What does your character(s) represent?

I my comic: https://tapastic.com/series/magicadvisor The main character Lizzy does represent a need for control in the weird supernatural world she lives in ^^

Her enemy (frenemy?) Prim does sort of represent chaos and disorder:

You can kind of see it in the way they dress. Lizzy (main character) is dressed more strict then Prim ^^ Prim has more fun with her clothes. ^^

I never really thought about it but it is really interesting. Thank you @vongcw for a great thread! ^_^

friendship and different aspect of family life in a society that is a little different.

I do usually think about these things when writing, but even if you dont mean to its still always there somewhere. Its really cool breaking things down in this fashion for Two Kings' characters its something like

The Frozen King - Conquest/obsession
Unseelie King - vice/reason
Unseelie Queen - loyalty/revenge
Prince Estoc - penance/forgiveness
Cytherea - love/vanity

For Gatf it would be
Ceres - death of innocence/mercy
Galdranorn - death and rebirth

I think some of those are a lot clearer in the original stories than the comics but there's mine!

Mine are really basic...

Crow Worth: Finding one's worth
Miss: Too miss someone/ femininity
Brad Bail: To run away from responsibility
Shoo-Fly: To be clingy (like a weed) and not going away, like a fly
Blake Blossom: or black blossom...which is a flower which is burnt.
Nono: constant rejection...like being told "no" repetitively

To name some...

I've only had 2 characters that are really prominent in Don't Be A Hero1 so far, so I'll talk about them:

Gemini = Vanity - Even though I haven't touched upon my main character much yet, I will say that her character is representative of the populace who has an easy run through life, gaining everything and not focusing on the people who have less. Losing a key part of her life who was integral to the development of herself and successes as a person, leads her on a quest to rectify what was broken. She believes that she's worth more, and deserves more, and she can't come to terms with the first real crippling loss she has had. Granted, her successes are rightfully earned. She's damn smart, determined, strong, and with a charming personality. But she has a tendency to hold grudges, and has a need to feel that she's in first place. She wants to bring about change to the world as a scientist, but is reluctant to change within her own life. Really, she doesn't like not feeling in control of her own life and the things around her. That scares her the most. She represents what we want the people ahead of us to feel sometimes. Loss, and the ability to learn and change through it. However, sometimes we should be careful of what we wish for. Sometimes, the loss is too great, and we wonder if the ability to recover from such a blow is irreverse-able once events are put into motion.

Johnny = Ego - Johnny is a great parallel to Gemini to start the comic off with. He's extremely egotistical, and believes he's the face of a millennia. Nothing can convince him that he isn't the greatest thing since sliced bread. His ego is a little more over-the-top than Gemini. Gemini is confident in herself, and has realized what she's achieved, and she does actually have the smarts to back it up. But while she can be stubborn, she can learn to change, even though she hates it. Johnny can't learn to change. He can't admit that he's wrong or is in 2nd place. And not just to someone else, but the entire world. He's an over-inflated representation of an egotistical person. Truth be told, he's partly based off of a real life musician who is the exact same way. And harming his poor ego brings out the worst in his temper, which is also over-inflated. Like a spoiled child he has to get what he wants, but unfortunately, the poor man doesn't have the intelligence to back up his claims. While his talents have earned him some stellar achievements, he tends to believe that he's bigger than he really is. He represents the masses of people with big dreams, who think they can achieve anything, but unfortunately, get relegated to at least second place. He represents that desire that our egos carry us towards. He represents overconfidence. And in the moment where we need to shine the most, sometimes our ego and passion can't take us all the way there.

In Rooftop Bookshop:
Rory- represents warmth, honesty and kindness
Laurent- Cool, mysterious, strange
Z- A persona; wearing a mask to hide true feelings, as well as cockiness
Quinn- Innocence and a pure heart
Blaize- Energy, tenacity, carelessness

In (Semi) Super, I've really only introduced one main character in the series so I'll just list her;
Nova- Untouchable, a force of nature, willful, witty

So many brilliant concepts wrapped up in your characters, you guys! Thank you so much for sharing but it's doubly awesome that we've got creators thinking deeper about their casts' significance. Honestly, it's one of the things that makes a pitch all the more delectable for audiences (and you'd be shocked at how often fresh creators overlook this topic!)

