# Mary Sue characters **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Created:** [January 2, 2009, 11:16pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/mary-sue-characters/479642 "2009-01-02T23:16:55Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 10
**Author:** ![BrainGlutton](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/82dd89/32.png) [@BrainGlutton](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BrainGlutton)\ **Post date:** [April 9, 2012, 12:57am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/mary-sue-characters/479642/181 "2012-04-09T00:57:57Z")
> [@The\_Second\_Stone](#): > > Louis Wu from David Niven’s Ringworld books is a Mary Sue/Gary Stu. His flaws are that he is a wire-head and cheese addict, both of which he can give up at will. He regularly out-smarts aliens with super intelligence without missing a beat. And for such a complex and gifted character he is quite incredibly uninteresting. **That’s** a mark of a Marty Stu. ---
**Author:** ![Jenaroph](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/e8c25b/32.png) [@Jenaroph](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Jenaroph)\ **Post date:** [April 9, 2012, 1:26am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/mary-sue-characters/479642/182 "2012-04-09T01:26:47Z")
Michael Blomqvist of the “Girl with the Dragon Tattoo” series. I’ve read the first two books so far. All the women just fall into bed with him, his magazine is doing awesome since his fabulous scoop against a super-evil corporate bigwig, everyone agrees that he’s a great guy, except for other reporters who are jealous, and his big flaw is he’s too stubborn in his pursuit of bad guys. The series in general is well written enough though that his Gary Stu-ness is more amusing than detracting. ---
**Author:** ![Der\_Trihs](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/der_trihs/32/233_2.png) [@Der\_Trihs](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Der_Trihs)\ **Post date:** [April 9, 2012, 1:46am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/mary-sue-characters/479642/183 "2012-04-09T01:46:49Z")
> [@brazil84](#): > > Honor Harrington, from David Weber’s series. > > I really liked the “duel scene,” but it really pushes one’s willing suspension of disbelief. Is there anything she can’t do twice as well as the best experts? She’s an example of what I was talking about earlier; a larger than life hero. Yes, she’s incredibly skilled and successful and heroic - and acknowledged as such in-universe; but a larger than life hero by definition isn’t just one of the crowd. She’s also undergone quite a lot of trauma, taken a lot of damage and suffered a lot of loss. And as far as her being twice as good at everything than everything else; when you get right down to it, she has a fairly narrow range of demonstrated abilities. It’s not like she’s a genius painted, engineer, architect and scientist. She’s not even all that great at politics, and most of her wealth is from being appointed a noble & getting in at the ground floor of the Grayson domestic expansion, and she had a financial expert to manage her financial affairs as well; she didn’t do it all or even mostly herself. And the things she really are good at are her athletic & military pursuits that she’s trained and performed in literally for 50-60 years, and unlike a real world person she still has a young body to use all that accumulated skill. ---
**Author:** ![Springtime\_for\_Spacers](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/a3d4f5/32.png) [@Springtime\_for\_Spacers](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Springtime_for_Spacers)\ **Post date:** [April 9, 2012, 1:56am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/mary-sue-characters/479642/184 "2012-04-09T01:56:46Z")
> [@The\_Second\_Stone](#): > > Louis Wu from David Niven’s Ringworld books is a Mary Sue/Gary Stu. His flaws are that he is a wire-head and cheese addict, both of which he can give up at will. He regularly out-smarts aliens with super intelligence without missing a beat. Larry Niven. David is the frightfully urbane actor. The conflation of the two is making me giggle. ---
**Author:** ![Der\_Trihs](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/der_trihs/32/233_2.png) [@Der\_Trihs](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Der_Trihs)\ **Post date:** [April 9, 2012, 2:28am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/mary-sue-characters/479642/185 "2012-04-09T02:28:37Z")
> [@Springtime\_for\_Spacers](#): > > Larry Niven. David is the frightfully urbane actor. The conflation of the two is making me giggle. I can’t believe I missed that. ---
**Author:** ![jayjay](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/jayjay/32/6765_2.png) [@jayjay](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/jayjay)\ **Post date:** [April 9, 2012, 2:34am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/mary-sue-characters/479642/186 "2012-04-09T02:34:12Z")
> [@Springtime\_for\_Spacers](#): > > Larry Niven. David is the frightfully urbane actor. The conflation of the two is making me giggle. For those who get confused: Larry Niven wrote _Inconstant Moon_. David Niven wrote _The Moon’s A Balloon_. Which one sounds like the science fiction writer to you? 😃 ---
