Sliding Scale of Plot Versus Characters

Everything About Fiction You Never Wanted to Know.

So there's a malevolent empire threatening to take over the world, and only a small pocket of resistance must combat it by any means necessary. However, each of the resistance-troops have their own backstories relating to why they're fighting said empire, as well as internal-conflicts that mostly relate to deciding between succumbing to their pasts, or leaving them behind for the present. So now, they must fight two conflicts: The malevolent empire (the plot), and their own pasts (the characters).

When creating a fictional story, the writers often have to develop it on a macro-level (the overall plot), as well as a micro-level (the individual characters). On the macro-level, the various characters have to unite to achieve a common goal, from surviving an island, to overthrowing a villain, to preventing a cataclysmic event from destroying the world. On the micro-level, meanwhile, each character faces a difficult internal-conflict, whether it's with a past-crime, a disease or disability, or a lost loved-one.

Here's what the story can be like, based on what it's focusing on:

  • More Plot Than Characters: Everyone remembers the external conflict and how it would later on be resolved, but the characters range between there for the sake of it, and almost non-existent. Mostly an action/adventure, mystery/thriller, or horror.
  • Equal Focus Between Plot and Characters: The plot and characters don't interfere with each other, and instead work in-concert with each other to create something memorable.
  • Less Plot Than Characters: The overall story isn't very memorable because of how boring and mundane it might be, but the characters gain a lot of development, as they resolve their own respective internal-conflicts, rather than an overall external one. Mostly a drama, comedy, or romance.
Examples of Sliding Scale of Plot Versus Characters include:

Anime and Manga

  • Bleach's Ichigo Kurowsaki originally lost his mother to a hollow during his childhood, inspiring him to develop the physical and emotional strength to protect his friends and family from the same fate his mother faced. As soon as he first gained Rukia Kuchiki's soul-reaper powers, then increased them throughout each new story-arc, his resolve to put aside his mother's death for protecting the loved-ones that are still alive would also drastically increase.
  • The Elric brothers of Fullmetal Alchemist, consisting of Edward and Alphonse, originally used alchemy to illegally resurrect their deceased mother, but instead lost their respective bodies as punishment. Since then, they joined the military as their new disposable-tools in order to gain clues on the philosopher's stone, which required several human-sacrifices to be made, so that they could restore themselves to normal. However, even without their original bodies, and even as "dogs of the military" whose only job is to die for a cause greater than themselves, they still have their brotherly bond with each other, sacrificing everything to protect each other even during desperate times.
  • Naruto's titular-protagonist was originally discriminated against by his peers for being some prison for a giant nine-tailed fox-monster. As he grows more physically-powerful, he also grows more emotionally so, as he learns to move on from his origins as a human-zoo for a fox-monster, and focus more on developing and helping out any new friends he can make throughout his coming-of-age journey.
  • The Straw Hat Pirates of One Piece originally lost loved-ones to either their deaths or disappearances, and when they don't lose them, their loved-ones just sacrifice their limbs to save them instead. As soon as they meet and team-up with each other, they would leave their respective pasts behind and develop a strong bond of friendship with each other, and with it a renewed sense of hope.


