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I Have A Habit Of Falling In Love With My Side Characters Which Detracts From My Main Protagonist. I've

I have a habit of falling in love with my side characters which detracts from my main protagonist. I've even elevated some of my side characters to minor-main characters(characters that are usually around the protagonist and contribute quite heavily to the plot) but my main-main protagonist still gets overshadowed. Any suggestions on how to fix this please?

You know… a lot of people would argue that you should push your side character into the main character role to solve this problem. For me personally, I reject this advice because… I feel when I make my characters, they already slot perfectly into the roles I wanted them to be in. In all of my stories, it would make no sense to take a side character and suddenly push them into the main character’s spot; the reason they are a side character at all is because a main character presented itself to me first.

That’s not to say that, on the whole, promoting a side character to a main character is bad advice… I just wouldn’t accept it as the only advice out there. Do what feels right to you, always!

It’s hard work but there are other ways, such as…

Spend More Time With Your Main Character(s)

If you feel like your love for your side character is making it harder for you to develop the main properly, then you need to take a step back from the side character, and spend more time with your main. Truthfully, it’ll be difficult if you’re already used to indulging your side character… but try the following:

The same rules apply to all. If you write your side character a backstory or a oneshot, or anything at all extra to the story, do the same for the main. After all, if you have time to spend developing an already well-developed character, you have time to develop the ones really missing your attention! Sorry about it ; ;

Get enthusiastic! Create playlists for your main character, draw your main character, imagine alternate universes for your main character… basically, do what you have to do to drive enthusiasm for your main! Really get to know them as much as you know your side character.

Get ruthless. Writing a scene where the side character appears? Find your main is totally infatuated with every move they make, every word they say, all of their mannerisms, their furtive expressions, and vague hints to their past? Cut it out. Only keep what is important.

Learn what is important. Do you know what’s not important? Whether your main knows your side character’s favourite food. Or that they tap their foot to music in the stores they pass. Or that they have a lengthy tale about that one time they crashed a spaceship into one of Jupiter’s moons. Keep it simple and to the point! Create mystery around your side character, but don’t solve it on the exact same page.

Start putting the main everywhere. So you’re in the mood to write and you really want to spend just another hour with your beloved side character on, like, drabble 18 in your ‘extras’ folder, right? No! Include your main as well! Write or doodle scenes where these two characters get to spend time together, and make it all about your main as practice for when you’re working on the real story.

The point being… your main character should take center stage; this is to get you into the practice of treating them as the star, not your side character.

Learn to Make Sacrifices for the Sake of the Story

You’ve got a main character for a specific reason, right? You want their story to be the one that gets told. Otherwise your side character would be the main… And if you’re not prepared to make that big of a change, it’s time to make changes elsewhere.

And if that means getting rid of what you deem to be interesting scenes that focus solely on your side character, then so be it. How do you know to do this? Well…

Read over your scenes where the side character appears and then look at this check list (tick off everything the scene meets in relation to the side character):

My side character aids (or inhibits) the main character in some way.

My side character provides new information to my main character*.

My side character causes (or fixes) a problem that my main character is facing.

My side character sends my main character in a new direction, or helps them to/prevents them from move(ing) forward in some way.

* New information can relate to plot-specific information, or character development information (either for another character, or the side character themselves).

If you have a scene where none of these things occur, then your side character doesn’t need to be there. They’re a support or they’re a hindrance, and they needn’t be anything else.

The same goes for scenes where the side character has served one (or more) of the purposes on the check-list above, but then remains in subsequent scenes anyway for no other reason than because you want them to be there.

This is when you have to decide if your side character even needs to be in the story for the whole length of it in the first place. As much as you love them, if they get to a point where they don’t serve a purpose (or risk overtaking the main/another, more important side character) then they either exit the stage and don’t come back until later, or exit via a suitable death scene and definitely don’t come back at all.

Still Set Time Aside for the Side Character

This doesn’t mean you should give up on your side character entirely though. You can still spend time with them if it is something you enjoy. Not only is it writing practice for you, but it means you can filter all of the side character love into one document, and save the real story for another.

Whether you want to write drabbles, oneshots, backstories or alternate universes all about them, or create doodles or just about anything else you can think of, don’t hold back! It’s important to have fun whilst writing too, you know, even if writing the actual story itself will be a hard slog.

Just make sure that… if you do write a side character-specific side-story, you’ll write one for your less-loved main character too (going back to the first header, heheh).

Resources

That moment when your supporting char is really your MC

Writing Excuses 10.5: What Do You Mean My Main Character Is Boring?

FYCD: ‘major character’ tag

I hope this helps you out somewhat. They’re not 100% guaranteed to work for everyone, but these are things I have done for myself to try and dull-down my own over-enthusiasm for my side characters. If it means anything, I find using my blog as an outlet to fawn over my favourite side characters is a good way to spend my time dedicated to them, so that the rest of my time can go into writing a good story that isn’t overtaken by my side characters, heheh. Make a tag for them and just do whatever!

Best of luck.

- enlee

I Have A Habit Of Falling In Love With My Side Characters Which Detracts From My Main Protagonist. I've

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