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Revised Character

Faerie

MONS
It's about time I made another thread here. I kind a missed this place while I was gone.

Hello everybody! As many of us here know, the characters in Pokemon fanfics are usually divided into two categories: OT (Original Trainer, sometimes used to refer to made-up, non-trainer characters) and characters that already exist in the Pokemon universe (which seem to have no fancy name). However, what I don't often see are revised characters - characters from the anime/manga/whatever that appear in fanfiction but are completley different from their canon selves except for name and often appearance.

No, I'm not talking about OoC (Out of Character) -ness here. What I'm talking about is basically taking a character, changing their personality, history, everything but the basics and putting them in a story. If that still doesn't make sense to you (and I won't blame you if that's the case), then I'll just give an example from a fanfic or two of mine.

Readers of the RSE manga may be familiar with a member of Magma-dan known as Hokage. (Yes, you all knew I'd use him as an example, didn't you?) In the manga he's basically your run-of-the-mill high-ranking villains, aside from the fact that his Slugma can create illusions. For a several of my fanfics, Reality's Crossroads and Love and Loyalty to a lesser extent, I revised his character. See below.

Hokage's "revised character" is still a member of the Fireheads trio, still looks basically the same and still has the same name. That's where the similarites end.

Here's the basics: Hokage in RC and LaL wears his hair over his left eye in order to hide a scar from a training accident that completley destroyed the eye. He can still create illusions, but since Pokemon have become exctinct he does it himself. His parents were killed when he was ten and he lived by himself until his teenage years, when he joined Magma-dan and wields a scimitar that is somehow linked to Celebi. He is quiet and sometimes moody, and he absolutley despises Bannai (for obvious reasons). Unfortunatley for him, he is in love with a member of Aqua-dan.

So the question is: Does anyone else use revised characters in their fanfics? Am I really alone in the world of fanfiction? What do you think of revised characters? Post please!
 

Bay

YEAHHHHHHH
Oh my gosh, I was about to ask the same question! :O

Well, in "Nothing, Everything", I have Molly Hale (from the third Pokemon movie) be as this smart Pokemon archeologist. Also, she is very hot headed. There will be a reason why she was liked that. Also, in this story she was much older then when she was in the movie.

I think it is okay to do revised characters if it will benefit the story. Sometimes it can be fun to see how well you can change the character's personality and such.

Sorry if this doesn't help much

;134;~Good night , and good luck~
 

Knightblazer

Memories in the Rain
Revise? Hell, I do more than just revise. I totally transform them.

If anyone read my one-shots so far, they'd know that Mewtwo's defitenly not like himself. It applies to Mew as well. And now in my *breathes in deeply* -greatestambitioninallmyfanfichistory- you can truly see just how different they are, for example...

You see, in Midian, Mew's actually sort of a legendary unknowingly by her power and more importantly, pride. And later when [majorspoiler]Rukario dies, she actually hated Mewtwo and wants to defeat him to such an extent that... I'll just have to shut my mouth from here.[/majorspoiler]

So, yeah, you can see how Mew isn't really the 'pure, loving -not to mention playful' feline everyone knows.

But in the end, I think revising characters is a good idea -provided, of course, that it gives a good impression rather than the latter.

Knightblazer ;262;
 
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Zerodius

Eternally hating D/P
Like... EVERYONE do this.

Unless you are the shows/games/manga authors (if you are reading this post, which is one against several billions... MAKE BETTER STORIES FOR THE CANON!!!!), you WILL revise the characters in a way or another, in a conscious way or not.

The question is not "Do anyone beside you use revised characters?" but rather "Do anyone ever DON'T use revised characters?".

Sarcasm aside...

Mewtwo in most of my stories is the Legendary Pokemon of Darkness and has Shadow-aligned powers. That means that he get to rule over his own alternate, nightmarish realm complete with demonic and undead minions to add to his already overflowing ranks of bloodthirsty clones. He also hang between two extremes ; one day, he is a world-terrorizing lunatic, the next, he fights for justice alongside the heroes.

Mew is her fun-loving self... except Light-aligned and with a seriously messed up and angsty past. From fic to fic, might include but is is not limited to: Mew being Love itself but being denied to right to feel the feeling she's the source of. Mew being a "fake", an evil and cruel duplicate taking all the credit for what she does. Her being caught in various and often painful love triangles with Mewtwo, Lucario, Jirachi, and even Pikachu's ancestor.

Lucario and Manafi are Mew's personal servants and get free revival everytime they kick the bucket. Lucario often get the sad fate of comic relief (poor shorts-wearing fox never get a break) while Manafi's attacks ALWAYS seem to backfire, causing him to have the highest record when it comes to getting himself killed among the Legendaries. Yet, against all odds, they ALWAYS get the job done.

Ash Ketchum actually have a brain in my stories and doesn't need the Pokedex's help to identity a Pokemon he has seen more than twenty times in the last thirty minutes. He also actually care for his Pokemon, actually valuing them rather than giving them away at the first opportunity in order to make room for flashy new entries which he shall eventually end up giving away too. He also won't make 100% of his remaining Pokemon who are not named Pikachu into "Catch'n'Oaks". My version of Ash also fulfill his promises, visiting all the people he met (and actually making promises he can fulfill) rather than making empty promises he'll never honor.

The list go on for a very, very, very, VERY long time.

So, no, you're not alone out there who don't use characters identical to canon.

NOTE: My post might sound mean but it really isn't.

Don't be afraid of busting that canon down and editing your characters!... but don't lose sight of the original design, either! Depending on the situation, you might want to stick to canon or not. Your story, your ideas.

