their values. Values indicate a theme. The theme centers on the core values that are expressed
in a story, the basic message, or lesson that the protagonist learns. You may want your main
character to reveal something about the theme to us but probably not in words. Maybe he
represents one point of view about your theme and the villain who opposes him represents
the opposing view. Maybe the other characters all represent differing points of view. One
character could even express the point of view of the audience. But each character should
have his own good motivations for feeling the way he does.
Your audience needs to be able to identify right away who the major characters are and
be able to tell them apart easily by name, sight, and personality. We should recognize, too,
which characters are minor and unimportant. Use height, weight, ethnic type, voice, hair-
style, clothing style and color, attitudes, and movement to help identify characters.
The hero or heroine must be the most interesting character in the story. If he’s not, then
you might want to consider centering the story around the colorful character instead, making
him the protagonist. Supporting characters don’t have the burden of driving the story
forward, and so they may become more interesting and colorful. Don’t let them take over!
If your characters get too pushy, stand up to them, and threaten to erase them from your
hard drive!
You may want your less important characters to help in defining the role of the hero. Is
your hero a leader, a father figure, the class clown? Minor characters can help us to under-
stand the star’s role in his peer group and in the story.
All characters need a story function, or they shouldn’t be there. What’s the essence of
this character—the core or nub? What is the one dominant characteristic that most affects
the plot? If a character doesn’t affect the plot, then remove him. A character should always
be motivated by this essential characteristic, and every other trait should ideally come out
of this one or support it. What event or circumstance or decision in the past made him this
way?
Character information is sprinkled throughout the script, not crammed into the begin-
ning. Use only the essence, and be concise. Use conflicts, contrasts, reactions, gags, or visual
symbols to convey information and define character.
Consider your protagonist or hero. What plans does he make, and what does he do to
attain this goal? What decisions does she make along the way? How do they affect her?
How do they affect others? What terrible thing is at stake if our hero doesn’t reach this goal?
Animation protagonists invariably do reach their goals at the end.
What are each character’s goals? What do they want? Do we care? What are their
hidden agendas? What do they reallywant? (If this is animation for kids, what drove you
personally as a kid?) What does each character promise? You should only set up traits and
circumstances that apply to this story and the goal. But if a character is playing with matches,
we need to see the inferno, the payoff. Don’t cheat your audience out of the juiciest parts
of your story.
Think in terms of scenes. What are your characters’ goals in each scene? Which char-
acter is driving each scene? What are your characters’ feelings in each scene?
Is there a broad range of emotions throughout your story? What are the conflicts your
characters go through to reach their goals? The goals of different characters should conflict
to set off sparks. We need to see the effects of conflict on the main characters. Characters
should confront difficult choices, and they must make those choices themselves. The more
difficult the choice, the more interesting the story. Because of difficult choices we get to know
Developing Characters 71