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{{trope}}
A subtrope of [[Original Character]]. An [[OC Stand
Sometimes these characters are just used to insult the heroes and make life hard for them, giving the character little point. Does [[Harry Potter]] really need another teacher who's out to get him? Hasn't [[Naruto]] dealt with enough crap already? In these cases, the character is simply used to replace the [[Canon]] obstacles for [[The Hero]] with smaller and (sometimes) more realistic ones.
An [[OC Stand
However, there are cases, even when the [[OC Stand
In video games, sometimes the ''canon protagonist'' is an [[OC Stand
A particularly successful [[Alternative Character Interpretation|interpretation]] of one of these
{{examples}}▼
▲{{examples}}
== [[Anime]] and [[Manga]] ==
* Odd example from ''[[Infinite Stratos]]'', it was the resident [[Harem Hero]], Ichika himself, often being accused of being [[Unlucky Everydude|flat]] [[Idiot Hero|and]] [[Idiot Hero|dense]]. For the most part, it also doubles as [[Possession Sue]], and packed in tandem with [[Adaptational Badass]]. The odd part mentioned because [[Tropes Are Not Bad|it's almost guaranteed that most people liked the change]].
* Tenten from ''[[Naruto]]'' is an archetypical example. Her brief appearances in canon [[Only Sane Man|provide]] [[Hidden Weapons|enough]] [[Deadpan Snarker|character]] [[Flechette Storm|elements]] for fanfic writers to build upon, and yet she never even got a formal introduction. [[Jobber|Being beaten by Temari]] -- ''off-panel'' in the
** Kishimoto, oddly enough, said he likes [[Chinese Girl|her design]] most out of the female ninja.
** Sakura's parents, particularly her mother, are common [[Fanfic]] characters. And her mother is usually both a [[Straw Civilian]] and a total bitch to Naruto. She's become someone the Naru/Saku shippers can use as a [[Freudian Excuse]] for Sakura, or just plain hate for no reason.
*** Sakura's mother is heard off-camera in the anime, but she only seems to exist to prove that Sakura, unlike Naruto and Sasuke, had a normal childhood.
** Other members of the Seven Swordsmen of the Mist show up often as oneshot villains. They're not even real characters to stand in for, so much as placeholders where characters presumably go.
** Similarly, tailed beast hosts number 2 and 4-7, as two and four were only seen briefly while the others were {{spoiler|all killed offscreen}}. The fact that the author made full designs of all of them (even for the three-tail host, when the three-tailed beast didn't presently have a host) for a cover as part of a [[Milestone Celebration]] is pretty much ''asking'' for
*** Yugito Nii (the 2-tails host) is an extremely popular
** Also, Hanabi Hyuuga, Hinata's sister, who only speaks in one scene and primarily only asks questions of her father. Fans tend to differ on whether she would become the heir or a branch house member (and how well she would accept either), and whether she loves Hinata or sees her as worthless.
*** Or, for that matter, sees her as a threat - the natural consequence of the prospect of one sister enslaving the other or else dying.
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** India, like Romania, was almost always depicted as female in fanworks only to be established as male later on in canon. No one seems to really care, though, probably because of his '''awesome''' Bollywood entrance in ''[[Hetaween 2011]]''.
** For a long time, Bulgaria's only canon scene was him hitting Italy with his stick and the most common fanon depiction of him was as a [[Jerkass]] with a [[Hair-Trigger Temper]]. This seems to have been [[Jossed]], however, with him being shown in ''[[Hetaween 2011]]'' and ''[[Hetalia Bloodbath 2011]]'' as a fairly nice guy who's good friends with Romania.
** Since the only Latin American country officially despicted is Cuba, there was a group of enterprising Latinamerican fans that created their own fanon for their respective countries. And thus Latin Hetalia was born.
* Matt from ''[[Death Note]]'' is a good example of this. He gets little time on the page in the manga, and even less time in the anime, but he has a large fan base, and thus many people end up writing about him, usually just writing him as whatever they need, within limits, for the story.