Have a nice day.
 
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Seijiro Mafuné

Diogomainardista!
Well, why not?

[SPOIL]My views of Kenta, Kamon, and Marina are pretty much a good example of how I 'revised' canon.

Kenta isn't really a perfect happy-go-lucky nice guy who goes around doing stuff and is also arrogant, in particular towards Kamon... he's more of a sad and depressive guy who's forced into becoming a trainer against his wont, because 'that's what everyone does!!111'. However, he still has his own feelings, and is a nice guy when he isn't being sad with himself.

Kamon is, as a general manner of speaking, an *******. Since I use mostly the games and little of the EU for my plots, this means I sorta disconsider all development he got in the mangá and just use my version... where he's an arrogant, annoying-as-hell teen who hates Kenta for being 'weak', himself for being 'weaker', and Giovanni for being a moron. (In case I happen to think they're related, he hates him for liking his company more and his child less.) Then, after Kenta beats him for the last time, he just becomes more arrogant and less annoying. I think.

Marina's funny, overall. Get a ditz, give her a brain, don't remove the ditziness, and have her crush on the professor. She's also really against Kenta, since she isn't travelling with Professor Elm, she's really opinionated, and also dislikes the fact that her Pokémon seem to be smarter than her.[/SPOIL]

Well... I think this expresses my point nicely.
 

Ledian_X

Don Ledianni
Sometimes i revise them. I did a rewrite of my story that totally changed things around. I did that in 2000 and basically rewrote the Starboltsverse, changed some origins around and made everything cooler. Some aspects remained of course. But, these are my original characters so I can do what I want to them. In the future though, If I want to revise a character, I just have something bad happen to them to make them change their ways.

For example: I have a s lutty heroine named Crystal. She was s lutty for a while and got knocked up. But, something will happen to her that changes her quite a bit. Not a total change. Just gradual.

Also, some characters' powers were different when I first wrote them. So, I changed their powers, personalities and made the rewrite.

So, if you're going to revise a character, do it gradually. Be better that way and you can see the character change over time.

LX
 

Keleri

I pinch.
Iand characters that already exist in the Pokemon universe (which seem to have no fancy name).

They are Canon Characters.

However, what I don't often see are revised characters - characters from the anime/manga/whatever that appear in fanfiction but are completley different from their canon selves except for name and often appearance.

No, I'm not talking about OoC (Out of Character) -ness here. What I'm talking about is basically taking a character, changing their personality, history, everything but the basics and putting them in a story. If that still doesn't make sense to you (and I won't blame you if that's the case), then I'll just give an example from a fanfic or two of mine.

So let me get this straight... you're changing everything fundamental about their character and leaving them with their name and -maybe- their appearance?

Why wouldn't you just make an original character?
 

Faerie

MONS
Like... EVERYONE do this.

Unless you are the shows/games/manga authors (if you are reading this post, which is one against several billions... MAKE BETTER STORIES FOR THE CANON!!!!), you WILL revise the characters in a way or another, in a conscious way or not.
You're right about that. But the subject matter here is characters that have been greatly revised, not just "revised in one way or another."
So let me get this straight... you're changing everything fundamental about their character and leaving them with their name and -maybe- their appearance?

Why wouldn't you just make an original character?
Well...Say, for instance, you're writing an alternate universe fanfic. You want to use the same characters, but to stay in terms with the "alternate universe" form you change the characters' personality and background (and other details if nessicary). It also counts as a revised character if the original character has little or no personality. Like most villains in Pokemon. There are lots of reasons to use revised characters in place of OCs.

As far as the "maybe their appearance" thing, I only added that in there because some authors change their appearance. I don't usually do that. If I do, it's a minor change, like what I mentioned in the first post.

Hope what I said makes sense to everyone. ^__^;
 

Keleri

I pinch.
Well...Say, for instance, you're writing an alternate universe fanfic. You want to use the same characters, but to stay in terms with the "alternate universe" form you change the characters' personality and background (and other details if nessicary).

I guess my problem with that is that I've seen a lot of "alternate universes" where the characters share nothing with their canon counterparts except for a name and their appearance, which is, to me, an enormous cop-out. If you're going to be writing about a character from the canon, they should be recognizable as that character. Otherwise, you might as well be writing about an OC, and it looks enormously cheap because you're just using the canon characters' existing appeal to pull in readers.

It also counts as a revised character if the original character has little or no personality. Like most villains in Pokemon.

I would refer to that as "fleshing out a minor character". I think the "revised" descriptor gets my hackles up because it calls to mind the ever-present "makeover" 'fics where characters are turned into goths/emo kids/cutters/badass gunslingers with little or no explanation, and the effect just ends up being ludicrous.
 

Yami Ryu

Well-Known Member
Sorry but Revised = OOC :/ if you want such a wonderfully fleshed out character that has no holds to the anime, make your own. If you take an existing character, the greatest challenge for the writer is to not cop out and 'OOC' it or revise it but to keep it IC, or add to the character like in one of my trainer fics. With Maxie, it occured to me, in Emerald, Maxie was insane. He wanted to blow up a volcano. I took that, fleshed it out and made Maxie a psychotically obsessed Magma Leader looking for Groudon.

:/ what you're doing is not having the characters really .. stay in character, or be evolved. Don't dress up Out Of Characterness.

._. It's still out of characterness. I admit my Maxie is a bit OOC, but it's only because I wanted to stress in my fic my POV of him from how he came off to me in the Emerald game.
 
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