"Character Driven" "Character Driven" "Character Driven" "Character Driven"

[Petra]

Personally, I'm getting tired of hearing how great shows are when they are supposedly 'Character Driven', also about how great SGU will be because of this.

Questions

1) What does 'character driven' mean to you personally?
2) Why is it the new fad?
3) How are SG1 and Atlantis NOT Character driven?
4) How will SGU be more Character Driven than the others
5) Why does one care if something is character driven? (as long as its a good show)

1) For me it means that development of the charcters is at least as important as the plot. i think "Dexter" is the perfect example of a character driven show, because eveything revolves around the main character. if Dexter didn't kill, didn't have doubts about himself there wouldn't be any plot, period. His character, and characters of people around him, drive the show. They form the plot, instead of reacting to it.

2) I don't think it's new, just that in recent years became more popular. I think - and i know it is a generalisation - in the 80s and the 90s we had mainly plot driven shows, e.g MacGyver or CSI and now we observe the opposite. It's natural. I'm pretty sure in some time we'll be back to plot driven shows being more popular.

3) SGA character driven? Now, that's an idea..seriously, SGA was very plot driven and we didn't find out a heck of a lot about its characters throughout 5 years of the show. How is Teyla, or John, or Ronon in season 5 different from season themselves in season 1? There was a lot of action but the characters stayed mostly the same the whole time and you didn't have any problems with predicting how they would react in any given situation.

SG-1 on the other hand is in part plot-driven and in part character-driven. There were some plotlines which were the results of a character decision, e.g the whole Jaffa liberation arc was initiated by Teal'c, Daniel was most of the time on a quest to find someone (Sha're/Harsesis/Sarah) and the characters did change. Daniel, Teal'c and Sam from season 1 and season 10 are totally different people. Even Jack changed, albeit the least of them all.
However I do believe that seasons 9&10 were totally plot driven.

4) I hope the characters will be more developed than characters from SGA or even SG-1. I hope they will evolve. Most of all I hope that they will have to face the consequences of their actions and be changed by what happened to them - something that was totally missing in SGA and largely missing in SG-1.

5) I care because I prefer character driven shows. For example I love CSI:NY (plot driven) but it's not a show I rewatch, because once the mystery is solved there's not much to see. I like all the characters, but they don't engage me because they aren't that important in the context of the story. I suspect one of the reasons I never got into SGA was because I didn't care about its characters. On the other hand I can rewatch SG-1 or said Dexter over and over because even when I know the outcome in terms of plot, personal interactions and characters still keep me interested and allow to see something new with each new viewing.

[Bytor]

1) 4) I hope the characters will be more developed than characters from SGA or even SG-1. I hope they will evolve. Most of all I hope that they will have to face the consequences of their actions and be changed by what happened to them - something that was totally missing in SGA and largely missing in SG-1.

Why would I want a character I love to watch onscreen possibly 'evolve' into a character I hate, because his/her personality/motives/actions are completely different from the character I fell in love with. I'ts like marrying the woman of my dreams finding out 3 years later she is a serial killer.

A good example of my point is SG1, archeologist/nerd Daniel Jacksons evolution into the later seasons Mr. Cool.. Call me Danny, every woman wants me, action jackson. I would have rathered him not to 'evolve'.

[Lahela]

Why would I want a character I love to watch onscreen possibly 'evolve' into a character I hate, because his/her personality/motives/actions are completely different from the character I fell in love with. I'ts like marrying the woman of my dreams finding out 3 years later she is a serial killer.

A good example of my point is SG1, archeologist/nerd Daniel Jacksons evolution into the later seasons Mr. Cool.. Call me Danny, every woman wants me, action jackson. I would have rathered him not to 'evolve'.

I think that thing with your wife would qualify more as a reveal than an evolution Character growth is about having them affected by the things they experience - something all human beings do. I do agree that the change in Daniel was more about giving the character a makeover than growth, but I certainly hope the characters in SGU grow and change with life's experiences - that would make them far more believable than having them stagnate.

[Petra]

Why would I want a character I love to watch onscreen possibly 'evolve' into a character I hate, because his/her personality/motives/actions are completely different from the character I fell in love with. I'ts like marrying the woman of my dreams finding out 3 years later she is a serial killer.