There's No Such Thing as Jason1's characters all began as chemical imbalance personifiers. I'd been fascinated with G. S. Hall's "Storm and Stress" of adolescence, a psychology study in the early 20th century. There are 3 focal factors:

￭ Parental conflict -- challenging, defending, and boundaries exploration
￭ Risk taking -- impulsive behaviours, recklessness, and experimentation with moral areas
￭ Fluctuating mood -- sensitivity toward and heightened experiences with emotional stimuli

So... the three main characters have a foundation in this. I grabbed the main issues one deals with during adolescence and shoved them into each character, revving up the properties of each a bit while injecting experiences with chemical imbalance issues (both artificial and genetic) into them. It's ultimately an examination on how ridiculous being a teenager in the 21st century can be.

However, the comic I'm working on now is a spin-off, an alternate ending to the actual story. All but one of the characters are young adults. So it's more a "coming off that high" tale about trying to recover yourself after the storm, memory being a crucial aspect involving trust (or mistrust!) of the self. It's a little bit-o-philosophy and psychology, my other loves~

I think every cartoon character is an extension of his/her creator. As a human, I have much of the same thoughts and feelings as anybody else, and so I'm working on a character who often sees the world through the eyes of, well, me, and hopefully by extension most other people. She's not a super heroine who beats up (and gets beat up by) the bad guys. She's, as I like to think of it, one of us!

Oh this is a good topic :Dc

I actually think about this a lot, so here goes~

Basically, factions in my comic, Cosmic Fish1 are ghosts and guardians. And from there on there are sub-factions but that's getting ahead of myself (and the comic)

Ghosts are entities that are told they're not supposed to exist or affect a certain "order" of things. In many cases, all the ghosts have a form of representation that is often erased or treated as "wrong". They, however, struggle to exist although they feel as if they don't belong, which is common for young adults so it's also a reason why the majority of the cast is so young.

The concept of monster, which is brought up later on, is a physical manifestation of the mental state the 'ghosts' find themselves in as they succumb to self-hatred or even negative traits that take over. Which is what the guardians are constantly fighting against...ironically with negative reinforcement.

Guardians are what are deemed "right". Planetary guardians are basically the earth-like deities in many cultures and religions as kind but also ruthless when needed to be, in a way like strict parents. "I'm hurting you because I love you" or even pick favorites in what they think is considered "right" instead of helping those who actually need it.

From then on, you have the characters:

Schnell is the physical representation of depression

(ironically)
and other things that are spoilers.

Acantha represents anger and frustration. And although she uses female pronouns, she is considered NB. (non-binary)

Gallo tends to consider themselves the hero of the story despite the fact he's often told he can't "fly" but rather glide and often does more damage by chasing ghosts away from his town instead of helping...but he helps sometimes, just...after proving you're not "a problem". He also lacks the use of hands which makes him handicapped but it has never honestly stopped him unless he recognizes he needs help, but that is not his persona nor is he someone that needs to "be saved".

(He just carries things with his mouth)

Bells, as one of the guardians, is the "martyr" or the self-abuser who takes responsibility for everything and constantly needs to "fix" things.

Krazzle is meant to be reassurance and acceptance. He's neither a guardian nor a ghost (just a giant cat dragon but w/e) so he comes from a different place. He's supposed to be the one that can help the current protagonist, Acantha, self-acceptance.

Can't say more because the other ghosts haven't been introduced, but there are a few other ones like Hessa being an overly-optimistic intersex, Bavel an atrsy-type dealing with autism, and Ramus being a bookworm pessimist with anxiety. As well as characters that basically represent utilitarianism, entropy, regret, so on and so forth.

