A dynamic character is one that undergoes important changes or developments over the course of the story. They learn lessons, come to realisations and are ultimately a different person, be it for good or bad, by the end of the narrative. A static character is, put simply, the opposite of that. They do not experience growth and who they are at the beginning is who they are at the end. So here are some possible scenarios where you can use a static character.
When your plot is story driven
If the story is plot driven, meaning that the story moves forward as a result of action rather than character wants and needs, having static characters can provide a balance to that. You’re not going to have as much time to go into a character’s backstory due to all the action and potential explosions and that’s fine. The focus is on the events that are unfolding so they characters are less likely to change.
When your character has been there and got the t-shirt
An old mentor figure is more likely to be on the static side when they’ve been around the block a few times. They’ve learnt all the lessons and are now ready to pass them down to those willing to learn.
When your character is an NPC
Not every character needs to be complex or experience growth. When every character is competing for their own arc it can get super crowded. Having a static It makes sense then, that if a character is non-essential, they don’t need to have the same level of attention given to their development as a main cast member.
Are there other uses for static characters? Do you have many in your comic? Let us know in the comment section below! And join us on Sunday evening for our Quackchat at 5:30PM(EST)!
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The Problem With Monopolies
Tantz_Aerine at 12:00AM, Sept. 28, 2019
8 likes!
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Kou the Mad at 6:12PM, Sept. 30, 2019
A reminder they actually are doing a Live Action adaption of Treasure Planet, and here I am waiting for them to also do Atlantis: The Lost Empire.
bravo1102 at 4:06AM, Sept. 30, 2019
So did Tsychovsky and Prokofiev and a couple of other composers. It's an old target for musicals and Disney produced a few versions back when they had a TV show. The live action and animated were different enough that it wasn't a remake.
Tantz_Aerine at 3:28AM, Sept. 30, 2019
They've done Cinderella :)
bravo1102 at 3:05AM, Sept. 30, 2019
@averageartistamber: the live action remakes are to cash in on the success of the Broadway plays. They follow the plays with all the additional material done for them rather than the original animated movies. So it's Disney cashing in on how a new generation may have first experienced those stories. The plays or the costumed folks at the theme parks rather than the animated feature. Notice they haven't done one that isn't also a Broadway play? Hheres no Sleeping Beauty or Conderella for example.
bravo1102 at 3:01AM, Sept. 30, 2019
I could go into past media conglomerates like Warner brothers or Fox or MGM and compare them to the megalomaniac myopia of Disney but that'd take a few hundred pages of books I know that have already been written in a forgotten section of the library few visit.
AverageArtistAmber at 3:00AM, Sept. 30, 2019
Would a comment about Disney's recent obsession with mediocre live-action remakes be relevant here? Feels like they haven't done anything new in a long time...
bravo1102 at 2:58AM, Sept. 30, 2019
Sorry, but I love Disney. Fans invariably include those with different visions from those who work on the various official projects. I don't see either as right or wrong, merely different. After Rogue One, I sort of gave up on Star Wars as I'd felt they'd taken the initial idea of a space opera too far. But as for Disney ruining everything they touch? Maybe they should stick to the mouse and the princesses. But the conglomerate is so big that you cant really blame the mouse for messing up something so far off with it's own production staff. They're really independent companies with one brand name distributor.
Tantz_Aerine at 3:48PM, Sept. 29, 2019
Abt Nihil: It's all right. We'll agree to disagree on this issue. All's good.
Abt_Nihil at 6:40AM, Sept. 29, 2019
Tantz: „Let it go“ was not meant as „shut up“, but in reference to specific expectations in regard to media. I don’t think I should have to say this, but for the record: You are free to retain these expectations and to voice them. And when you do, I feel just as free to vocally disagree, as I did below. „Moralizing and psychologicizing“ referred to your repeated use of terms like „arrogance“ and „ignorance“. You posted a strong opinion using strong words, with what I deem adventurous conclusions, hence my reply (which I thought was rather tame compared to your article, but it seems that it wasn’t received as I intended, and I‘m sorry for that).