**Author:** ![Robot\_Arm](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/robot_arm/32/18280_2.png) [@Robot\_Arm](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Robot_Arm)\ **Post date:** [April 9, 2012, 2:37am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/mary-sue-characters/479642/187 "2012-04-09T02:37:40Z")
The main character in every TV show made by Donald Bellisario; _Black Sheep Squadron_, _Battlestar Galactica_ (1978), _Tales of the Gold Monkey_, _Airwolf_, _Magnum, P.I._, _Quantum Leap_, _JAG_, and _NCIS_.[sup]\*[/sup] Seriously, it seems to be what he does. - Does anybody remember anything about _Tequila and Bonetti_ or _First Monday_? I don’t, and am fairly confident that I don’t have to. ---
**Author:** ![CalMeacham](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/calmeacham/32/35_2.png) [@CalMeacham](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/CalMeacham)\ **Post date:** [April 9, 2012, 2:51am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/mary-sue-characters/479642/188 "2012-04-09T02:51:35Z")
David Stone actually wrote a book titled **the Mary Sue Extrusion** , which seems to be simply begging for a put-down or something. According to the reviews, it’s actually pretty good. I haven’t read it, but I stumbled across the title while hunting for entertainingly bad science fiction: > **[The Mary-Sue Extrusion](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Mary-Sue_Extrusion)** > > The Mary-Sue Extrusion is a novel by British writer Dave Stone featuring the fictional archaeologist Bernice Summerfield. The New Adventures were a spin-off from the long-running British science fiction television series Doctor Who. > The title of the book (a reference to a Mary Sue, an authorial wish-fulfillment character) was thought up by Kate Orman, who had been offered the slot, but declined. The title was given instead to Stone, who based the book on material he had written for an abortive... ---
**Author:** ![The\_Second\_Stone](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/bbe5ce/32.png) [@The\_Second\_Stone](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/The_Second_Stone)\ **Post date:** [April 9, 2012, 5:21am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/mary-sue-characters/479642/189 "2012-04-09T05:21:38Z")
Well of course I meant Larry Niven. Mistakes can be funny. ---
**Author:** ![KneadToKnow](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/kneadtoknow/32/3999_2.png) [@KneadToKnow](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/KneadToKnow)\ **Post date:** [April 9, 2012, 12:05pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/mary-sue-characters/479642/191 "2012-04-09T12:05:02Z")
> [@Robot\_Arm](#): > > The main character in every TV show made by Donald Bellisario … _Battlestar Galactica_ (1978) Nitpick: Bellisario [directed 2 episodes of the original Battlestar Galactica](http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0076984/fullcredits), but otherwise had nothing whatsoever to do with it. It was created by Glen A. Larson. ---
**Author:** ![Ludovic](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/7ab992/32.png) [@Ludovic](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ludovic)\ **Post date:** [April 9, 2012, 12:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/mary-sue-characters/479642/192 "2012-04-09T12:07:37Z")
> [@KneadToKnow](#): > > Nitpick: Bellisario [directed 2 episodes of the original Battlestar Galactica](http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0076984/fullcredits), but otherwise had nothing whatsoever to do with it. It was created by Glen A. Larson. The Far Side guy? ---
**Author:** ![Robot\_Arm](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/robot_arm/32/18280_2.png) [@Robot\_Arm](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Robot_Arm)\ **Post date:** [April 9, 2012, 12:20pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/mary-sue-characters/479642/193 "2012-04-09T12:20:25Z")
> [@KneadToKnow](#): > > Nitpick: Bellisario [directed 2 episodes of the original Battlestar Galactica](http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0076984/fullcredits), but otherwise had nothing whatsoever to do with it. It was created by Glen A. Larson. You know, I thought it was a little less women-want-him-and-men-want-to-be-him than the others. Thanks for the correction. ---
**Author:** ![Der\_Trihs](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/der_trihs/32/233_2.png) [@Der\_Trihs](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Der_Trihs)\ **Post date:** [April 9, 2012, 12:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/mary-sue-characters/479642/194 "2012-04-09T12:39:30Z")
> [@KneadToKnow](#): > > Nitpick: Bellisario [directed 2 episodes of the original Battlestar Galactica](http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0076984/fullcredits), but otherwise had nothing whatsoever to do with it. It was created by Glen A. Larson. > [@Ludovic](#): > > The Far Side guy? No, that would be [Gary Larson](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gary_Larson). ---
