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Does anyone else feel like this term is thrown around excessively? As soon as any powerful character shows up in any form of fiction, haters immediately start bashing it by calling him/her a Mary Sue/Gary Stu. This especially notable in 40k where every codex, especially Marine ones, has a character or two that gets deemed a Mary Sue.

Why is there all this hate for heroes, especially in OOT/Fantasy universes?

Because people like throwing around clever or pithy terms when they're trying to criticize something. The meaning has been so watered down from it's original definition, 'a character who is obviously a self insertion of the author inserted within a fan fic, who abilities and presence completely overshadow the original characters with the purpose of the story often to highlight how awesome they are,' that if you see someone use the term, it's because they're hoping it's a cruise control for cool.

Aside from the silliness of seeing it used on characters in original fiction (Harry Dresden seems to catch this a lot), it keeps getting misused in cases where a character makes the mistake of being awesome, or capable at something. Apparently, it's a bad things these days to actually be a bad ass.

Because Mary Sues are extremely easy to write and very hard to justify.

For example Paul from Dune fits the Mary Sue definition to the letter, but the story is written around the fact that he is supposed to be that way. It takes what the made paul into account and makes sure to keep paul well rounded with flaws and challenges making the most of paul being a special flow rather than letting it take over the book. Even at the end when Paul has come into his own he still can't do everything. His mother and sister still are very relevant as are his aliles, the story doesn't devolve into just one whole scenario to showing Paul doing BA things for the sake of reminding us how BA Paul is.

Most of the time however, exceptional characters are not as well written and the fluff around why they are so special and how it causes them to interact with the world is often exceptionally poor using their ultra powers and super special Mary Sue as a crutch to move the plot along.

While term Mary Sue is absolutely over used, having a character be BA just to be BA is poor writing and rightly tagged as a Mary Sue. We like heroes but having the hero be a the number one bad ass in the universe requires more talent then a lot of writers have to pull off unless they are going for a campy B movie sort of style.

Look at Roland from the Dark Tower for example. While the guy is fast, he is far from the best gun slighter and he lacks any special powers in a universe filled with magic and scifi. What makes him the last man standing is just the fact that he obsessed and does whatever it takes to reach his goals. The fact that he defeats his foes without powers is what makes him interesting and well written. All the situations he over comes become much less interesting if you suddenly also make him the most powerful telepath on the planet.

Same as Troll. Some terms have lost their punch over time due to over use.

Kris Knives wrote:For example Paul from Dune fits the Mary Sue definition to the letter

Except that he doesn't. As Portugal Jones pointed out, a Mary Sue is a romanticized self insert, which Paul is not. At the very least the character has to function as some sort of wish-fulfillment fantasy for the author, which again, Paul does not.

Kris Knives wrote:Because Mary Sues are extremely easy to write and very hard to justify.

For example Paul from Dune fits the Mary Sue definition to the letter, but the story is written around the fact that he is supposed to be that way. It takes what the made paul into account and makes sure to keep paul well rounded with flaws and challenges making the most of paul being a special flow rather than letting it take over the book. Even at the end when Paul has come into his own he still can't do everything. His mother and sister still are very relevant as are his aliles, the story doesn't devolve into just one whole scenario to showing Paul doing BA things for the sake of reminding us how BA Paul is.

Most of the time however, exceptional characters are not as well written and the fluff around why they are so special and how it causes them to interact with the world is often exceptionally poor using their ultra powers and super special Mary Sue as a crutch to move the plot along.

While term Mary Sue is absolutely over used, having a character be BA just to be BA is poor writing and rightly tagged as a Mary Sue. We like heroes but having the hero be a the number one bad ass in the universe requires more talent then a lot of writers have to pull off unless they are going for a campy B movie sort of style.

Look at Roland from the Dark Tower for example. While the guy is fast, he is far from the best gun slighter and he lacks any special powers in a universe filled with magic and scifi. What makes him the last man standing is just the fact that he obsessed and does whatever it takes to reach his goals. The fact that he defeats his foes without powers is what makes him interesting and well written. All the situations he over comes become much less interesting if you suddenly also make him the most powerful telepath on the planet.

I was typeing a wall of text. This sums it up a lot better. This is why Gaunts Ghosts (Witha bit of mary Sue) is better then Matt Ward's GK Codex Fluff

Making both you, and Kris, prime examples of people using the term without actually understanding what it's means.

There isn't a WTF emoticon in the world big enough to respond to something as dumb as, 'using Dune as an example of Mary Sues...' Saying that he 'fits the definition to the letter' is a prime example - aside from the critical failure of Dune not being a fan fic, there is absolutely no resemblance between Paul and Frank Herbert. So yeah, he doesn't fit the definition of all. Combine it with the failure to be able to actually list anything Mary Suish about him... The point you seem to be missing the most is context. A character with super natural powers and a major power player in the events of the known universe is not out of place is a story where the focus is on the machinations of galactic leaders with super natural powers. Move that to a Battlestar Galatica setting, where everyone else is human normal, and then you've got issues, because you've got one super awesome special snowflake character that overshadows everyone else.

A Mary Sue is not required to be self-insertion character, that is simply the most common form. You assumption that it is explains your frustration with the term. A mary sue is simply a character who's positive or "special" traits overwhelm all other aspects of the character. Normally this is only found in self-insert fan fiction because when money is on the line editors don't typcially let this stuff into print.

Kris Knives wrote:A Mary Sue is not required to be self-insertion character

Only due to misuse of the term due to people appropriating it because they want to whine about something and lack actual reasoning for it, as the original coining arose from a godawful Star Trek self-insert character named 'Mary Sue.' It's use outside of fanfiction is a recent development, and often hilariously incorrect, as your reference to Dune displayed.

