Characters that developed in ways you didn't plan for!

[Endrenesk]

As most people (should?) know, characters are seen as people just like you and me who grow and develop, and not an excuse to pop in a few lines that are funny or interesting. I mean, yes, you can do that on the side, but think about your character first.
Which brings me to the question, how did your character develop?
What did and did you not plan to happen to them?
If your character did develop in unpredicted ways, are they better for it?
I'm curious. Let me know!

[NickRowler]

So I created this character named Shoo-Fly when I was in high school. He was suppose to be just a air headed boyfriend for one of my characters.

But when I decided to redraw my old stuff (about 10 years later), I ended up giving him a backstory and character motivations (like him not getting along with his mother) and more or less took him from a random supporting character to be a major character in the comic. And because of this, parts were added to Chapter 04 and Chapter 05 so that he would have more presents in the overall story.

Also the mask guy was a hell of a lot nicer.

And this kid was originally not gay. He's sexuality was changed because.....um how do I say this without making my 15 year old self sound like a complete weirdo???

[niinasalmelin]

ohohooh oh boy almost all of them! This has something to do with how old I was at the time when I started to put this story together. All of the main three of Numb were noticeably different from what they are now.

Biggest change would be grumpy, chainsmoker Sue, who was actually meant to be this really sweet and doe-eyed girlfriend type and I just.... well let's just say thank god she got some personality among the way. She became her own person and I was glad that I became really fond of her, since before she got this makeover I had problems on how to use her in the story at all. I find that the bitterness and bluntness she got made her more likeable than that perfect girly girl she was many years back. She's also dropped as a love interest since I also found out that any of that shit isn't now the main force driving her. Far from it.

Levi was supposed to be huge asshole and really just unlikable person, but this made every other character get away from him/or just straight up kill him, sooo having him as a MC caused a bit of strain for the dynamics. This comic would have been entirely different. Not maybe bad comic, but different from the one I wanted to tell. I struggled a lot with it, because I wanted certain story, but couldn't nail Levi's character just right for everything to fall in the right place. Change for his character came with his name. Levi was a name of my most loved childhood toy and imagination friend, so naturally the character that would have his name would have same characteristics, since there's no way a bad guy would have such a sweet name like 'Levi'. No way.

Nikita remains the most unchanged, but he acts completely different. This is mainly because the other two of the main characters took such a drastic makeover. Nikita is a character who reacts strongly, and what he does depends highly on what kind of people are around him and if he likes those people or not. Let's just say, in the original version Nikita was straight out there trying to kill Levi and after Levi changed, well now they're in quite frendly terms.

I'm glad I started to write off this story so much more early than when I started to actually draw it. By that time many of these issues were solved. It would've been horrifying if I'd started to straight away put out pages and then meet up with these problems.

[eleoza]

I have 3 characters who were supposed to be real bad guys and planned to only appear once or twice. They became good guys and stick in the story.
And then I have one guy who started out as a good guy and turned into a bad guy. Which also wasn't planned.

[spooktacularprize]

This happens to me sometimes, it seems to be for the most part because it's harder for me to plan who or what a character will be before they have a specific place in the narrative. If I try to force character traits, it comes less naturally than if I sort of just get this overall "impression," and that impression generally ends up being what I go with...even if it's in an entirely new direction than what I had planned before officially starting the story. :'D

[MissMagicGirl]

@NickRowler that is so cool! Sometimes side characters can become even more interesting then the main characters.

@lucazu thats great! How they changed from bad guys to good guys. It is so much fun when things like that happen. Redeemed villains are so interesting Or good guys going bad ^^

In my comic Magic Advisor https://tapastic.com/series/magicadvisor I made the character of Prim who appeared in the second chapter. A wanna be super villain with a flair for the dramatic who likes telling amazing (and untrue) stories about herself. I always thought she would be coming and going in the comic. Appearing once in a while. But when I first published my comic in swedish she got so popular with the readers that she has appeared in every episode since then and the focus of the whole story is now on the very weird relationship between her and my hero. I love that and I am really pleased things developed that way

First appearance:

Typical Prim:

[Endrenesk]

@MissMagicGirl Wow, I've seen you just about everywhere! I'm impressed with your dedication to these forums.

A lot of these are some really neat examples, and I'm not sure which method works better.
Me drawing out the actions, and then doing a personality around it, or extensive writing first.
Honestly, just a single page (Which, I'm only like two pages through my intro... rip progression) takes anywhere from 1 to 3 hours.
so i guess on one hand i have literally hours to think about what my characters do but on the other it still takes forever

[respheal]

This nerd, Conan, the MC of Galebound:

In the first revision, his personality was honestly pretty flat. He had two simple goals (get rich and get married) and one defining trait (untrusting). As the story went on, however, I found that his distrust was coming across as forced, as if he didn't want to be written like that. He still is (when it's deserved coughDincough), but it's no longer his main trait.

