Illustrating the Characters

If someone is interested in ways to work the Main Character, the new USA show, “Mr. Robot”, is a work of genius, imho. I don’t want anyone interested to miss it. To say anything more would be a spoiler, but there might be a clever MC/IC switch, also, for part of some episodes.

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So Elliot is definitely the MC. But who do you think is the IC? Mr. Robot? Someone else? Perhaps Tyrell?

Remember the car scene in Ep08? Wasn’t Tyrell the MC in that scene, and wasn’t Mr. Robot the IC? That scene blew my mind, the switch, creating an insight forshadowing. It should be a small enough scene not to be a spoiler, here. I figure Tyrell is the Contagonist and Mr. Robot is the IC, with the title flagging his importance and continuity in the series’ overall story arc. Could the IC be someone else?

I do get caught up in the colorful dynamics given us by writers. I may get off base, but I love to think in Dramatica terms.

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That scene is the one that’s had my head spinning. Though, I’m not sure how much we can discuss without giving it away. Perhaps wait a few days after tonight’s finale to start discussing things that might be spoilers.

Right, more later…I’ll switch over to another Character treasure trove on TV: Suits.

Is anyone else caught up in the parade of Character illustrations at play in the TV show “Suits”?

To practice my Spanish, I happened to watch some episodes of “Yo soy Betty, la fea”, a Columbian series that was the inspiration of Ugly Betty. The two series have differences, so I am referring, only, to the original Columbian series. It seemed very clear to me that the Sidekick was the whole group of office workers, together. They even move, together. As an aside: catch that, if you want to see something like that actually working. With that in mind…

When I watched this last Suits episode, it came to me that the MC might be the whole darn office. I felt like I had been riding along to a crescendo for years, to that realization, that the office was MC, and everyone took turns being IC.

Anyone?

So you can have MC & IC switch ups? Is it then true for archetype to be, say, a Sidekick in one relationship & later acting as a Protagonist with someone else?

Well, I have a kind of free and easy attitude with my Dramatica use, so I always let myself consider lots of possibilities. And the experts, here, have a solid understanding, and sure to pipe up. In the meantime…

The story will have the basic characters that usually stay the same. What happens is they become complex, swapping traits and functions, most of the time. The thing is the traits and functions remain consistent once certain dynamics are in place. There is a freedom to have different actors step into the “spot” but you would not want to confuse the audience. The protagonist stays the same, though, except for some rare storytelling experiment that doesn’t count on audience reception to pay the bills or talent. Then again, the initial protagonist could die and another character step in to take over the spot, ie, The 50’s Phantom.

When I first bought Dramatica v1.6, I was told it was created for writing TV programs, so I always see two things going on, the individual episode and the overriding arc of the series. I find it is good practice to consider interesting possibilities, then get set straight from more expert feedback.

There would have to be a different protagonist in existence, doing the protagonist functions, while your person is a sidekick to him or to a different character. Something would have to happen to that protagonist before your sidekick could step into that place. It seems that is how some stories begin.

The Mc/Ic switch that I think I saw was with the same IC with different MC. TV shows can do that because the MC becomes the one the audience viewer sees the story through, and seeing is what TV is all about. An important note, the brilliance was the new MC for the scene had identical functions and traits as the show’s usual one. Consistency remained.

I’m away from home now, without my handy dram theory book, btw, but I wanted you to have some feedback.

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