Tantz_Aerine at 4:20AM, Sept. 29, 2019
Abt_Nihil: What you are saying then, is your opinion that I am moralizing. I don't feel I am. You will allow me, I hope, to know what my post is about a little better than you. As for 'letting it go' I think you should follow your own advice, because if you look at your posts, the one that appears to be attacking is you. Disney is not 'obliged' to do anything, but we're not 'obliged' to shut up about what we think of their decisions either, as you're telling me to do.
TheJolle at 3:58AM, Sept. 29, 2019
Disney is cancer, everyone should boycott them. I've been doing that for years now
Abt_Nihil at 3:22AM, Sept. 29, 2019
Tantz: But that‘s what I am saying - you are NOT „analyzing a company's business and creative decisions“. You are moralizing based on two simple facts: Disney did not use Lucas‘ story ideas, and some vocal group on the net was terribly disappointed by TLJ. You may now retreat to points about marketing and storytelling, but those weren’t what your post was about and would mean opening a different can of worms. What I am saying is that a feeling of being entitled to getting some specific version of Star Wars is not healthy if it results in rage against a company whose business model is simply making relatively ok movies (yes, with lots of storytelling flaws and questionable marketing decisions). And I know that you feel very attached to certain details (*ahem* Arielle *ahem*), and I‘m telling you that Disney is not obligated to adhere to those. To quote another probably ok Disney movie I haven’t watched: Let it go.
dpat57 at 1:40AM, Sept. 29, 2019
I couldn't wait to read Splinter Of The Mind's Eye when I saw it on the bookshelf but man it was poop on a stick. That phrase can be liberally applied to a lot of Star Wars material. I could come up with better, you could come with better, we all could come up with better.
cdmalcolm1 at 8:15PM, Sept. 28, 2019
https://www.cartoonbrew.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/04/everythingdisneyowns_b.jpg It is scary how much Disney owns.
cdmalcolm1 at 8:11PM, Sept. 28, 2019
As far as StarWars goes, it should be open source.. fans have come up with better stories than the Planned published versions. I wonder if Disney is still going to have marvel writers fix the franchise?
Gunwallace at 7:07PM, Sept. 28, 2019
After Star Wars: A New Hope was made they started work immediately on a second movie, but that wasn't Empire Strikes Back. Alan Dean Foster, who had ghostwritten the Star Wars novelization, was asked to write a low budget story that would reuse footage from the first film, and was told to set most of it in closed spaces and on a planet so as to avoid costly new effects shots. That story was dropped once Star Wars went on to box office success, but you can read it as it was published as Splinter in the Mind's Eye. There's no Han Solo (as Harrison Ford hadn't signed up to a sequel film, and Luke and Leia have a romantic relationship. It's an interesting insight into what Lucas and the studio saw the future of the franchise in the early days, and explains the Muppets episodes, the Xmas special, and all the other dreck that everyone by Ford was involved in.
hushicho at 6:07PM, Sept. 28, 2019
A lot of this definitely also ties back to the massive problems with copyright (and copyright versus trademark and so forth) that were recently discussed. Star Wars, Marvel superheroes, and everything else this company bought up have suffered for it. Like someone was thinking they could just buy up things and wouldn't have to invent them? But not willing to actually do the work to keep them beloved. I adore porgs, BB-8, and other elements of the new Star Wars movies...but they are the only good parts of those movies. If you're just going to rehash A New Hope and then toss out an incoherent ball of nonsense that comes out of nowhere and ends up in the same place, just save us the bother. At least Lucas had the sense to give the Extended Universe his blessing. Disney rather tellingly wiped that out almost from the start. Can't have anyone challenging that monopoly!
ShaRose49 at 5:49PM, Sept. 28, 2019
Disney has way too much powers it stifles their creativity and makes them lazy. I could vent about Disney all day but I’d better not or I’ll end up saying something uncalled for 🤭
Kou the Mad at 2:43PM, Sept. 28, 2019
I think The Last Jedi is worse than the Prequels. Then Again I'm one of the few Hardcore Star Wars fans who likes them.