** Also Linda, who was mentioned in the manga a grand total of twice, seen only once, and has only one line. Considering that, she is a ''massive'' [[Ensemble Darkhorse]]; if you type in "linda death note" on deviantART you get 526 results, and she has 34 fanfictions on fanfiction.net.
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* From ''[[Neon Genesis Evangelion]]'' we have Kyoko Soryu (we have no idea what she was like before [[Gone Horribly Wrong|the]] [[Empty Shell|incident]], or even what the woman looks like) and (to a lesser extent, due to having somewhat of a discernible canon characterization) Yui Ikari.
** Also, [[Class Representative]] Hikari Horaki's sisters, Kodama and Nozomi; they never appear on-screen, and the only known facts about them are that they're older and younger (respectively) than Hikari {{spoiler|and that the three of them have a [[Missing Mom]] like the rest of their class}}. To a lesser extent, Hikari herself. Also, Touji's little sister.
** Occasionally the few ''Evangelion'' [[Canon Foreigner
* The unnamed girl from ''Dissociation'' was often used as this in ''[[Haruhi Suzumiya]]'' fanfiction until the release of ''Surprise''.
* An odd variation happens in the ''[[Fullmetal Alchemist]]'' series, specifically the first one. During the movie, and around the end of the show, Ed gets sent to "our" world where everyone he knows has an [[Identical Stranger]]. Fans have a ball with the ''unseen'' ones such as Winry's, who is usually portrayed as the opposite of tomboyish counterpart and is either a [[Dark Fic]] [[Replacement Goldfish]] or someone Ed learns to love, and Roy who is almost always portrayed as the [[Jerkass]].
* ''[[Code Geass: Lelouch of Britannia|Lelouch of Britannia]]'' is prone to taking minor, undeveloped (and sometimes thoroughly unsympathetic) characters from ''[[Code Geass]]'' canon and giving them personalities, backstories, complex relationships with existing characters, and [[Ascended Extra|major roles]]. In some cases (particularly Kewell and Darlton), this results in their being [[Rescued
** Also in ''[[Code Geass]]'' (though not in the above fic) Kallen's brother Naoto Kozuki sometimes get this treatment, largely because all we know about him is that he was the leader of Ohgi's group and died sometime before the series started.
* In [[Yu-Gi-Oh!]] fandom, there was a brief period of time during which people knew about the Toei series, but had no fansub available. Cue Miho, who was a one-shot character in the manga and had a prominent role in the anime, becoming an
* Example from [[Tengen Toppa Gurren Lagann]]: Nakim, one of Yoko's pupils, stars in his own story in the fic ''[http://www.fanfiction.net/s/5765216/1/The_World_Tree The World Tree]''.
* This is heavily subverted with the series [[Zatch Bell]], where unless you're Zatch, Tia, Zeon, Sherry, Brago, or another of the main characters, you'll never get any actual writing or stories based around you. Case in point, any of the many villian-a-week enemies of other mamodos Zatch faces. This extends to major recurring enemies as well.
* A lot of the unnamed [[Posthumous Character
** Sword Knight and Blade Knight get this a lot, too.
* There are many characters<ref>Dr. Bombe, Chienowaman, Cubeman, the Kinnikuman Big Body team, Teapackman, Watchman, and Woolman</ref> in ''[[Kinnikuman]]'' that never show up again or barely get a chance to shine in the original manga. As a result, Matayan is forced to make up movesets for these characters in ''[[Kinnikuman: Muscle Fight]]''.
* A ''canon'' example comes from the [[H-game]] ''[[Triangle Heart 3 ～sweet songs forever～]]'', in which the protagonist has a little sister who doesn't have very much screen time. That little sister got a spin-off game in which she got to be a [[Magical Girl]], and ''that'' game got an anime... and another anime, and more after that. The little sister's name is [[Lyrical Nanoha|Nanoha Takamachi]].
