Character dimensions - Mckee vs Dramatica

[kf27]

Robert Mckee says "“Dimension means contradiction: either within deep character (guilt-ridden ambition) or between characterization and deep character (a charming thief). These contradictions must be consistent. "
and
" In essence, the protagonist creates the rest of the cast. All other characters are in a story first and foremost because of the relationship they strike to the protagonist and the way each helps to delineate the dimensions of the protagonist’s complex nature. Imagine a cast as a kind of solar system with the protagonist as the sun, supporting roles as planets around the sun, bit players as satellites around the planets—all held in
orbit by the gravitational pull of the star at the center, each pulling at the tides of the others’ natures…
Character A, for example, provokes the protagonist’s sadness and cynicism, while Character B brings out his witty, hopeful side. Character C inspires his loving and courageous emotions, while Character D forces him first to cower in fear, then to strike out in fury. The creation and design of characters A, B, C, and D is dictated by the needs of the protagonist. They are what they are principally to make clear and believable, through action and reaction, the complexity of the central role.”

Dramatica sees four dimensions as necessary to flesh out a character. (motivation, purpose, methodology, evaluation)

Which is the better/easier approach? Can we use the two methods simultaneously?

Mckee’s cast design
Dramatica - Character Dimensions

[decastell]

I can’t speak to “better” or “worse” (though it’s a safe bet that Dramatica’s approach offers a more concrete means of achieving the coherency to which McKee is referring.)

However in my life I’ve never constructed a character on any basis other than them emerging naturally from the organic need for conflict. Mckee’s overarching point makes sense when you ask yourself, “why would I create any character who didn’t affect or challenge my main character in some way?” In Dramatica, of course, the very definition of the Influence character is that they push the MC to change their approach, and thus has to be someone who both has the inner characteristics and outward position to conceivably make that happen. But from a writing standpoint, I usually start with a main character trying to do something (even if it’s just live their regular lives) and then ask, “who could screw them up right now?” – that can be someone against them but it can just as easily be a friend or lover trying to push them in a different direction.

Where conceptual models like Mckee’s “solar system” or Dramatica’s four dimensions become most helpful for me is when either a character feels flat – not dull, simple or boring, but rather, that their existence doesn’t feel important – or when two characters feel too similar. That’s when trying to place them in Dramatica’s character model can give you a structure to evaluate whether the character you’re concerned about represents anything meaningful to the story or is simply hanging out on the page taking up space.

[jhull]

What Mr. Grumpy Pants is referring to is the relationship of the Objective Story elements to the Goal of the story. Because he blends Main Character and Protagonist together, McKee assumes that these other characters stand in relation to the central character–not the central inequity of a story.

The Protagonist pursues the Goal, so it seems–from a blended point-of-view–that a Faith or Feeling character represents Faith or Feeling towards the Protagonist.

It’s really Faith and Feeling in relation to the Goal.

A more comprehensive understanding of narrative seeks the initial inequity, the Goal to resolve that inequity, and then assigns elements in context of that Goal to individual Players.

[MWollaeger]

To build off @jhull’s explanation here, and to add in some subjectivity, let’s throw in an example.

In Breaking Bad we have Walter White who is a father – totally devoted to his kids. Pure love and joy and fun. Then we have Heisenberg, who ruthlessly kills. Total contradiction.

McKee talks about these things as though they are the positive and negative of the same dimension in the same character, and he’s right, they are.

Dramatica would see these as traits of the Protagonist (ruthless pursuit of goal) and the MC (who wants to be a giving father). This is also right.

In this version, we are really reducing Dramatica down to its building blocks, but storyweaving is where Dramatica and McKee start to have some overlap. The difference, to me, is that I can’t see producing a character by saying, “I want them to be contradictory over this trait” in a meaningful way until I know much more fundamental things about a story, at which point contradictions seem to arise naturally.