A good example of my point is SG1, archeologist/nerd Daniel Jacksons evolution into the later seasons Mr. Cool.. Call me Danny, every woman wants me, action jackson. I would have rathered him not to 'evolve'.

Ha, I certainly feel your pain regarding Daniel - and I agree. Accept, although I had some issues with him already in seasons 7 & 8, his change in season 9 was so drastic and unexpected that I wouldn't call it "evolution", more like "personality crisis" or something along those lines..

Anyway, Daniel is just one example. Think of Sam, or Teal'c, or even Jacob Carter. Would you really prefer them to be at the end of season 8, or 10, like they were in CotG? I don't think so.

[Bytor]

Ha, I certainly feel your pain regarding Daniel - and I agree. Accept, although I had some issues with him already in seasons 7 & 8, his change in season 9 was so drastic and unexpected that I wouldn't call it "evolution", more like "personality crisis" or something along those lines..

Anyway, Daniel is just a one example. Think of Sam, or Teal'c, or even Jacob Carter. Would you really prefer them to be at the end of season 8, or 10, like they were in CotG? I don't think so.

I personally don't think Sam or Teal'c or Jacob changed much over the years, and that is not a complaint.

I mean, I think they got better at acting over the years, and they portrayed the character better and better as they fell more and more into the role, but I don't think it changed the overall personality of their characters over the years.

[jenks]

You don't think Teal'c changed over the years?

[Petra]

I personally don't think Sam or Teal'c or Jacob changed much over the years, and that is not a complaint.

I mean, I think they got better at acting over the years, and they portrayed the character better and better as they fell more and more into the role, but I don't think it changed the overall personality of their characters over the years.

Seriously? You don't see any difference between always silent, never showing any emotions, serious Teal'c from season 1 and fairly outspoken, eloquent, openly showing his emotions and using humour Teal'c from season 8?

Between stiff, harsh, distant Jacob from "Secrets" (season 2) and warm, joking around with Sam, openly showing his affection and concern Jacob from, say, "Death Knell" (season 7)?

You think ultra feminist "call me Captain" Carter on a quest to prove herself to anyone around her from the beginning of season 1 is the same self-assured, comfortable, caring leader from seasons 8-10?

Wow.

Personally I think they changed big time. Same for Daniel (pre: Action Jackson). Ascended Daniel from season 6 wasn't that naive geek from season 1. Jonas from "Meridian" wasn't the same person who left in "Homecoming" etc. I just wish other characters went through as significant changes. For example, as a Jack fan, I can see how he changed and can work out the reasons for this, but I'd still prefer if events from "Abyss" for example were somehow addressed and made an impact on him, because it is just unbelievable that he went through something so horrible and it didn't leave any scars.

That's what I'm hoping for in SGU. Characters will naturally evolve (like Teal'c) and they won't just shrug off life-altering events. It's a lot for Stargate.

[Vyse99]

I liked seeing the occasional character driven ep like "The Shrine", it was good because we got to see all the characters in a differently light then we usually see them, it was a nice change of pace. However, I don't want to see a purely character driven series because to me that would be pretty boring and not what Stargate has been at its core. For me Stargate has been about the exploration and fighting evil.

[GateFanSamJack]

"Character Driven" is a phrase that, to me, exists only to give a flip side to the word plot driven.

Joe Mallozzi once posted an outline for an episode of Stargate that was never produced. The thing that jumped out at me was that, with little tweaking, the plot would have worked for more science fiction shows than just Stargate, or it could have worked for SG1 or Atlantis. You insert the heroes in the right places and give them their characteristic dialogue and feed the challenges to them on their level. I'd consider that plot driven, even though you wouldn't bother with the story if the heroes didn't drive it to resolution and the heroes didn't have attributes we cared enough about to care how it turned out.

If whether the inciting incident happens at all depends on a character's backstory, I'd consider that character driven. In Chimera, Daniel's knowledge of the Ancient language was the main story's whole reason for being so that one I'd consider character driven. For most SG1 episodes, though, I think of Daniel's searches for various people as his character arc happening in parallel with mostly plot driven stories since, if it wasn't Daniel out doing that stuff, they would have someone else like Jonas doing the same things for their own reasons.

[jenks]

I would consider both of those plot driven, as in both cases it's the development of the plot that's driving the story, rather than the development of the character.