== [[Comic Books]] ==
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== [[Film]] ==
* The [[Pirates of the Caribbean]] movies gave [[No Name Given|no name]], characterization or any information about the mother of James Norrington other than ''she exists'' (because everyone has one). The [[Mega Crossover]] [[
* Unused or non-canon characters from ''[[The Lion King]]'' series are especially apparent in fanon works. The most common are Mheetu (Nala's brother), Kopa/Fluffy (Simba's son), Tesma (a meerkat friend of Simba), Naanda (Sarabi's sister), and Bhati (a bat-earred fox friend of Simba). Given that most of them don't have much of a personality this leads fan-artists to create their own versions.
== [[Literature]] ==
*
** Professor Aurora Sinistra.
** Blaise Zabini gets special mention here since from his name appearing in book one until he got a physical description in the book six, half the fanfic writers [[Did Not Do the Research|assumed it was a girl's name]] (They've since taken to writing about Daphne Greengrass or Tracey Davis when they need a generic Slytherin girl.)
*** This even applies to translators. In the Dutch translation, names are frequently changed to sound more familiar to the readers. So a ''Bella'' Zabini was sorted in book one, and in book six 'she' magically became ''Benno'' Zabini.
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** Daphne Greengrass also gets a lot of attention when authors need a sympathetic Slytherin girl, as she's rarely if ever mentioned in the same negative light as Draco or Pansy in the books. Typically she's said to come from a neutral wizarding family or otherwise isn't connected with the rest of her house, possessing the same traits that Slytherins are known for but without invoking [[Ambition Is Evil]].
** Really, just take any throwaway name mentioned in the series and you'll find at least a few dozen fanfics starring that character.
** [[Chris Columbus]] giving his daughter Eleanor a [[The Cameo|cameo]] by casting her as Susan Bones in the [[Harry Potter (film)|first two movies]] might almost count as an "official" version of this. After all, Susan was a background role with no lines, so what better place would there be for the American director to slip his daughter in without effecting the all-British cast requirement? Well, true to form, Susan ended up getting developed into more than just a throwaway name in the books written after the first two movies came out. The latter films handled this by simply not including her plotline, which they likely would have done anyway considering [[Doorstopper|the length of the latter books]]. In any case, if they had really wanted to include her in ''Phoenix'' or ''Prince'' with actual lines, they presumably would have just invoked [[The Other Darrin]] (as they already had for far more prominent characters, like Pansy).
** Back before Ginny had much of a canonically defined personality, she was a frequent target of this.
** Fanfic writers are also fond of writing about the main characters' kids' school days, when they don't just [[Broken Base|ignore the epilogue entirely.]]
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* In ''[[Peter Pan]]'', Jane appeared in only one scene and was basically a [[Generation Xerox]] of her mother, Wendy. The Disney sequel ''Return to Neverland'' turned her into a highly pragmatic, disillusioned girl who grew up too fast as a result of living through the bombing in London. Margaret, the next descendant in the Wendy line (named, but never shown), gets this treatment in some fanfics.
== [[Live
* There are ''[[Lost]]'' fanfics that takes the minor survivors, including ''extras'', and gives them the full on Lost treatment, with flashbacks and their own sideplots.
** Although the show itself [[Filler|wasn't above doing that, either]].
* Ronnie Gardocki from ''[[The Shield]]'' qualifies as a major example of a live action version, as fans of the character have largely grafted onto him the personality of good guy nerd/geek who fell in with the wrong crowd as far as personality goes. Ironically, David Rees Snell (the actor playing Ronnie) has joked that had the writers fleshed out Ronnie and explored the character's dark side in relations to him being just like Lem, Shane, and Vic as far as being a [[Jerk Jock]], that he probably would have lost all of his fans.