Why are you guys arguing about the definition of a Mary Sue? There's an entire wiki article on the subject. Go look it up.

Because I've been editing long enough that I don't need wikipedia to tell me the definition of a term I've heard bandied about for the past twenty years?

Portugal Jones wrote:

Kris Knives wrote:A Mary Sue is not required to be self-insertion character

Only due to misuse of the term due to people appropriating it because they want to whine about something and lack actual reasoning for it, as the original coining arose from a godawful Star Trek self-insert character named 'Mary Sue.' It's use outside of fanfiction is a recent development, and often hilariously incorrect, as your reference to Dune displayed.

You are aware the language evolves over time right and that it is evolving faster then ever before in human history thanks to mass communication? What a word meant 20 years ago doesn't necessarily reflect what it means today. Mary Sue, like many words before it, has grown since its inception and it is not misuse to apply the current application of a word in language. You are of course free to insist the term means whatever you want, but as a share understanding of terms is basis communication it rends it impossible to discuss the matter with you. Not that I would want to discuss anything with you further as, right or wrong on this, your attitude towards a friendly conversation in the forum sucks.

-Kris Out

Well I think we Mary Sued this into Mary Suedom.

Now we need to Chuck Norris this thread.

WarOne wrote:Well I think we Mary Sued this into Mary Suedom.

Now we need to Chuck Norris this thread.

Please, Jason Statham is the new Norris. He fought two bears.

Portugal Jones wrote:Aside from the silliness of seeing it used on characters in original fiction (Harry Dresden seems to catch this a lot), it keeps getting misused in cases where a character makes the mistake of being awesome, or capable at something. Apparently, it's a bad things these days to actually be a bad ass.

Harry D'Amour & Clive Barker think that Jim Butcher is a bad fanfiction writer that somehow gets published.

pretre wrote:Same as Troll. Some terms have lost their punch over time due to over use.

Or misuse. Just look at pretty much any British newspaper with any story regarding something on the Internet. They really do not know what "Trolling" is.

Kris Knives wrote:You are aware the language evolves over time

I think you are confusing 'doing it wrong' with 'evolves over time'.

I went on a bit of a rant about this a while ago but yes Mary Sue is completely overused now. It's devolved (there's no evolution of language here) from "unintentional authorial insert character" to "thing that sucks". It needs it's own Godwin's law now it's so prevalent.

"Mary Sue" has a specific meaning that seems to have been forgotten, now it is just used for any super-cool character that people dislike, rather than the crass self-insertion of the author into the story. Similarly people don't seem to understand how to use the term 'deus ex machina', thinking that it can be applied to any slightly illogical story ending they don't like.

Because much like Deus Ex Machina, irony, and other terms, most people have no idea what a Mary Sue actually is.

LordofHats wrote:Because much like Deus Ex Machina, irony, and other terms, most people have no idea what a Mary Sue actually is.

I know what both of those mean...education ftw.

No idea what a "Mary Sue" is. Even having read the wikipedia article.

Mary Sue originates from a Star Trek fan fic character (of the same name). Ironically, the character is itself not a Mary Sue, as the character and the story itself were purposely written to poke fun at the concept.

A Mary Sue is a character who is basically the author, in an idealized form. They lack real character flaws (Mary's only downside was that she was clumsy *that is not a character flaw), seem to be able to do things the moment the plot demands it (suddenly Mary knows how to hack computers so she can get into the secret basement), and are just plain annoying to read about cause no matter what things work out for them (even when they die!).

Text book examples include: Bella Swan and Will Crusher (though he stopped being one eventually).

Not all author insertions are Mary Sue's mind you. Eragon is admitted by Paloni to be himself, but Eragon has numerous character flaws in the books (as does the witing har har!).

Ahtman wrote:As Portugal Jones pointed out, a Mary Sue is a romanticized self insert

THat is one definition, but not the only one. Most uses of the term tend to have it be ANY overly idealized character-- ones which are perfect and without flaw, especially.

I think you have to go as far as a character like John Constantine before people don't label them a Mary Sue. Yes it's overused and used wrongly. But saying that, I think a lot of 40k characters are guilty of being Mary Sue in it's original sense.

Glorioski wrote:But saying that, I think a lot of 40k characters are guilty of being Mary Sue in it's original sense.

I wouldn't say that. Most 40k characters are classical epic heroes (in space). Though epic heroes tend to have a defining flaw, the narrative of 40k isn't really deep enough to present characters in a dynamic light (I'm talking about Codex stuff here, not BL).

Nazi is another overused term. The other day I was called a Nazi for skipping ahead in a Supermarket queue. If they had called me a f$$%%%G you know what, I could have understood that, but Nazi

Anyway, back OT, is Mary Sue not a term from the Turkey Lexicon if memory serves??

Do_I_Not_Like_That wrote:Nazi is another overused term. The other day I was called a Nazi for skipping ahead in a Supermarket queue. If they had called me a f$$%%%G you know what, I could have understood that, but Nazi

Anyway, back OT, is Mary Sue not a term from the Turkey Lexicon if memory serves??

Why do you think the Nazi's were so keen on invading Britain? So the could get to the front of that line, obviously.

Never heard the term....until reading this thread.

GG

generalgrog wrote:Never heard the term....until reading this thread.

GG

Really? People like to throw it around on here quite a lot. What I have learned is that if you don't like a particular author, book, or character, but don't have any real reasons, you can accuse them of being/creating a Mary Sue and still retain your bubble of intellectual superiority.


Or, you can take it one step further and create a thread about it!

LordofHats wrote:Because much like Deus Ex Machina, irony, and other terms, most people have no idea what a Mary Sue actually is.

Oh yes, irony, which some people think means just about anything funny, instead of actually being ironic.