**Author:** ![KneadToKnow](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/kneadtoknow/32/3999_2.png) [@KneadToKnow](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/KneadToKnow)\ **Post date:** [April 9, 2012, 1:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/mary-sue-characters/479642/195 "2012-04-09T13:14:56Z")
> [@Robot\_Arm](#): > > Thanks for the correction. Happy to help. ---
**Author:** ![brazil84](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/8491ac/32.png) [@brazil84](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/brazil84)\ **Post date:** [April 9, 2012, 1:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/mary-sue-characters/479642/196 "2012-04-09T13:59:43Z")
> [@Der\_Trihs](#): > > She’s an example of what I was talking about earlier; a larger than life hero. Of course you are free to define the term “Mary Sue” any way you like. And I agree with the implication that there is nothing necessarily wrong with a book who has a “larger than life” hero who is totally awesome and kicks ass. I do think that if the author goes too far, the hero can start getting ridiculous and the story and characters can start becoming less interesting. I think this was starting to happen with Honor Harrington. > [@](#): > > Yes, she’s incredibly skilled and successful and heroic - and acknowledged as such in-universe; but a larger than life hero by definition isn’t just one of the crowd. She’s also undergone quite a lot of trauma, taken a lot of damage and suffered a lot of loss. For example, she lost an eye and had it replaced with a bionic eye which is better than other peoples’ eyes. > [@](#): > > And as far as her being twice as good at everything than everything else; when you get right down to it, she has a fairly narrow range of demonstrated abilities. It’s not like she’s a genius painted, engineer, architect and scientist. She’s not even all that great at politics, and most of her wealth is from being appointed a noble & getting in at the ground floor of the Grayson domestic expansion, and she had a financial expert to manage her financial affairs as well; she didn’t do it all or even mostly herself. Here’s a question for you: If Honor Harrington decided to take a break from the military and start managing her personal fortune, do you think she would blow it all with foolish investments? Or do you think that by the end of the story she would be the next inter-galactic Warren Buffet? Of course she would be the next Warren Buffet because she never fails at anything she tries, a classic Mary Sue trait. Another (IMO) classic Mary Sue “flaw” is that he is so honest and principled and loyal and incorruptible that he has problems with politics and such. For example Edeard in the Void Trilogy. > [@](#): > > And the things she really are good at are her athletic & military pursuits that she’s trained and performed in literally for 50-60 years, and unlike a real world person she still has a young body to use all that accumulated skill. She didn’t practice dueling for 50 years. She didn’t practice the art of being nasty for 50 years. And yet she out-dueled and out-nastied the number 1 dueler/nasty guy in the galaxy. Oh, I forgot to mention that by the end, she enters into a polygamous marriage and the other wife is totally cool with it. :rolleyes: Does anyone happen to know how many titles and honors she had received by the of the most recent book? ---
**Author:** ![brazil84](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/8491ac/32.png) [@brazil84](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/brazil84)\ **Post date:** [April 9, 2012, 2:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/mary-sue-characters/479642/197 "2012-04-09T14:14:07Z")
Found this on Wikipedia: > [@](#): > > In the course of her career, Honor Harrington becomes a Duchess of the Star Kingdom of Manticore, a Grayson Steadholder, and an Admiral in both the Grayson Space Navy and the Royal Manticoran Navy. She also earns several medals for bravery, including the Parliamentary Medal of Valor for saving both Queen Elizabeth III and Protector Benjamin Mayhew IX (the heads of state of Manticore and Grayson respectively) from a surprise attack. She earned the Star of Grayson for saving Grayson from a Masadan attack as well as saving Protector Benjamin and his family during the Maccabeus coup assassination attempt. She is the only living holder of the Star of Grayson, and the first in six hundred years to receive it twice, as noted by the crossed swords beneath. She receives the Monarch’s Thanks on several occasions, including her role in search and rescue efforts during an avalanche on Gryphon and her handling of an accident on HMS Manticore. But wait, there’s more! > [@](#): > > Honor Harrington’s rank and titles as of the end of the events in At All Costs include Admiral of the Fleet and Captain HMS Unconquered Lady Dame Honor Stephanie Alexander-Harrington, Steadholder Harrington, Duchess Harrington, Countess White Haven. This makes her the fifth highest ranking person in the Manticoran aristocracy (only the Grand Dukes of Manticore, Sphinx, Gryphon and Queen Elizabeth rank higher). Her claim to “Countess White Haven” is unclear but arguable, since she is Earl White Haven’s second wife (a case of polygamy), but in any event is not held in her own right. In many respects, Steadholder Harrington, Duchess Harrington, and each of the Admirals Harrington are different entities inhabiting the same body. Imagine how much bling she must have on her uniform. Probably she would put [Idi Amin](http://jewamongyou.files.wordpress.com/2011/12/amin_dada_lg.jpg) to shame. ---