* ''[[iCarly]]'': Rebecca Berkowitz, seen only once, in an extended rarely seen version of "iSaw Him First" and usually mentioned
* To a degree, the Eighth Doctor from the FOX ''[[Doctor Who]]'' movie, at least when compared to the rest of ''Doctor Who'' continuity. Since the movie was a failed pilot, this Doctor received nowhere near as much character development as other Doctors, and ended up becoming something of a Tabula Rasa. As a result, he has seen the most fanfics and extra media ([[Doctor Who Magazine|comics]], [[Big Finish Doctor Who|audio plays]], [[Eighth Doctor Adventures|novels]]) of any of the pre-2005 incarnations.
* On ''[[Neighbours]]'', Lisa Jeffries was a very minor character who shared a few scenes with Summer Hoyland; she appeared in about a dozen episodes over the course of two years. She has, however, inspired a substantial volume of fanfic, which has developed her in ways totally unrelated to her canonical characterization.
* A juvenile character named Marissa Flores, who appeared in the ''[[Star Trek: The Next Generation]]'' episode "Disaster" (and absolutely ''nowhere else'' in Trek canon), spawned the rather infamous ''[[Marissa Picard]]'' fanfic series, written by a chap named Stephen Ratliff. And it's not limited to just Marissa; Ratliff also included a bunch of one-off kid characters from ''TNG'' as the title character's various minions and cohorts.
* In the ''[[30
* Puck's mother and sister on ''[[Glee]]'', since they don't even have [[No Name Given|names]] in canon, but he presumably lives with them and they therefore play at least a minor part in most fics about his life outside of school and glee.
* Since Sebastian Moran (Moriarty's [[The Dragon|
== Music ==
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== [[Toys]] ==
* This trope is all over the place in ''[[Transformers]]''. The franchise is filled with characters who only appear as toys with bio notes of varying character depth. It has even happened in canon on a few occasions - the profile book ''More Than Meets The Eye'' required the authors to invent personalities for the Micromasters out of whole cloth, since those characters did not have bio notes.
** Many fans were actually ''thrilled'' when this was done, en masse, in the canon comic ''[[Transformers: Last Stand of the Wreckers]].'' Japanese exclusive Overlord and toy-only characters Pyro, Ironfist, Guzzle, and Rotorstorm were assigned new, quirky personalities and [[Rescued
* The same applies to ''[[Bionicle]]'' and its [[Loads and Loads of Characters]], some of whom only appeared in a [[One-Scene Wonder|scene or two]] and barely get to be described (the author claims he is very bad at coming up with visual traits, for example). The developers of the beloved ''Mata Nui On-Line Game'' said that [[LEGO]] barely gave them the most minor of side-characters to work with, and they had to develop their personalities and culture themselves. What resulted was a game teeming with characters more memorable and charming than many of the ones that the "official guys" made up. They easily became fan favorites.
** Fans themselves also get chances to flesh out some of the more underused characters, via official writing or art contests. In the latter, they can even design the look of the characters themselves.
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* Any [[Heroic Mime]] character tends to be this, due to little to no characterization of them in the actual source material.
* Just about any ''[[Pokémon]]'' fanfic that places characters from the games (Brendan, Lucas, Silver, Leaf, etc.) into the anime's continuity will make use of this principle to some extent, since most of said characters never appeared on the show outside of 3-second cameos, with Leaf never appearing at all. There's no set pattern for what personalities writers assign them, but there's usually a good chance that they will be used for [[Shipping]] somehow.
** Likewise with game fanfics themselves. No one takes account to Dawn or May's in-game personalities, being that they're technically not their canon ones though. Most [[NPC
** Due to the fact player characters and rivals [[Hello, Insert Name Here|can be named by the player]], fic writers can freely use any name for any of the above characters, except possibly Brendan and Lucas in the anime. For some reason, [[Author Avatar|writers tend to use their own names]] for these characters.
** The Generation IV Frontier Brains (other than Palmer and Caitlin, who have appeared outside the Frontier in the games) rarely appear in the anime continuity, but when they do, they are this trope.
