Is Sophie A Mary Sue? (Essay)

Why Are Mary Sues "Bad"?

The answers will vary, depending on the person. But the two main reasons are these:

The Mary Sue character doesn't earn the powers, perfection, and praise.

A powerful character with little imperfection can be done well. There are stories with gods as characters-- gods that are portrayed as being nearly perfect (not always, of course). These characters don't even have to be divinity-- they're just ultra-strong, ultra-powerful, and ultra-awesome for reasons justified in the story.

But that's the key word there: justified.

A character who is perfect with no explanation, justification, or reason is a bad character. Why? Well, that leads into point two:

      2. Mary Sues are unrealistic.

Why is realism such a big deal for readers? Why do we not want to read about

Supermans who can fly everywhere and do everything and defeat all the bad guys with barely any sweat and barely any tension-- because he has no weakness (except for one)?

First of all, that would be a boring story. We wouldn't fear for the character's life, because they're practically invincible. However, there are many stories without Mary Sues that feel this way as well, so this factor doesn't automatically make a story bad.

But then there's the unrelatability. Being able to relate to a character is such an indescribable feeling. This probably sounds corny, but it feels like there's a connection between you and that character-- or maybe even between you and that author-- and you likely enjoy that character more than one you can't relate to. That's not always the case, and I won't claim it is, but from my experience it's plausible, if not expected.

A Mary Sue, who is perfect, absolutely beautiful, adored by everyone, and has immense power is... not relatable. Humans are not perfect. Humans are not loved by everyone. Humans are not objectively beautiful.

See, the only relatable aspects of the Mary Sue are the parts of them that aren't flawless. The parts of them based on the author, or perhaps added on by the author in a feeble attempt to make the character more realistic.

Realism is a big deal. You don't have to relate to all of your favorite characters in order for them to be your favorite, but again, the ones you do relate to are special in their own way.

Authors are encouraged to make their writing and portrayal of certain aspects of their writing that are based on real life as believable as possible. Actually, yeah, "believable" might be a better word to describe a well-written character.

Let's say there's a character who is descended from divinity, and she has immense power that is rarely challenged. Well, as long as there's a believable explanation regarding that power (perhaps the divinity she's descended from is a super-powerful god), that's not an objectively bad character, since their power is there for a reason.

Now take a character who is clearly an author-insert in every way. They have immense power because... she was born that way.

How is that a good explanation? It's not believable-- and it's clearly a cop-out of making an actual, fleshed-out character.

Readers won't respond well to the latter character-- and while there might be mixed feelings on the former, it will (probably) be digested better.

Mary Sues are bad because it's bad writing-- since you could create a better character-- and because readers often won't like them. Now, it's not all about the readers-- but seriously, write a character you can be proud of as an author. Even if you didn't mean to write a Mary Sue, that's okay! You can rewrite them, change some things, change the WHOLE thing-- whatever you need to feel good about your story. That's my opinion, anyway, and you can take it as you will.