Mary Sue- Not sure I understand

[Midnight Dawns]

So I have seen this term used a lot around here and try as I might I can't get a good definition of it. One one hand it sounds like a dm npc (but for literature) but on the other hand a good deal of the time I see it used I could just as easily say protagonist or big bad. The things people rail against seem to be things that have been common in stories for a very long time. Maybe someone can clear this up for me. Maybe give some examples of what you deem are mary sues and why.

 

[Kordeth]

So I have seen this term used a lot around here and try as I might I can't get a good definition of it. One one hand it sounds like a dm npc (but for literature) but on the other hand a good deal of the time I see it used I could just as easily say protagonist or big bad. The things people rail against seem to be things that have been common in stories for a very long time. Maybe someone can clear this up for me. Maybe give some examples of what you deem are mary sues and why.

Mary Sue - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

 

[amysrevenge]

From TV tropes (Mary Sue - Television Tropes & Idioms)

"The closest thing to a widely agreed-on definition is a character who has too many positive characteristics, and too few genuine flaws to be believable or interesting. Of course, despite what many tongue-in-cheek litmus tests claim, there's no objective standard for what qualifies as "too many." In truth, the closest thing to a consensus on a definition is that it is bad. "

 

[Khime]

The concept of the Mary Sue has been stretched and bent over the years until it can mean almost anything. For a good read-up on this trope, check out Mary Sue - Television Tropes & Idioms

Edit: D'oh, too slow.

 

[wayne62682]

That's basically accurate - the term refers to the author making a character that represents themselves in the novel, and said character being the star and better than everyone at everything... basically the author on a power trip.

 

[Aus_Snow]

Maybe give some examples of what you deem are mary sues and why.

Apparently, fanfic (i.e., 'Fan Fiction') is rife with them. Perhaps you could look there?

Oh, and while we're tvtroping away, there's this.

 

[Doug McCrae]

Elminster from Forgotten Realms is a Mary Sue. Partly because he's very knowledgeable, wise and powerful. Partly because he has sex with lots of hot magic elven babes. And mostly because he's a stand-in for the author, Ed Greenwood.

 

[GMforPowergamers]

Elminster from Forgotten Realms is a Mary Sue. Partly because he's very knowledgeable, wise and powerful. Partly because he has sex with lots of hot magic elven babes. And mostly because he's a stand-in for the author, Ed Greenwood.

well ed himself made this one, in general by the end of 2e and begining of 3e Mystra really bec ame one too.

Wait our Netural god of magic died...and was replaced by a Good god, who was an adventurer...and who still thought like a mortal...and gave the title of choosen to so many characters it isn't even funny...


By the end of 3e we here at my local gameing store (also a comic shop) called it Midnight and her Justice League of the Realms...they had batman/Blackstaff (a bit of a jerk loner who split off and made his own group) Superman/Elminter (Yea...just yea), Symbol, shoot I can't remember but I know at least all 7 sisters, the two guys I already named and atleast 1 other were stated as epic...and mostly good, and working with the spy network called the harpers...

 

[Faraer]

Luckily, a lot fewer people are falling for that misinformation than some years back. Back in reality, Elminster isn't intended to be a protagonist of any kind, the sex thing simply isn't true by the sources (Doug & co. have apparently been fooled by the same randy old goat act that misleads folk in Faerûn), and the idea that he's some kind of projection of Ed more than the thousands of other characters he's created, or is his favourite character, or anything like that is pure internet Chinese whispers based on a marketing strategy TSR insisted on for a while.

 

[UngainlyTitan]

Apparently, fanfic (i.e., 'Fan Fiction') is rife with them. Perhaps you could look there?

Oh, and while we're tvtroping away, there's this.

Fan fic is rife with them, not all of them are bad, I used to have links to some reasonable Mary Sue stories but I lost them in a disk reformat some months ago.
A lot in the fan community consider the character of Wesley Crusher to be a Mary Sue (really a Gary Stu) in Star Trek the Next Generation.