* Commonly done to Dark Link from ''[[The Legend of Zelda]]''. In the video games, Dark Link is a mindless, monstrous, obstacle, usually representing the evil in Link. [[Self Fanservice|But fanfiction writers and fanartists tend to give him]] [[The Blank|a face]] and personality.
** Link himself, whose dialogue [[Heroic Mime|is limited to the player picking 'yes' or 'no' when asked a question]] ([[But Thou Must!|and "no" usually gets you a re-statement of said question]]) lends himself to this. The [[Featureless Protagonist|main character of a video game is often a blank slate for the player to write him/herself onto]], after all.
* ''[[Touhou]]'' has this mainly in the form of the dialogueless midbosses.<ref>except Te([[Spell My Name with an "S"|w]])i, who got plenty of canonical characterization later</ref>
** Daiyousei and Koakuma don't even have any stated non-danmaku powers in a series where virtually everybody has a random superpower, so fans are ''required'' to make up a power for them. They didn't even have ''names'' originally, the ones used here invented entirely by the fandom (translated as "big/greater fairy" and "little devil", respectively).
** Part of the reason for the massive doujin and fanfiction community that has arisen around the games is that, despite the [[Loads and Loads of Characters]], only a small portion of the cast receive anything more than a brief character profile and some dialogue, and even fewer receive any form of backstory, leaving writers with enormous wriggle room. Even the two [[Universe Compendium
* Doctor Cain usually gets this treatment in ''[[Mega Man X]]''. Despite being a pretty important canon character in regards to the backstory, he barely gets a few lines in the games before vanishing. Most fanfic writers characterize him as a kooky old man and a father figure to X and Zero. Lots of other characters could also qualify, since the MMX games were very sparse on characterization until the later games.
** The same can be said for the characters in ''[[Mega Man (video game)|Mega Man]]'', since most of them only have a small character profile to hint at their personalities.
* The Guardian Spirit from the first ''[[Baten Kaitos]]'' game is supposed to be [[Anyone You Know|you]], and is therefore a sort of [[
** {{spoiler|Marno}} from the prequel doesn't get this to the same degree, since he has an actual role in the plot. However, he could still work for this trope, since his actual personality is never shown.
* The [[Word of God|commentary]] on ''[[Half-Life]] 2'' states that this is the entire point of [[Heroic Mime]] Gordon Freeman, with the player being the OC in question.
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* ''[[Mass Effect]]'' fanfiction has Oriana {{spoiler|Miranda's twin sister}} and Kolyat, Thane's son, as a relatively popular pairing despite ''never'' meeting, or even coming ''close'' to meeting and having no connection to each other in the game besides a certain Commander intersecting with their lives. Kolyat is developed a bit better than Oriana, who never actually speaks or is interacted with.
** Preitor Gavorn -a turian whom you only meet outside of Afterlife- is this to an extent, too. He was largely ignored by the fanbase for some time, until a video in ''Lair of the Shadow Broker'' showed him with a human male in what appears to be a bedroom. Since then, he has been given varying personalities, though most have some hints of [[Invisible to Gaydar]] in them.
** Annother popular target for an OC Stand
* ''[[Sonic the Hedgehog]]'' has accrued several such characters, though since these often turn up [[Adaptation Distillation|in the comics]], said personalities are often used. Nevertheless, Ray the Flying Squirrel, Mighty The Armadillo (though he's almost always put as the lost forth member of Team Chaotix), Bean the Dynamite, and Bark the Polar Bear (often paired together, for being introduced in the same game), often end up being OC stand-ins, as do [[Good Bad Bug|Ashura The Hedgehog]], [[Fan Nickname|Wechnia]], [[Development Hell|Tiara Boobowski]], [[What Could Have Been|Nazo]], and [[Dummied Out|Honey The Cat]], though these five are very rare to see in fanfic, not that the first four show up often, [[Original Character
* A few shopkeeps from ''[[The World Ends With You]]'' get this treatment, and HT Masuoka in particular is a favourite of slash writers given his [[Ho Yay|suggestive dialogue]]. Eri is the minor character who gets the most mileage by far, however, since she has a confirmed pre-existing relationship with Shiki and can be believably integrated into the main cast.
