anyone else bored/frustrated by all the "Mary Sue" debates?
- Thread starter Phil123
- Start date
All of which destroys any pretense of a good faith discussion.
If you earn a title, where it proudly or change your stance.
No. Seth totally subverts the trope by making Ed the opposite of awesome at everything.We know that Seth Macfarlane is a big Trek fan and has even appeared in Trek fan films when he was younger. And considering that Mary Sue is supposed to be a wish fulfillment character based on the Author, it means Ed Mercer is Mary Sue
It's entirely accurate.
I wish there was a gender neutral term, until then why not have it as Gary or Marty Stu for males, Mary Sue for females.
Though such a term, like "poorly scripted characters to be unrealistically superior within their own universe's environment, allowing them to do anything with ease - regardless if they're being written up by no other way than to artificially write everyone else down (e.g. having the Mary Gary insulting them then writing them out of the show conveniently and/or sloppily to prove Mary Gary was right, just because)" is too many syllables and it is, then a descriptor being quicker to say or type might be preferential to some extent.
Doesn't it bug people more that recent new shows try to say "We have the first ___________ ever!" despite loads and loads of shows made years or decades earlier having beaten them to putting in characters, regardless if they're Mary Gary's or not and the article writers are blissfully unaware that TV and movies were ever made before 2015 (regardless of how imperfect, even Mary Gary's of the time still count) and everything was worse than the middle ages, which they would not want.
ST2009 was about stroking nostalgia and catchphrases for the mass audiences that grew up as not-hardcore fans as kids, not encouraging masses to experience a new world and build new characters of depth. "Beyond" fixed most of the remaining problems KelvinTrek had but by then it was too late. And the nostalgia fuzzy feel had left long before "Into Darkness" and the superficiality in most of it was screened. (It had its moments of greatness but it had some real cringe too.)
Though such a term, like "poorly scripted characters to be unrealistically superior within their own universe's environment, allowing them to do anything with ease - regardless if they're being written up by no other way than to artificially write everyone else down (e.g. having the Mary Gary insulting them then writing them out of the show conveniently and/or sloppily to prove Mary Gary was right, just because)" is too many syllables and it is, then a descriptor being quicker to say or type might be preferential to some extent.
Doesn't it bug people more that recent new shows try to say "We have the first ___________ ever!" despite loads and loads of shows made years or decades earlier having beaten them to putting in characters, regardless if they're Mary Gary's or not and the article writers are blissfully unaware that TV and movies were ever made before 2015 (regardless of how imperfect, even Mary Gary's of the time still count) and everything was worse than the middle ages, which they would not want.
ST2009 was about stroking nostalgia and catchphrases for the mass audiences that grew up as not-hardcore fans as kids, not encouraging masses to experience a new world and build new characters of depth. "Beyond" fixed most of the remaining problems KelvinTrek had but by then it was too late. And the nostalgia fuzzy feel had left long before "Into Darkness" and the superficiality in most of it was screened. (It had its moments of greatness but it had some real cringe too.)
I don’t know the reasoning for it, it’s a stupid argument and an invitation to never take that person seriously ever again.
There are flip terms to use instead of Mary Sue. Mary Sue is usually only used when someone wants to be political or to take a jab at liberals. Terms like preachy,dumbed down,polemic,one-note,cliched, political correct in the fictional sense of political incorrect in the fictional sense or just bad writing are all the ways one can talk about problems with a character. or a show or anything artistic without the intent of trying to incite a negative reaction out of people. Granted at this point with society what it is and all I still think you going to have trust issues but I don't think it used to be that way or at least not to the level it is now.
Jason
Strange. This hardcore fan (and his dad who had been a fan since he was a kid) enjoyed it quite a bit and found it expanded the world quite a bit.
Same here, my dad was watching TOS when it originally aired and I grew up watching TNG, Best of Both Worlds was Little Possum's first experience with a cliffhanger and made me panic because I thought Picard was gone forever. We both loved 2009 and Into Darkness, seeing both in theaters. He died before he could see Beyond and I missed in theaters because I couldn't stand the thought of seeing it without him. You could call us both hardcore fans. He couldn't do the Spock hand thing, but he was proud that I could. He probably would have loved the hell out of Discovery, mostly to see Pike because he was always interested in seeing more stories with him.
Gatekeeping in fandom needs to stop. We all enjoy these shows and movies, sometimes in different ways and to different levels. But no one loves something more than anyone else or are more of a fan than other people, especially when you love something so much that you hate new versions of it.
Amen. "More fannish than thou" is never a good look for anyone.
Wow what a beautiful memory of your father do you have!
One of the problems with the whole Mary Sue debate is the shifting definition. It used to be about characters that were introduced that were one step away from being self-inserts and whom the universe suddenly revolved around. Then it became highly competent characters that didn't have much in the way of flaws (too perfect).
Now it's essentially become any character that highly competent. Basically the vast majority of main characters in science fiction and fantasy.
Now it's essentially become any character that highly competent. Basically the vast majority of main characters in science fiction and fantasy.
Yes, if going by "awesome at everything" definition. But the original Mary Sue definition was "wish fulfillment main character based on the Author".
I was the one who posted the link to TV Tropes' article on the original instance. The original instance of the Mary Sue was an obnoxiously awesome wish-fulfillment author avatar, that was in addition created to satirize the self-insert fan-fic sub-genre.
The point is that Ed Mercer satisfies one of the criteria of a Gary Stu, being an author avatar, but not the most critical, being obnoxiously awesome.
That was one of the original criteria.