Throwing away Characters

[Tentakustar]

Sometimes it get's to the point where your writing changes up a bit and the stories you've had with some of your older characters appears dated. I'm not sure if this happens with others, but it happens to me and I wanted to kinda talk about it. When this happens, I begin to juggle them. trying to figure out if whether or not if I should keep them or not. The problem isn't the characters purse, but the story i've written with them. after a while, my writing starts to change and I gain interest in other things.

The issue is that with my new way of coming up with stories, these older character's don't really seem to fit in it. it actually becomes really hard, but I don't want to get rid of them because I still care for the characters so it's hard to simply just toss them away.

I guess my question is , how do you guys normally go about something like this if it's something you go through?

Like, I just don't know if I should let go. The stories I have for them I still enjoy but it doesn't fit too very well with how I write now...

[kanisgir]

I know the feeling honestly I still hold on to my characters just in case and because their like family you don't have to let them go but if you feel like your not doing your character justice then you should give them away to someone you know will use them properly and care for them like they would their own characters I know it sounds a bit weird ^^; but its the truth

[mariusthered]

I have a cast of over 40 for my comic (not all of them have shown up on Tap yet) I have about 10 main characters and the rest are what i consider co-stars that sit in the green room of my mind until they are needed. dont worry about not using everyone just take them off the bench now and again or have them in the background.

[Stellamari]

I share the same sentiment wholeheartedly. As someone who don't have much or any friends in real life, they are like the dear old friends that helped me through tough times, my emotional safety net.

[zetina]

I have trouble letting go so the stories with their seeds in my middle-school days, I've still kept today. They have really grown and changed a lot... But I often feel... weary of them. I have come up with much more interesting premises since then but... I still can't do something like throw them away.

I don't know if it's similar to you.
Right now, I'm simply focusing on the stories I feel like I can do, and also want to do... And if later on I find more experiences and inspiration to breathe more life into those old ones, they will always be there waiting. It's not like you can actually press "delete" on something like that to begin with ^^;;
Just a few months ago, one of my oldest stories got a huge overhaul... It honestly changes everything I had for it. So it does and can happen! If you can't fit them into your current stories, you can still fit them to be right for your style and who you've become!

[kanisgir]

I agree with you 100%

[Raven_C]

Oohh, I have trouble letting go of characters too. Haha. Sometimes I don't even think about them for years -- and yet, they resurface every now and then, kinda like when you find yourself rummaging through old stuff every few years and you find that one thing you've been keeping and haven't seen in forever, and you think, "oh yeah I remember this.". Lol...My old characters are definitely like that. But I don't feel too sad about not properly giving them a story or if they don't fit in my current writing. I still look fondly at them. Sometimes they even evolve into new characters that are better and more well-suited to the stories I want to tell now somehow. Sometimes they don't. In case of the latter, I just put them back in the old box and maybe I'll find them again in a few years. I'm just sentimental. xD

[getsuart]

I rewrite them if they are still needed. If not, they just disappear and leave the story forever in a grand adieu.
Or you can change them to minor characters Still there, but not as influent on the story than before. I deleted a whole story for another project, but i'll try to put some of the old characters somewhere. In a painting, maybe.

[shazzbaa]

The stories I have for them I still enjoy but it doesn't fit too very well with how I write now...

I really believe that almost all stories have a shelf life, so to speak (which is part of why I keep urging people to just go ahead and TELL THE STORIES THEY WANNA TELL rather than saving their babies for later). Even people who are still working on that story they had as a kid will often need to adjust that story in huge ways because of how they've changed. Your story reflects your worldview, and eventually, if your worldview shifts, your story either has to shift or fall to the side.

There are some characters who have a fond place in my heart, but they were stories from a different version of me that just never got told, and that's okay. You talk about "getting rid of them" but like.... it's not like I have to physically throw them out. I just don't focus on telling their stories. Sometimes I draw them for fun or nostalgia, but I'm not trying to make their story work. I also have a lot of characters who may or may not get a revamped story someday, because I like them, and I don't actually ever have to make a final decision on that -- the only decision I have to make is whether I feel like focusing on their story right now.

