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February 1st, 2008
 | 01:40 pm - Bela and Ruby take the Universal Mary-Sue Litmus Test
Okay, this is just for giggles and because I won't have time to post my list of thoughts about last night's new SPN episode until tonight or tomorrow.
I adore the Mary-Sue Litmus Test, and because people will go on and on about how new female characters are Mary Sues, I figured I'd try to run both Bela Talbot and Ruby through the test and see how they came out. (Actually, I wanted to see mostly whether Bela would score anywhere nearly as high as I figured Ruby would.)
I avoided answering "yes" to any of the self-insertion questions (for both characters), because I have no idea whether either of them have elements of that. And because they were created by a group of writers, not a single author. So my initial prediction was that both of them would score lower than they might if the actual creator were taking the test.
Bela scored a whopping 16 points.
0-16 Points
Most likely Not-Sue. Characters at this level could probably take a little spicing up without hurting them any.
I think Bela got this low a score mostly because we don't know a ton about her background yet, and also because she actually had a couple of de-suifiers at work.
Ruby, despite having the same downplaying tactics applied to what I scored, came out with 36 points!
30+
Fanfiction authors beware - Mary's on the loose. There's still a chance you can save this character with some TLC, though. Role-players and original fiction characters, you should also strongly consider giving your character a workover.
Or
36+
Fanfiction authors, you might just want to start over. Role-players and original fiction authors, at this point your characters are likely to provoke eye-rolling and exclaimations of "yeah, right!" from your readers. (Well, at least from me.) Immediate workover is probably in order.
Um. Yeah. Wow, that's actually higher than I predicted. (Mind you, I've very interested to see what they do with Ruby--the field is wide open from here. And I don't believe her pity-poor-little-demon-me act for a second.)
Current Mood:  amused
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I ran this recently and got an unbelievably high score for my one character. Man, you create a half-demon and the points just rack up. Seriously. That's half Ruby's problem, her nature. *g* Foxglove/Jane/Leila/whatever her name is got a 19, which I thought was pretty accurate. As a fanfic character, she would be a bit Mary Sueish. But as an original character, she's fine. :-) Yeah, this is a great test, if you do it right and are scrupulously honest. I keep it bookmarked for checking my characters. The only hope is if it turns out she's a huge liar with her own secret evil agenda.
Oh, I'm fully convinced that this is where we're headed. Ruby needs the boys alive for some reason, and needs Sam as a soldier, hence her working so hard to get on Dean's good side and enlist his help in making Sam able to fight. But no way is she on their side...she's playing them like whoa.
And Bela? Great antagonist, doesn't overshadow the boys, gives sweet opportunities for snark and bickering, and is something new in the hunter's world. I enjoy her a lot. |
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