Tantz_Aerine at 2:34PM, Sept. 28, 2019
Abt_Nihil: I think you're missing the point. You're entitled of course to not like people analyzing a company's business and creative decisions, but facts are facts, and facts show that this 'well oiled production business' has messed up where it comes to SW as a franchise. I do agree with you that Lucas is a terrible storyteller and would probably have done a terrible job with more SW movies. Disney however, is NOT, nor are they novices in marketing, and thus this output they've been having of the sequel trilogy (and the handling of the backlash) is something to be discussed. What can be objectively said about the new SW movies is that they broke basic storytelling rules, especially with TLJ. That's fact. Whether you take it seriously or not or you don't like the 'psychologizing' (i.e. seeking to understand why they made the choices they made) is irrelevant.
Abt_Nihil at 2:16PM, Sept. 28, 2019
Frankly, I don’t like this moralizing and psychologizing on what are essentially business and creative decisions. And they have nothing to do with Disney being a monopoly, but a well-oiled production business. As far as I am concerned, the facts that matter are: - The original SW trilogy was great because Lucas was working in a system of checks and balances, with two great directors in charge of Eps. 5 & 6 - directors far better than he was. - The prequel trilogy was bad because Lucas was left to his own devices. - The Disney SW films have been less original creatively, but each of them was better than any of the Lucas prequels. If Lucas had wanted to make these films, he shouldn’t have let himself be bought out of them. Had he made them, chances are they would have been far worse. - There’s a completely insane campaign against Disney SW since The Last Jedi - as if they *objectively* made the most terrible movie, ruining SW forever! I can‘t take that narrative seriously.
Andreas_Helixfinger at 1:26PM, Sept. 28, 2019
Ever since the "Star Wars Christmas special" came to my awareness (Yes, George disowned it afterwards, but it was he who green lighted it in the first place), I've been convinced that George has pretty much always been fully capable of alienating his own franchise on his own. As for Disney's handling of the franchise, I think it's been a fairly good, but non-invigorating approach, as it is, like most popular franchises these days, too focused on playing it safe and too focused on appealing to a "wider audience", which makes it ironically unfocused. I'm just gonna go and see "The Rise of Skywalker" just to see how they wrap things up, after that, I'm done with modern Star Wars, just like I'm done with modern Disney.
Kou the Mad at 1:15PM, Sept. 28, 2019
Holding on to hope the Darth Jar Jar Theory is Confirmed in Episode 9, That would singlehandedly redeem the Prequel Trilogy.
Kou the Mad at 1:14PM, Sept. 28, 2019
Also no, we aren't THAT hard to please Bane, just look all all the Extended Universe stuff we often gush about, Knights of the Old Republic 1 and 2 are considered some of the best in Star Wars, Dark Empire is a very cool comic series that would have made a perfect first movie or 2 for a Sequel Trilogy, EVERYTHING WITH THRAWN, Various bit Characters like Jedi Master K'Kruhk (He's my favorite Star Wars Character.), Jedi Knight: Jedi Outcast games (Alot of the games are considered good and they could have solely ripped from them if they wanted to and succeeded.). It's telling that the few parts of the New Canon people like are made mostly by Dave Filoni. Granted I think Rogue One was fantastic, I will defend that movie, it was well done, even explaining away the Death Star Weak Point Plothole.
Kou the Mad at 1:10PM, Sept. 28, 2019
Iger, or at least those in charge of various projects (ESPECIALLY Kathleen Kennedy, like holy shit is she bad at managing Star Wars.), don't really seem to know what they are doing and it appears to be costing them quite alot. I think Disney might collapse in the near future unless the various people in charge making the biggest mistakes are replaced with competent people as soon as possible. I don't know what's gonna happen, but my prediction is Disney will collapse if they don't do something relatively soon, and by do something I mean actually do something CORRECTLY.