* Kaede from ''[[.hack GU Games|.Hack://GU]]'' has absolutely no real importance in the story other than acting like Zelkova's bodyguard, although until she joins your party in the post game you have no idea what her weapon even is. The worst part is she basically vanishes in volume 1 after her appearance, yet you can still do the marriage event with her in Volume 3 despite her having absolutely no development and virtually no game time.
* ''[[Player
* [[Fire Emblem]] has the [[Player Character|tactician]] from the [[Fire Emblem Elibe|seventh game]]. His default name is Mark, but you can change that and his gender. He never says anything (that we hear) and is only spoken to. There are a small wealth of fanfics about him/her, and almost each one gives him a separate personality and back story.<ref>Most popularly coming from Bern.</ref>
* The originally-intended but [[What Could Have Been|eventually scrapped]] protagonist of ''[[Psychonauts]]'', Dartagan, appeared in the game for less than five seconds. There is a huge range of interpretations of him within various different fanfics, roleplaying accounts, and even [[Creepypasta]].
* The player characters from the ''[[Harvest Moon]]'' series, being [[Silent Protagonist
* [[The Faceless|The Pyro]] of ''[[Team Fortress 2]]'' often gets this treatment, having the least characterization of all of the classes, [[The Spook|no backstory]], or even [[Ambiguous Gender|a set gender]]. This practice will presumably stop when his/her [[A Day in the Limelight|'Meet the' short finally comes out]].
* In ''[[Katawa Shoujo]]'', the students in Hisao's class besides him, Shizune, Misha and Hanako get this treatment, as a piece of official art shows their names, club affiliations and disabilities, but nothing about their personalities or backstories.
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== [[Web Comics]] ==
* The [[Film Noir|Midnight Crew Intermission]] of ''[[Homestuck]]'' brought us The Felt, a 16-man mafia group, only two of whom (Snowman and Doc Scratch) got substantial characterization to be clearly defined as characters. The rest of the fourteen ALL get this treatment, as only their powers and maybe a single moment of funny is supposed to encompass their characterization. The only exception is Clover, whose appearances manage to characterize him as a fusion between [[Batman|The Riddler]] and the [[Clock King]], which is still a fairly open characterization.
** Until recently, two of the Felt only appeared [[Posthumous Character|posthumously]], and all that was known about them previously were their names and faces (of course, they still got no characterization at all when they showed up). While their appearances in fanfiction increased once they made an appearance in the story, there still were examples of people using them for as
== [[Western Animation]] ==
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** Dani Moonstar and some of the New Recruits serve as this as well. As Dani only appeared in one episode, not much of her personality was fleshed out, and as such can serve as any personality type they want. Roberto only got a bit of characterization: A slightly egotistical 'jock' type, while Rahne got a snarky playful personality, both from just one episode, after that, they get no lines other than background appearances.
* Ursa, Zuko and Azula's [[Missing Mom]], from ''[[Avatar: The Last Airbender]]''. She's of no small importance to the plot, given that she {{spoiler|killed Azulon to save Zuko's life}}, but her only scenes are in Zuko's flashbacks and {{spoiler|Azula's hallucinations}}. Fans have a field day discussing how accurate either of those are and what she was actually like. It doesn't help that the lack of a family reunion is the series' biggest unresolved plot thread.
* ''[[Danny Phantom]]'' has a few, but none so popular as Star, or Star "Satellite" as the fandom has named her. She has some lines and establishing character moments, but in general, the Show portrays her as the blonde girl who hangs around the [[Alpha Bitch]] Paulina. Naturally, fanfic authors have a ball giving her [[Hidden Depths]].
{{reflist}}
[[Category:Fanfic Tropes]]
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