Comic Books

  • Most super-hero comic-books, namely the ones in the DC and Marvel universes, have each hero deal with the external-conflicts of defeating powerful super-villains, and the internal-conflicts of resolving their past-issues.
    • Bruce Wayne of the Batman fame originally lost both his parents to a criminal during his childhood, forcing him to become Batman himself to battle crime and make sure no one goes through the same tragedy he used to go through. He also doesn't bother to fall in-love with anyone of the opposite gender, out of fear that the villains might (a) use them to get to him, and (b) traumatize him like in his childhood.
    • The Fantastic Four possess a bad habit of fighting amongst each other, and at times even more so than against their villains! The Thing is selfish, Human-Torch is brash and impatient, Mr. Fantastic is the strict leader, and Invisible-Woman struggles to keep the team together. Those differences would, in-turn, make them bound to create tons of internal-conflicts!
    • Spider-Man was a nerdy teenager that everyone evaded out of jealousy for his good-grades and cooperative behavior at high-school. As soon as he gets bitten by a radioactive-spider and lost his Uncle Ben to a wanted-burglar, he would dress-up as Spider-Man to not only fight crime and keep people safe, but also gain the positive-attention he couldn't attain as Peter Parker.
    • Superman originally hailed from Krypton, until he was orphaned by his parents to be saved from the planet's inevitable explosion. As he was adopted and raised in the rural-town of Smallville, then moved to Metropolis to work at the Daily Planet as his alter-ego, Clark Kent, he struggles long and hard to fit into a world he doesn't belong in. His Clark Kent side was to make sure he could interact with other normal human-beings so that no one would discriminate against him for his Superman-side's origins as an alien from Krypton.
  • The Scott Pilgrim comics had the main-protagonist of the same name do more than just battle against seven evil exes to earn Ramona Flowers' heart. Considering that he used to date three more girls before Ramona, including Kim Pine in high-school, followed by Envy Adams in college, and then Knives Chau at the beginning of the main-events, it would be implied that Scott Pilgrim himself was as much an evil, selfish user of women as Ramona's seven evil exes. The seven exes were all metaphors for Scott's malevolent user side, and as Scott defeats each evil ex, he would also defeat parts of his own selfish desires that almost made him an evil ex himself, and thus become a better person toward Ramona in the process.


Film -- Live-Action

  • The original Star Wars trilogy was more than just about a small group of rebels doing battle against the Galactic Empire, a force several times larger and more powerful than them. It was also about several issues that were smaller than the rebellion itself, two of them being the most vital of them all:
    • The main-protagonist, Luke Skywalker, goes on a dangerous Bar Mitzvah of death in order to not only become a full-fledged Jedi, but also a full-fledged adult human-being. This would involve helping the Rebel Alliance overthrow the Empire, as well as saving his beloved father, Anakin Skywalker, from his own Darth Vader-side.
    • The other two protagonists, Han Solo and Princess Leia, both start out distrustful to each other, just because the latter was a princess and the former was a smuggler. As the original trilogy progressed, they would put aside their differences, work together to help Luke defeat the Empire, and even romance each other!


Literarure

  • The The Lord of the Rings trilogy has each main-hero, whether they're within the Fellowship or not, face two conflicts, whether it's against Sauron or themselves. For example, Frodo Baggins, the main-protagonist and hobbit from the Shire, quests to destroy the One Ring, while deciding whether or not to involve his friends, old and new alike. As the quest moved on, Frodo would abandon his friends to keep them safe, but would slowly become consumed by the One Ring for that. As soon as the One Ring is destroyed, he goes back to being considerate again toward his friends, who were all willing to sacrifice everything to help him with his quest.
  • The Deryni works are equally plot and character driven, largely because many of the protagonists have to deal with the powers and the persecution that come with being Deryni, as well as the strife between the rival kingdoms of Gwynedd and Torenth. In particular, Denis Arilan and Duncan McLain have to resolve a basic personal conflict between their arcane abilities and their vocations; they both choose to be priests, but Denis chooses to keep his secret as far as possible, while Duncan eventually chooses to live openly as a Deryni priest. Alaric Morgan has spent years cultivating an ominous reputation, yet he has to adjust when a new king (Kelson, himself half Deryni) takes the throne and works to end the persecutions and regain lost knowledge. Kelson has to grow into his own as a man and a king, cope with his heritage on a personal level and cope with rebellions, church schism, and the rival kingdom to the east.


Live-Action TV

  • Star Trek: The Original Series was powerfully renown for this, as while the show's trademark trio, including Kirk, Spock, and McCoy, face a huge variety of external-conflicts in each episode, they also internally-argue amongst each other on how to resolve each external-conflict. The calm and intelligent Spock would often pick the logical-yet-immoral choice, while the brash and emotional McCoy goes for the illogical-yet-morally-correct choices, leaving Kirk to either side with one of his two crew-mates, or invent a third option that satisfies both sides.
  • Lost turns this into a pretty monumental task by combining it with Loads and Loads of Characters. Almost every one of the many main characters has a heavily layered backstory to accompany the main plot of the series, and they are represented in flashbacks, flash forwards, and their own invention: flash sideways.