**Author:** ![Normal\_Phase](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/5f9b8f/32.png) [@Normal\_Phase](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Normal_Phase)\ **Post date:** [April 9, 2012, 3:00pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/mary-sue-characters/479642/198 "2012-04-09T15:00:13Z")
> [@Jenaroph](#): > > Michael Blomqvist of the “Girl with the Dragon Tattoo” series. I’ve read the first two books so far. All the women just fall into bed with him, his magazine is doing awesome since his fabulous scoop against a super-evil corporate bigwig, everyone agrees that he’s a great guy, except for other reporters who are jealous, and his big flaw is he’s too stubborn in his pursuit of bad guys. > > The series in general is well written enough though that his Gary Stu-ness is more amusing than detracting. Both protagonists, really, have more than a touch of being the author’s “perfect woman/perfect man” about them, though there are many redeeming factors as well. (It’s hard to imagine any true author of a Mary Sue putting their prized creation through what either Blomqvist or Salander endures in “Dragon Tattoo”, and Blomqvist doesn’t even solve his problem himself.) I came here to yell at someone from three years ago, though. Rand al’Thor as a Marty Stu? No way! Yeah, he gets away with a ton of crap that a normal person would not get away with due to his status as a figure of prophecy, and yes, he got three women to fall in love with him. But he also spends half the series half-insane, literally hates himself most of the time, and is thwarted by his own allies almost as much as he gets his own way or is thwarted by his enemies. To boot, even his most loyal and loving friends and allies mostly maintain that status by staying as far away from him as they can, and those who do remain with him treat him generally with contempt (many of the Aes Sedai) or just plain want to smack him all the time (Nynaeve). Yeah, he kinda sucks as a character most of the time, but he’s not a Marty Sue. ---
**Author:** ![Anduinel](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/848f3c/32.png) [@Anduinel](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Anduinel)\ **Post date:** [April 10, 2012, 6:18am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/mary-sue-characters/479642/199 "2012-04-10T06:18:07Z")
Nurse Annie from Chuck Austen’s stint on Uncanny X-Men. Named after the writer’s wife. Beautiful, selfless, loves children, etc. Tragic backstory (husband was an insane, powerful mutant who tried to kill her and their son). Becomes confidant to most of the mutants around her, BFFs with one of the team’s most prickly members, has two long-time X-Men in love with her by the time the writer left the book. Falls in twu wuv with the writer’s favorite X-Man, who leaves his long-time girlfriend (made unsympathetic by plot-convenient cray-cray) at the alter to be with her. God, I hated that run. It was so awful that I stopped buying Marvel comics for about five years. ---
**Author:** ![Der\_Trihs](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/der_trihs/32/233_2.png) [@Der\_Trihs](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Der_Trihs)\ **Post date:** [April 10, 2012, 10:10am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/mary-sue-characters/479642/200 "2012-04-10T10:10:55Z")
> [@brazil84](#): > > Of course you are free to define the term “Mary Sue” any way you like. “A character someone doesn’t like”. I don’t use the term myself, and have seen it used to bash such a wide variety of characters that I consider the term effectively meaningless. ---
**Author:** ![brazil84](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/8491ac/32.png) [@brazil84](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/brazil84)\ **Post date:** [April 10, 2012, 12:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/mary-sue-characters/479642/201 "2012-04-10T12:15:13Z")
> [@Der\_Trihs](#): > > “A character someone doesn’t like”. FWIW that’s not how I would define the term. I did enjoy the Honor Harrington series quite a bit, and I do like her character. Masturbatory fantasies and adolescent escapism can be fun sometimes. > [@](#): > > have seen it used to bash such a wide variety of characters that I consider the term effectively meaningless. Well do you agree that some characters in fiction are so Totally Awesome that they start to become ridiculous and/or uninteresting? Do you agree that sometimes authors insert an idealized version of themselves (or of their dream girl / dream guy) into their fiction? Do you agree that this phenomenon is common enough that it is reasonable to give it a name? [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/mary-sue-characters/479642.md?page=9) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/mary-sue-characters/479642.md?page=11)