forum Ways to fix a bland protagonist?

Started February 08, 2021 by @SingSongKV group

tune

My main character is a pro wrestler and his goal is to revive people's love for pro wrestling, however, i don't have a backstory, motivation, or even a personality for him! Is there a way to remedy this? He literally have no personality compared to most of my other side and even minor characters!

• I'd start with coming up with a backstory since that can often influence other aspects of the character. I find that a lot of my characters kind of are the way they are because of things that happened to them before the start of the story.
• You mention that this character is very into pro wrestling, and that seems like a good place to start. How did he get interested in it? Did a friend or family member introduce it to him? Why is it so important for him to get other people to like it as well?
• Try writing about him from a first person POV. I had a MC who was kind of bland, and had a backstory that really wasn't that interesting. I found that when I wrote from his perspective I was able to really get into his head, and his personality really came through. You don't have to write the entire story that way if you don't want, but try just writing some excerpts and see how it goes.

I struggle with this a lot, too. I would say finding the character's core motivation is a good start. His goal is to revive people's love for pro wrestling, you said; why does he have this goal? He clearly has passion for his job; why does he like it? If it's difficult to figure out that, you could also start with his backstory first to help you figure it out. When and why did his love for wrestling start? Asking little questions can help you slowly flesh out the character; pretending like you're interviewing your character can help. For me, it's a matter of figuring out either backstory, motivation, or personality first, and partly figuring out one of those things helps shape the others, because ideally they all somewhat reflect each other. For example, if you know a character is cynical and cold, it's likely they weren't born like that, something in their past made them that way, which can help you with their backstory. You already have a solid goal for this character, which is a really good place to be! Like I said, I still struggle with this myself, but I hope this helped somewhat!