Mary Sue characters

Cafe Society
1

From what I understand, Mary Sues are annoyingly perfect characters with extreme talents in books or movies or TV.

Wesley Crusher is an example of a Mary Sue (although for male characters, they’re called either Gary Sue or Marty Sue, IIRC). But I think Wil Wheaton knows how one-sided the character was written and maybe if he’d been a bit older during ST:TNG, he might have been able to speak up.

I was recently rereading the Earth Children series* by Jean Auel (I gave up about 2/3 of the way through Plains of Passage) and I think an argument can be made that Ayla is a Mary Sue.

What other characters, in either books, movies, or film, are so annoyingly perfect you just want to slap them?

*I was in between trips to the library. Maybe if I hadn’t just finished rereading the stunning Outlander series by Diana Gabaldon I wouldn’t have lost patience with the travels of Jondalar and Ayla and Whinney and Racer and Wolf. Either Auel is getting older or lazier, but her writing style has severely diminished since *Clan of the Cave Bear. *

2

Well, there’s the fishwife from Atlas Shrugged, briefly but obviously a stand-in for Ayn Rand herself.

3

I thought a Mary Sue had to be a stand in for the author and his/her own bizzaro fantasies?

I nominate the main character from the Twilight Series. I haven’t read the whole first book, but my sister in law was reading passages of it too us when she was in town for the holidays. She was reading it because a friend forced her, and found the book to be alternately disturbing and hilarious because the main character was such an obvious stand in for the authors desires.

We played an awesome bibliomancy drinking game with the book and then she read some of her “favorite” bits out loud. Good times were had by all.

4

The doctor in Uhura’s Song, whatever her name was. Fitting, considering the Trek origins of the term.

5

The male version is a Gary Stu.

6

No, that’s a self-insert. Almost all self-inserts are Mary Sues, but not all Mary Sues are self-inserts.

There’s a whole LiveJournal comm dedicated to Sues at canon_sues, which I gleefully read for the sporking.

7

Well then, I stand corrected, ignorance fought. And here I thought I was up on all this stuff.

Off to read up on canon sues.

8

Well, when I was first introduced to the concept, the Mary Sue was an incredibly wonderful and perfect person who everyone loves but who dies in the end because he/she is too wonderful to live. This could, of course, be a stand-in for the author (except for the dying part).

Given that, Inman in Cold Mountain is a perfect example.

9

You mean like Beth from Little Women? I never wanted to slap her, though. She was too sweet.

10

Rudi Mackenzie in S.M. Stirling’s Emberverse series. I don’t even want to smack him; being likeable is part of his impossible perfection.

11

Also, the main character in Battlestations! and Dreadnaught! – both Star Trek books by Diane Carey.

It’s like the author had a checklist she was following in making that character into a Mary Sue.

12

I think a big part of the concept is not only the perfection, but how the fictional universe, especially other characters, react to said character and perfection. If the world and the characters treat them reasonably, there’s much less of a problem. If they act like (s)he is the most important thing of all, then you start to wonder…

13

Princess Admiral Marissa Amber Flores Picard Gordon

14

Eva from Uncle Tom’s Cabin.

Beautiful and perfect, she manages to lift the soul of everyone she meets. And then she dies tragically but beautifully.

Bleh.

15

The character who was first identified to me as a Mary Sue:

Lal (Data’s android “daughter”) from ST:TNG

16

By that standard, Mother Abagail from The Stand qualifies (also qualifies as a magical negro).

Whether magically retarded King characters such as Duddits and John Coffey meet Mary Sue standards is debatable. They’re not perfect – imperfection is essential to their characters – but they’re such insightful holy fools!

17

Is the “Mary Sue” only found in genre fiction? Was Phineas in A Separate Peace a Gary Stu?

18

I thought of suggesting this too, but Phineas’ perfection is fundamental to the plot. I wonder, would that count?

19

Joey on Dawson’s Creek–not a stand in for the creator (that was Dawson, though I got the sense the writers tried to make one). After a while, it was like she could do no wrong, was gorgeous but didn’t realize it, every guy possible fell for her, etc. Blech.

20

In my view a Mary Sue has certain defining characteristics:

  1. They’re the protagonist. Side characters might not be fleshed out enough to make a real judgment and some of the other aspects of a Mary Sue are main character focused.

  2. They’re effectively an author stand-in. If as you read the novel you can envision the writer trying to describe how great they are, then you’re well on your way.

  3. They’re effectively always right. Whatever course of action they decide is the right one even if it requires that everyone else in the world suddenly become brain droolingly stupid to allow it to work.

  4. Hand in hand with that, they’re never morally, mentally, or spiritually conflicted. Because they’re always right they cut through other people’s strawman arguments… er… faulty thinking. They are allowed to be physically threatened but they cannot be in danger of being wrong.

  5. Everyone loves them. Everyone who is a good guy that is. Unambiguously evil people hate Mary Sue, however, because she is so perfect.

  6. Any character flaws that they have exist only to emphasize how great they are. They’re too trusting, too caring, too gentle, too special. Note that these “flaws” rarely actually impact them because as stated above Mary Sue is never wrong. So being too trusting appears to be a problem at first but it works out for the better in the end.

From that I have to point to the works of Vonda N. McIntyre. I have read both *Dreamsnake *and The Moon and the Sun and in both of those very separate novels the main character is such an obvious authorial stand-in Mary Sue it is ridiculous.