said female character you mentioned...I'd love to know more about her!
I first thought up the character to fulfill a specific purpose (basically, as a way of foreshadowing another, stronger character), and figured it would be appropriately tragic to kill her off once she'd done so. She's on the weaker end of the story's power scale, so I had her mortally wounded going up against a villain much stronger than herself.
As I initially envisioned the scenario, she fights the villain in order to save the life of a female anti-villain whom she knows will be important to the (male) hero, who in turn is important to saving the world. Then I realized that 1) I had her sacrificing herself for a man, and 2) I was planning the whole thing out from his perspective, having be about how all this effects him.
That obviously wouldn't do, and one day, I just sort of had an idea for how I could make the scene (and the character) work. First, I switch the emphasis from the male hero to the character herself, and make her death be about her character arc, rather than his. Second, I made it that instead of sacrificing her life for the anti-villain because the latter has a greater destiny, but because it's wrong to kill people on principle. (I was heavily influenced on this change by this article.)
Third, it occurred to me the character would be a great vehicle for exploring a lot of stuff which I think is cool in Nietzsche's philosophy (the little snippet it I got of it from my one college class on existentialism, that is). So, after the more powerful villain has taken her to pieces, she has some last words to the effect that, "yeah, this sucks and all, but it was the right thing to do and I regret nothing. And if the universe were to give me the whole thing to do all over again, I say: bring it on!"
So yeah: she still dies in this version, but because it's what has to happen for her story, not anyone else's, and she goes out like a boss.
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timeasmymeasure
Re: Part 2
Date: 2013-12-16 03:30 pm (UTC)I first thought up the character to fulfill a specific purpose (basically, as a way of foreshadowing another, stronger character), and figured it would be appropriately tragic to kill her off once she'd done so. She's on the weaker end of the story's power scale, so I had her mortally wounded going up against a villain much stronger than herself.
As I initially envisioned the scenario, she fights the villain in order to save the life of a female anti-villain whom she knows will be important to the (male) hero, who in turn is important to saving the world. Then I realized that 1) I had her sacrificing herself for a man, and 2) I was planning the whole thing out from his perspective, having be about how all this effects him.
That obviously wouldn't do, and one day, I just sort of had an idea for how I could make the scene (and the character) work. First, I switch the emphasis from the male hero to the character herself, and make her death be about her character arc, rather than his. Second, I made it that instead of sacrificing her life for the anti-villain because the latter has a greater destiny, but because it's wrong to kill people on principle. (I was heavily influenced on this change by this article.)
Third, it occurred to me the character would be a great vehicle for exploring a lot of stuff which I think is cool in Nietzsche's philosophy (the little snippet it I got of it from my one college class on existentialism, that is). So, after the more powerful villain has taken her to pieces, she has some last words to the effect that, "yeah, this sucks and all, but it was the right thing to do and I regret nothing. And if the universe were to give me the whole thing to do all over again, I say: bring it on!"
So yeah: she still dies in this version, but because it's what has to happen for her story, not anyone else's, and she goes out like a boss.