forum A what point does a character become a Mary Sue?

Started February 13, 2018 by @Paperok

tune

Your opinion.

Well, my opinion is that your character is a Mary Sue if they have no flaws and like a perfect backstory. Seriously its one of my biggest character peeves. Like of course your character can be nice and sweet and all around a good person, but people tend to thing that means they have nothing wrong with them! I think a lot of people forget that there are other flaws besides being Arrogant or a complete A#@hole. Like your character can still be sweet but also be forgetful. Your character can be all these wonderful things while still being childish, or anxious, gullible, immature, nosey, etc!
And about the background, no one lives a completely perfect life. But not everyone is abused, experiences a close death in their life, has some sort of traumatic experience that scars them for life. So your character can still have a life without these! But something has to happen that they aren't happy about. Maybe them and their sibling never got along well, or a pet they loved died. Maybe they just have always had anxiety or depression!! Like, no* one lives a perfect life thats all cupcakes and raindbows no matter how much they want it.

Either when your character faces no real problems in life, has no enemies/people that dislike her, or when the character has no realistic flaws.

The point where a character gets obnoxious to read about is when they doesn't have to work to accomplish any of their goals or resolve the story, and face no character development. It's also somewhat grating when every other character's life seems to revolve around them; even if they're the main character and the one driving the plot forward, there are going to be people who couldn't care less and have their own motivations/issues going on.
I honestly wouldn't worry too much about it, though. Mary Sue is a really vague concept, and having an attractive character with a tragic backstory, cool powers/gadgets, and the ability to make other people like them even when they're assholes isn't exactly a dealbreaker in storytelling. (If it were, the superhero genre would've died out years ago.)

also keep in mind that many people are all too quick to call a lot of female characters a 'mary sue' when their male counterparts have the exact same skills and abilities (whereas no one is calling those men a 'gary stu' because sexism is alive and well).

think about rey from star wars. she's intelligent, she's naturally adept at using the force, she's a good pilot. now think about luke at the beginning of his story. pretty much the same skillset. rey isn't suddenly the best force user ever (like kylo said, she was just beginning to test her abilities, and people are more likely to do daring things when in distress) and she's certainly not the greatest at wielding a lightsaber (that whole fight was sloppy, but darn it all if she can't land a kick). she's tough because she had to be growing up on jakku. she wouldn't have survived if she wasn't, so it translates well that she is a quick learner, even without formal training. so why do people call her a mary sue when luke swoops in with his whole 'i'm here to rescue you' spiel right off the bat?

be careful with the term 'mary sue.' it happens, and that could just be a result of bad writing. or it could be a result of misogyny and we don't want that.

I literally gave a rant/lecture on the fact that people criticize female characters and not males for English class, and since I absolutely LOVE Rey, I focused mostly on her.

Mary Sues are the author's favorite character, and they get preferential treatment (e.g. most beautiful, gets to break rules, overpowered). This is irritating to readers because the author's love of the character is being pushed down their throat. Make sure your character is balanced, and is approximately as talented as her peers are.[1]

(hint hint Mia from princess diaries 1/2)

honestly the best advice on mary sues is from a friend. She said that a mary sue isn't defined by how powerful they are, but how the story reacts to them. I mean, look at the Odyssey. Odysseus is powerful, a lot of people like him, has a great family, and survived Troy. But what we mainly see are the people who hate him and how he had the worst luck of all.