One huge development for his character appeared in the writing unintentionally and I didn't even notice it until someone else read through and started questioning his motives. That made me realize that his goals weren't exactly as simple as I thought, and perhaps not even in line with his true feelings. As one character puts it, "There’s more than one kind of obligation."

I also didn't plan for how clever he would turn out. It's actually making the rewrite a little bit difficult because there are some scenes that basically required him to get dragged along by others, but now he's actually asking questions and challenging other characters.

Anyway, I love this character and how he's developed. He's gonna go through hell (sorrrrryyyyyyyyyyyy) but you can't forge a sword without fire.

[jacintawibowo]

I usually have a rough idea of how my characters will develop from beginning to end. Still, I like to keep it fairly vague so that if there's something I think would be a neat thing to add to a character, nothing's set in stone. I can't say too much about my characters yet, but I'd say on two occasions my sister and I decided to make major changes to our main character from either tossing ideas in for fun or feedback from readers =) I think he's a much interesting character now because of that.

[shazzbaa]

This guy:

Esra started out life as a random background character when I was developing the Agorath cult, drawn just to give the cult's leader someone to talk to. He got a name so that the cult leader could refer to him by name.

So I drew them together more. He started getting a personality to contrast with the cult leader -- Master Agorath is aloof, scattered, and absent-minded, so Esra started to become a precise, organised control freak.

After constantly drawing him interacting with Master Agorath, it started to seem like maybe he was Agorath's favourite henchman, like his second-in-command or something. So I made him the second-in-command.

By the time I started actually creating the comic, it was obvious that Esra was not a background character anymore.

He and Master Agorath clearly need each other, both in an in-world sense and in a narrative sense -- their dynamic has actually helped develop both of them a lot!

[Endrenesk]

Kinda gives me a vague pirates of the caribbean feel from just this.
...pretty good!

[Michelle]

I think the character that underwent the most change in my comic is Midori's grumpy compadre Grey.

Midori's character has stayed generally unchanged for the most part, but I had a really hard time designing a companion character for her. I knew was that it would be boring to watch her go through the story solo, but I had to design a character that would enhance the overall story and not just give Midori someone to bounce zany witty one-liners off of. I knew I wanted the character to be male (not for romance purposes, I just like the dynamic) and they had to be a counter to Midori's personality, but at the beginning I just had "Generic Cool Guy Partner" and it felt really flat.

Like @shazzbaa though, once I started writing the characters together instead of designing them in a bubble, they both started to become more believable characters. Most importantly, I started developing Grey not as someone who exists to help Midori achieve her goals, but as someone with his own goals and needs before Midori even arrived in his life. Once I was able to think of his goals and how they intersect with Midori's, it became easier to write their respective characters and figure out his unique story. And it's been fun to develop Midori and Grey's relationship from their first meeting to how things end up down the line, showing how their personalities come out as their friendship develops.

[Starfestival]

3 characters ended up having a related backstory together.

[Zanreo]

Yep, pretty much an inevitability when your characters are literally based off real companies... sometimes stuff happens that you aren't prepared for.

For example, when I first started designing Konami back in late 2013-early 2014 (long before she'd actually show up in the comic) I was certainly not prepared for the events of 2015... and just went with making her more of a "comedic villain"-type character instead, while she originally was meant to be more "neutral"-leaning-towards-good. x3

[Aspie_Gamer]

Susan Graham from my shoujo slice of life comic Life of an Aspie did not start out having Asperger's Syndrome. As I began to write dialogue and conversations for her in my head often based off of my own conversations with peers back in high school, it just made sense to put her on the spectrum and I think that has really given my shoujo comic a unique perspective since female aspies are more or less unheard of in the media compared to males like Sheldon Cooper from The Big Bang Theory (who hasn't been officiallyconfirmed as being autistic, but the evidence that points towards him being as such is pretty damning last I checked.)

[TrustyShamrock]

yussssh so for my comic Robo Hole my main characters are Geckie and Parsnip


Geckie was suppose to be the main main character and Parsnip was suppose to be more of his moody side-kick with some lessons to learn and blah blah. but once i started drawing/making the comic Parsnip somehow started being waaay bigger of a character and havin lots of layers and junk. so even tho Geckie is the interesting character with super powers and he kickstarts the plot Parsnip ended up being the one who keeps the plot going and stuff since it sorta follows her around from her POV.
im not sure if it helped tho. she can be a downer and some people really dont like her but other people think shes super relatable. so i dunno

[shaneoid77]

Damoizelle was meant to be just a small part character, but her character took over and I wrote her to be more intrinsic to HOTWAB.