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Main characters with main character syndrome? What is main character syndrome? Well the way we're dealing with it here it's normally a snide criticism you level and someone who seems to think the world revolves around them, like social media “influencers”, selfish self centred people, that sort of thing. Popular figures like Elon Musk and Donald Trump are great examples: they imagine the world should bend to their whim, and normal rules don't apply, like a main character in a fictional story.
The funny thing is that not many main characters think or act like that. Some do but they're the exceptions. Generally it's comic-relief side characters, villains, or antagonists who have main character syndrome. It's especially true for villains because behaving that way is easily seen as a negative and being selfish like that harms other characters in their world, being a great example of “evil”. Other characters typically notable for it include Queen bees in a highschool setting, also dominant “jocks”, and the love interests in harem anime- each of them think they're the main character, while the actual main character is a characterless blob.
Main character syndrome isn't always a negative thing though! It can be fun or funny, or it can make you more invested in the world. Exceptions where main characters have MCS are the protagonists of noir detective stories. Every main character in Seinfeld had MCS, not initially but that's how the show developed. Cher in Clueless starts off that way but graduates out of it. In superhero comics MCS is definitely something you often see, I think Batman can have it depending on the writer, Deadpool is a good candidate… A fave example of mine is TankGirl, she has it 100% and it works in her favour, she moulds her world to her will.
Do you have a fave example of a fictional character with Main Character Syndrome?
Gunwallace was busy this week so we have a reissue of Gamma Blue Smoldering of Creel - Heavy rocking fire. This is a hammer forging red hot steel on an anvil, rhythmically pounding it into shape, slamming into it with thunderous blows, drawing out the metal into a brutal sword of pure rock!
from Quackcast 680, 26th of March 2024
Topics and shownotes
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Featured comic:
Imparting Quietus - https://www.theduckwebcomics.com/news/2025/jan/07/featured-comic-imparting-quietus/
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Gamma Blue Smoldering of Creel - https://www.theduckwebcomics.com/Gamma_Blue_Smoldering_of_Creel/ - by Odebear, rated E.
Special thanks to:
Gunwallace - https://www.theduckwebcomics.com/user/Gunwallace/
Tantz Aerine - https://www.theduckwebcomics.com/user/Tantz_Aerine/
Ozoneocean - https://www.theduckwebcomics.com/user/ozoneocean
Kawaiidaigakusei - https://www.theduckwebcomics.com/user/kawaiidaigakusei
Banes - https://www.theduckwebcomics.com/user/Banes/
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Quackcast 722 - Main characters with main character syndrome
Ozoneocean at 12:00AM, Jan. 14, 2025
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Main characters with main character syndrome,
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Ozoneocean at 8:35PM, Jan. 20, 2025
EssayBee - for those styles I think it's just more implicit. I know that seems iffy but we're getting THEIR idea of reality, it's a high subjective view. I mean things are ONLY noir because that's how it looks through heir eyes, people don't usually get that, especially people who want to write in the style.
EssayBee at 6:22AM, Jan. 15, 2025
The mention of noir fiction made me raise an eyebrow. Reading Raymond Chandler's Marlowe books (just finished his last Marlowe book "Playback" today, as a matter of fact), and Marlowe never struck me as having MCS. It's a first-person story, yeah, but Marlowe tends to see himself as just a schmuck looking for answers and knowing everyone else is holding out on him. Most of the time, if anyone in a Marlowe tale has MCS, it's one of the pompous police officers or detectives (i.e., "This is my town" types). Similarly, Joe Lansdale's Hap and Leonard series (described brilliantly as "redneck noir") is narrated by Hap, but Hap has a pretty low view of himself and doesn't really display MCS. Neither of these characters really fits the MCS bill. I think a distinction needs to be made between first-person narrators of a story and characters with MCS.
Ozoneocean at 7:03PM, Jan. 14, 2025
@usedbooks - Yes! Both Mad Mardigen and the characters in Spy have that. Makes me think of Adam Sandler and Eddy Murphy actually, in some of their movies that tends to happen: I Spy with Eddie Murphy was like that. He believed he was the main character in the whole world haha!
Ozoneocean at 7:00PM, Jan. 14, 2025
@Marco- YES, modern anime (and manga?) Isekai protagonists do. Traditional western ones and even older Japanese ones don't but definitely the modern ones and especially those they think they're in a game. Not all but many do. Good pick! I've not seen Bastard. I think for modern Isekai that is a negative trait and doesn't not enhance the story.
usedbooks at 9:26AM, Jan. 14, 2025
It also makes me think of Spy: https://www.newdvdreleasedates.com/images/posters/large/spy-2015-01.jpg
usedbooks at 5:22AM, Jan. 14, 2025
Madmartigan in Willow has main character syndrome so severe he even gets top billing on the DVD over the titular character. -- And he is not the main character.
marcorossi at 4:39AM, Jan. 14, 2025
Also the old fantasy manga Bastard!! ( https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bastard!! ) which however is halfway a parody.
marcorossi at 4:38AM, Jan. 14, 2025
Most isekai protagonists? Because they are actually told they are the chosen ones.
Ozoneocean at 3:40AM, Jan. 14, 2025
Ahhhh, but do you know any fictional characters that actually THINK they're the main character? ^_^ That's the contention. It's really rare for actual main characters to think they're a main character in their own world- being AWARE that they're a main character is slightly different.
marcorossi at 2:44AM, Jan. 14, 2025
In some sense we are all born with MCS, kids totally believe they are the centre of the world, but then we are forced to accept that it isn't the case when we grow up. Very often, narrative offers escapist power fantasies where the MC is actually the center of the world (think of "chosen ones" charachters like Luke Skywalker or Harry Potter, but anyway this is true also for other more low key stories), so that we can imagine again that we are the center, like when we were kids. In those cases, the MCs are humble but the world really gravitates around them, so it satiates both our desire to be the center of the universe and our realisation that acting like that is bad, so there is a sort of slight hypocricy in that kind of stories. Also some really bad ideologies, like racism, stem from that childish thinking (MY ethnic group is the most important bestest one!). Those thing work because childish fantasies/desires are a part of our personality also as adults.