Something I've found that happens in my work is a thing I've described as a character getting "reincarnated." Most of the time I wouldn't notice it until later, but some new character I've invented sure has a LOT of similarities to an older, forgotten character. It's like that old character I couldn't use anymore got reincarnated into a new form, but like, not on purpose? In one case I noticed when I realised I'd given a newer character the exact same scars as an old Neopets character that I hadn't thought about in years, and then suddenly noticed how similar they were in personality, too. So I dunno, sometimes a character I totally let go of still manages to come back, just in a different way. ;u;

[AnnaLandin]

Preface to this question: I have ideas like other people breathe.

The last time I bothered to sit down and count my characters - which was about 5 years ago - I had over 400 characters scattered across 35+ fictional universes and stories, and that number has only grown since. This is counting ancient stories I never finished, stories I intended to finish but then scrapped completely, stories in various stages of development, stories I've already finished, and stuff I'm working on at the moment.

I'm kind of a hoarder when it comes to stuff like this. Nothing ever really gets thrown away. I keep everything lying around (neatly organised by project-folders, of course, so I can find it again).

This doesn't mean I cling to old ideas and find it hard to sacrifice characters for the good of the story - it just means that once they've been cut out, I stick them in a little box of spare parts labelled "Ideas and characters", which I can then revisit whenever I need to.

To pick one random example; when I was seventeen, I wrote a story about a world made up of islands floating in the air, and some of the characters I had were pirates aboard a flying ship. The story went nowhere in the end, and I scrapped the entire fictional universe, along with it, but I kept the ideas around in my box of spare parts. And then, when I was about 21-22, I invented another story, in another fictional universe which had air-travel by flying ships, and found myself in need of some characters. So I reached into the box, pulled out the cast of that old story, dusted them off, tweaked a few things, turned them from pirates into a scrappy air-navy, and voilá, they had a new home and a new story.

I do stuff like that all the time. Everything serves a purpose, even when the original purpose they were invented for no longer exists for them. I'm the storytelling-equivalent to an old lady who always keeps a piece of old string in her purse, just in case.

I let go of the old stuff that wasn't working, but I keep the stuff that might. Even if it doesn't end up in the story I originally intended, and even if I tweak and change a bunch of stuff the next time I use them, and even if the old story gets entirely scrapped, I keep the spare parts. I can cobble together pretty much anything from spare parts!

[joannekwan]

I've had tons of story ideas and characters that never got past the development stage. I still have them recorded down in case I ever want to revisit them. Of course there are some that I never plan on redoing, but I like to keep them around for nostalgia's sake.

And I'm always open to recycling character designs and having "spiritual successors."

[Choosybeggar]

Well, characters don't really stop existing for me, period. They're always living their own lives in character-land when I'm not using them or just interacting for my own enjoyment. That said, I definitely have gone through the generational shifts that make old characters no longer that relevant or interesting in the stories I currently create.

[Doubtcent]

I try never to throw away my characters, even the worst ones. Instead, I find clever or interesting ways of updating them.

For instance, I had a character that I had come up with back in the day for a series, but found that the character's design was a bit... boring. So I swapped the gender. Boom! Now I love her to death.

Or even my OC.

I used to have a face. A cute, horrible looking face.
But to make it cool and relatable, I simplified it. I don't remember when it happened exactly, but it happened and its my favorite OC by far.

[wbparham247]

I actually realized a few months ago that there were a lot of characters that I created at the start of my series and left them behind, so I determined I was going to do a series bringing them back in! I call it "A Door Revisited"! http://m.tapastic.com/series/Dobble--Ed-A-Door-Revisite

I felt like it would really add to the diversity and excitement in my comics if I reintroduced a lot of "retired" villains and characters that had been made back when the series took off in 2002. It's come a log way since then but there's nothing like getting back to your roots!

[phillip000515]

I hate throwing away characters honestly but whenever I do I have this mid-life crisis of actually feeling emotion for once in my life and just cry inside, but jokes aside I either try to change the character drastically or change them so they can fit. I could show you an example picture (but I'm at school on my school tablet writing this out so rip).

Anyways for instance I had an OC who loved gems and was with the protagonists team, but now I've changed him to where he still loves collecting gems, but he's on the opposing side and wields a legendary sword now. So I didn't have to throw him away but I just changed him. I actually do have moments where I throw away an OC and magically bring him back though.