Tl;Dr, my comic is 90% symbolism hidden in antics of monster kids figuring out their lives and how they can change and grow for better despite everything stacked against their favor.

The other 10% is a huge conspiracy.

Oh absolutely! What your character represents is one of the very first steps to making a character for me, so I always keep it in mind when I'm writing characters.

For Tales from the Well!
Prince Deryn= Reckless bravery
Poppy= Innocence and naivety
Esther= Coming of age and irresponsibility

For Manna Magi Wilbur and Amira are a tongue and cheek take on Good vs Evil

Characters can also represent different virtues depending on the "episode" or comic issue. Like how Batman can represent Justice in one series, or recovery from tragedy (maybe resilience) in another story. Batgirl represents youthful intelligence, but sometimes she represent recklessness, or survivor's guilt. That way I can mix it up depending on the episode X)

I haven't started working on it yet. It's called Mystical Tales and Whimsical Adventures - The Creation Chronicles.

Each Act stars a different set of characters. One of the set of characters I worked on is based on the Major Arcana cards, either upright or reversed. I chose to base them on the Arcana cards because of what they represent, and how it reflects the character. There is like 22 of them and I wanted to keep 14, so I decided to kill off 8 of them for the sake of the plot.

On another set, I based them off of what the elements of the universe represents. I also based them off me and my friends. Like fire can pertain to the burning passion of beings, darkness can pertain to the blankness of the soul (or something), etc.

I have, like, four sets of characters. I don't know the motif of the other two.

My characters always have a meaning because each character I introduce is vital to how I tell the story.

For Me and My Friend
Mary Ann: She actually represents me and my wishes when I was a kid. She also represents when we have to grow up.
Friend: He is actually my imaginary friend when I was younger but he also represents all the things that I have forgotten growing up.

My inner demons

all the things i wanted to say out loud but wasnt able to

balor and cath, my two main characters, have always been intended to represent opposites in all areas. cath is a representation of balance and acceptance, so i guess balor represents chaos and what? denial? confusion? they all fit. also, in the story, theres presentation of the four elements - the Tuatha De are air, the fomor are water, cath is earth, and balor is fire. so theres that too.

Well I guess one thing about my characters in Manga Academy are interesting In how they play off each other. Lily is the peacekeeper to Akane's punch first ask questions later. And Josh acts like sort of a mentor to Yuta being a young protege.

My main character is a young kid, he is bland, average and boring, there is nothing special about him. He is like a blank paper.
As the story progress he meets new and different characters with their own ideals. They are like crayons. Each crayon leaves a different mark on the paper, which shapes and forms the main character. By the end of the story the blank paper becomes an unique colorful painting. Whether he becomes good or bad I don't know.

My main characters are based on 3 attitudes/reactions someone leaving a dysfunctional family may have.
I haven't gone too deep into it yet but Wash is the child looked up to as the favourite and wants to go back, Lunch is the one that wanted nothing more than to get out of there, and Drink is the one that wanted to leave more than anything at the beginning but begins to regret it.

Oh my, this is something to think about. Hmm...

One of the core themes of Galebound is not reading a book by its cover. Many of the characters subvert the expectations other characters (and perhaps the readers) have, generally for the better (but occasionally for the worse). So every character has a core of dichotomy, where they could be and act like one thing, but they're also something else entirely (whether they realize it or not). Yeah.

Anyway.

• Conan - Duty, to the point where what he wants and what he feels he needs to do are in deep, deeeeeeep conflict.
• Din - Love and retribution. He's out to overthrow a kingdom for reasons that haven't been revealed yet, but his motives are spoilerspoilerspoilerspoiler. He's...he's a complicated fellow.

Not yet revealed chars:

• Pascal - Mercy. This boy is my cinnamon roll. He's an assassin, but he's the sort that will literally take his target out to dinner and a movie first.
• Vivian - Expectations. There's a lot one might expect from Vivi. Unfortunately she acts on what people expect of her and exemplifies those expectations...or so it seems. When nobody's looking, she turns those expectations around and upside down.