Video Games

  • In Final Fantasy VII each of the main party has past of being wronged by the Shin-Ra Cooperation and Cloud's personal weaknesses and past is intertwined with that of the main villian, Sephiroth. Each of the main cast's pasts is explored and helps them grow stronger during the game.
  • Final Fantasy XIII is almost entirely character-driven until chapter 12 or so, when the Ragtag Bunch of Misfits finally sort out their issues and personal differences and become True Companions. After that, the overall plot kicks into full gear, but the characters still remain the most memorable aspect of the game.
  • While most people believe the Golden Sun franchise's characters are flat and under-developed, they weren't that much so, as they do have internal-conflicts of their own. The external-plot involves questing to prevent alchemy's return in the first Golden Sun, and restoring it in Golden Sun: The Lost Age. Meanwhile, the internal-conflicts include the following:
    • Isaac and Felix both desire to save Weyard, but their methods of doing so oppose each other, meaning that they must decide on how they must deal with each other in the process. That is, until Felix's group saves Isaac's group on Jupiter Lighthouse and told them their side of the story, thus earning them allies out of Isaac's group.
    • Ivan is the adoptive son of a powerful merchant named Hammet, and joined Isaac and Garret when he was unable to do so. However, the player is given the option to save Hammet, and in-exchange gain information on delivering the Shaman's Rod to Hesperia, resourceful for Golden Sun: The Lost Age. As soon as he learned that he originally hailed from Contigo and his sister was Master Hamma, he then had to reluctantly leave his home and sister behind to help Felix restore alchemy to Weyard.
    • Mia joins Isaac's group to stop her evil cousin, Alex, from destroying Weyard, while deciding whether or not to fight her own flesh-and-blood.
    • Sheba hailed from Lalivero and was adopted and raised by Faran, but joined Felix's group to travel to Contigo and Jupiter Lighthouse, so that she could learn about her past, but with failing results.
    • Piers is sent by his King Hydros of Lemuria to confirm his research on Weyard's decline, but was unable to return to his home due to the perpetual fog and strong currents surrounding it. As soon as he returns home, however, he finds his mother dead and has to visit her grave to mourn her loss.
  • Heavy Rain's external-conflict mostly revolved around capturing the Origami Killer before he kills Ethan Mars' surviving son, Shaun. The internal-conflicts, however, included these:
    • Ethan Mars lost his eldest son, Jason, and didn't want to lose his youngest son, Shaun, as well. This explains why he does all sorts of harmful things to himself and others around him to save Shaun from the Origami Killer.
    • As the other two protagonists, Madison Paige and Norman Jayden, quest to capture the Origami Killer and rescue Ethan's kidnapped son, the former would fight-off chronic-insomnia, while the latter does battle against triptocaine-addiction.
  • The Kingdom Hearts franchise had many characters face off not only against their foes, but also their own friends.
    • Kingdom Hearts, Chain of Memories, and Kingdom Hearts II had Sora decide between saving only one of his two childhood friends, Kairi (the metaphor for Sora's light) and Riku (the metaphor for Sora's darkness). By the time Kingdom Hearts II ends, he manages to find a way to save both, since the two were capable of handling themselves anyway.
    • Kingdom Hearts 358 Days Over 2 had Roxas, Xion, and Axel struggle to find a balance between their bond of friendship with each other, and their duties and responsibilities to the malevolent Organization XIII and its leader, Xemnas.
    • Kingdom Hearts: Birth By Sleep would also pit the three friends, including Terra, Ventus, and Aqua, against each other, and not just against Master Xehanort and his apprentice, Vanitas. The reason was because Terra was succumbing to the darkness, forcing Aqua, the new keyblade-master, to slay him on sight because of it, and thus leaving Ventus to decide between saving Terra or Aqua, much like Sora's decision between saving Kairi or Riku.
  • Like most other role-playing games, Mass Effect has a large cast of characters, each facing an external-conflict and an internal-conflict.
