of course, until she discovered how much more fun hurting people rather than helping them was.

Of course, she didn't find that out on her own. She'd known all along, but the pain of betrayal was such a delightful pain for her - and she loved how bitter everyone turned afterwards, if they survived.

I knew from the start - and I still hated her guts. Casual shrug She was one of those characters the writer and the audience was meant to hate.

So yeah, she exists.

Then there's the main villain of my universe, Golden Tears.

Now this guy, he's a real piece of work.

No further details needed beyond manipulative and rude.

Sounds fun, yeah?

Absolutely!
There was one, Micah. Initially he was my favorite, however similar to another protagonist and another person's character outside of the story, so I changed him. I went a little ham on the pitiful, self righteous part of him so he'd be more different. it worked but by the timei started writing for him I realized I hated it.
Another time, with a character who is my favorite now but had a weird development. I created her specifically for an rp but once that died I was like hey maybe I should use her for my projects so i did- the thing about that is she was my first character after a long hiatus of not writing so she was somewhat poorly written, to be strangely childish in a way that I grew to be very repulsed by (I still am, her maturity in comparison to her age was just a little off but that almost killed her for me). so I changed her to be very mature in my project, a sort of voice of reason, which did not suit her at all and felt very bland. in the end I changed her back, fixed her maturity to match her age and after a little development I liked her again.

Totally.

I used to come up with story ideas by the day, and I would quickly start working on characters that didn't have much depth or personality. One of these was Psari (pronounced sari, Greek for fish). In the story, the main character comes upon a civilization of water people (people literally made of water) and they share their wisdom. Psari was the stable girl who took care of the seahorses. Clever, I know.

Psari was mentioned once in the original draft of the story. Here's the line: "When I was helping a river girl named Psari(yes, Psari, it’s Greek for fish) at the stables, I bonded with those huge sea horses."

I wrote this when I was eleven.

I wanted to give Psari more time, and I thought she could be a new love interest or someone who helped the MC on their journey. I asked my friend for help on this, and she said that Psari and the water people as a whole could have a power that allowed them to shapeshift.

I had been pretty set on having Psari take on a new name, Circe, and be one of the side characters' love interests. It was a whole thing, and he was eventually going to choose her over the other corner of the triangle.

Then the brainstorming came.

Long story short, Psari ended up threatening the side character if he didn't choose her over the other corner of the triangle (named Clarrie [yes, weird name.]).

So Psari went from a lowly stable girl to a love interest to a very violent love interest, and I haven't thought about her since I wrote this post.

Thanks for listening to my TedTalk.

I am loving these comments honestly so I felt compelled to write about the character that sparked this discussion
My character's name is Carmen, she's the embodiment of good luck. She started out being the supportive confidante for my other character, Carlos who is the embodiment of bad luck and her twin.

As I developed Carlos more, I found that Carmen seemed to slowly become more of a passive aggressive influence in Carlos' life before just becoming a massive bitch later on in the plot.

Now Carlos is one of my fav ocs. I'm gonna be honest. Maybe it was the fact that he's more introverted and artistic. Maybe it was the fact that he was the embodiment of bad luck. Whatever reason, I decided to just take this development and run with it

So yea, that's basically it in a nutshell