    • Mass Effect 1 had the main-protagonist, Commander Shepard (and in-turn, the player controlling him), face two conflicts as expected in a main-protagonist: Chase Saren throughout the galaxy (the main-arc), and decide whether to take the Paragon-route or the Renegade-route to do so (Shepard's personal-arc). The two chosen backgrounds each player gives to his Shepard simply adds more to the character's personality, as implied by the bonus Paragon/Renegade points gained from each of the two chosen backgrounds. Is Shepard afraid of killing innocents because he wanted his actions to be consistent with the day he saved Elysium from the Skyllian Blitz? Or, does he show no remorse to the people he kills, just as he displayed none of it during the raid on Torfan?
    • Mass Effect 2 was more about Shepard's teammates than Shepard himself, as they each have to decide between confronting the Collectors, or conflicting with their respective pasts. That's where Shepard comes in, as he has to help them resolve their pasts in order to increase the likelihood of surviving the final suicide-mission.
      • Jacob Taylor struggles with his father's past-failures, including the abuse of his own crew while stranded on the deserted-planet, 2175 Aeia, which wouldn't be revealed to Jacob until he and Shepard quest to rescue him and the very crew he abused.
      • Miranda Lawson once ran away from her corrupt father, and in the process rescued her baby-sister, Oriana, and transferred her to a new adoptive family. Now, with Shepard's help, she has to rescue her sister again from her father.
      • Mordin Solus' former-teammate, Maelon, was "kidnapped" by the krogan Weyrloc clan to cure the genophage, but actually chose to help them in order to atone for the salarians' war-crime of infecting the krogan with said genophage.
      • Garrus Vakarian retired from C-Sec and became a vigilante crime-fighter on Omega, known as "Archangel," and would develop his own team along the way. However, one of his teammates would betray and kill the rest of the team save for Garrus, thus giving him the desire for revenge.
      • Jack, a.k.a. Subject Zero, was tortured and experimented on by Cerberus back on the Teltin Facility when they gave her biotics. She managed to escape from it and lived a life of crime to survive the galaxy since then, until she enlists Shepard's aid to blow-up the abandoned Teltin Facility
      • Grunt was a tank-bred krogan who was also an adolescent with raging and violent hormones. So, Shepard takes him to Tuchanka to go through a rite-of-passage, so that Grunt could come-of-age as a full-grown krogan-adult, as well as give him a krogan-clan to protect.
      • Tali'Zorah was accused by the flotilla's admiralty-board for delivering active geth-parts to her father back on the flotilla, and must stand trial for her crimes. Any time Shepard, Tali's captain and "lawyer," fails to defend her, she would be sentenced to exile and become unable to return to the flotilla anytime.
      • Thane is a former-assassin who retired from the business to atone for his past-crimes as said assassin, especially since (a) he angrily murdered batarians to avenge his wife's death, and (b) he's dying of Kepral's Syndrome. He would enlist Shepard's aid to stop his son from killing someone and becoming as his evil as his father used to be in the past.
      • Samara quested to kill her evil Ardot'Yakshi daughter, Morinth, so that she could stop her from mind-raping more innocent people. During the climax of her loyalty-mission, Shepard can decide to either kill Samara or Morinth, the latter becoming Shepard's new teammate any time he chooses to kill the former.
      • Legion enlisted Shepard's aid to stop the geth-heretics, who served the Reapers, from unleashing a virus upon the good-geth and converting them into heretics themselves. At the end of the quest, Shepard can choose to either use the virus to convert the heretics back into good-guys, or kill them all as punishment for serving the Reapers.
  • The Metal Gear Solid franchise had Solid Snake face off against two threats, one per front. Externally, Snake battles against long-time foes such as his malevolent biological-father, Big Boss, as well as his equally-evil twin-brother, Liquid Snake/Ocelot. Internally, however, he fights what the majority of other military-soldiers would face as well, in the form of Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder.
    • If anything, the same can be said for the huge variety of friends and foes Solid Snake would develop throughout his quest. Otacon quests to struggle with the deaths of three women in his life, including Sniper-Wolf (Metal Gear Solid 1), Emma Emmerich (Metal Gear Solid 2: Sons of Liberty), and Naomi Hunter (Metal Gear Solid 4: Guns of the Patriots), while Raiden quests to fight off his origin as a child-soldier throughout Metal Gear Solid 2, and Meryl Silverburgh would have frequent family-arguments with her father/uncle, Col. Roy Campbell, about her becoming a soldier like him.
  • While the Resident Evil franchise was more well-known for the external-conflict against Umbrella Corp's T-Virus zombies, that doesn't mean it had no character-driven internal-conflicts of its own, either. These internal-conflicts mostly revolve around the characters' various interactions with each other, rather than their respective backstories, or lack thereof compared to Umbrella.
    • Resident Evil 1, for example, had multiple endings that changed depending on the player's actions. To get the best ending, the player has to rescue both Barry and Chris if he chose Jill as his character, or both Rebecca and Jill if he chose Chris.
  • Tales of Symphonia is chock-full of characters facing difficult internal-conflicts throughout their quest to resolve the external-conflict of uniting both worlds back to one.
    • As soon as Lloyd Irving learns that Kratos Aurion was his true father the whole time, he has to decide whether or not to redeem him of his past crimes of betrayal.
    • Colette Brunel was the chosen of Sylvarant, but as soon as she loses her humanity only to regain it again thanks in-part to Lloyd and the others, she must free herself from her destiny at any cost.
    • Genis and his older sister, Raine, were born half-elves in a world that despises them, so they must learn to cope with their origins even if it might mean getting themselves killed.
    • During her failed pact with the summon-spirit, Volt, Sheena betrayed her home village of Izumo to save her own life, but since then learned to develop actual courage to atone for her betrayal.
    • At a certain point of the game, Zelos betrays his friends to Mithos Yggdrassil to free himself from his destiny as chosen of Tethe'alla. If any time the player manages to unlock a conversation with Kratos in the town of Flaneur, Zelos will die and be replaced by Kratos.
    • When Regal's fiancee, Alicia, turned into a giant-monster, he was forced to kill her out of self-defense. Since then, he surrendered himself to the authorities to punish himself for murdering her, while Alicia's sister, Prescea, vows revenge against him for what happened to her. However, as soon as they join Lloyd Irving, the two would put aside their differences and become friends to reunite the two worlds with Lloyd.
  • The Xenosaga trilogy had the various main-protagonists face off against not only the Gnosis, the U-TIC Organization, the Testament group, and many other external-threats, but also their pasts:
    • Shion Uzuki, the primary-protagonist, lost her parents during her childhood, followed by her boyfriend, Kevin Winnicott, and thus had to decide between succumbing to those tragedies, or putting them aside for her new friends, including her assistant, Allen Ridgeley, her robot-creation, KOS-MOS, and the variety of other friends she, Allen, and KOS-MOS gain in their quest.
    • Jr., also known as Rubedo, was originally a weapon built to combat U-DO, known as a URTV, alongside his two "brothers," Gaignun Kukai/Nigredo, and the misguided Albedo. He also once fell in love with Dr. Joachim Mizrahi's daughter, Sakura, until Albedo killed her in front of Jr. out of jealousy and misguidance. Since then, as soon as he'd meet with the realian-copy of Sakura, MOMO, and the rest of the main-heroes, he would also struggle between his tragic past and his new friends, MOMO included.


Western Animation

  • The Simpsons is powerfully notable for this, especially in the form of Bart and Lisa, and how they interact with their peers and teachers at Springfield Elementary. Both know that they could either become so-called "lame teacher's pets," in other words making other children envious of them, just by doing well at school, or become "cool toward other kids" through bad grades and acts of misbehavior. This is why both Bart and Lisa took seperate routes, with the former taking the route of appealing toward other children as much as possible at the expense of disrespecting authority for it, and the other taking the route of appealing toward said authority at the expense of making other kids jealous.


Real Life

  • Just as it's common in fiction for characters to face an overall external-conflict and their own, smaller internal-conflicts, it's just-as-much so for people in real-life. For example, a student goes to school, as during his time there he develops two conflicts of his own. The external-conflict would normally revolve around studying at school, like he's supposed to. The internal-conflict, meanwhile, would be whether or not he should, as he might make other kids jealous any time he develops good grades.
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