I Beg You, Please Cripple Your Characters

Music-

A Caring Friend- Bad Snacks

Yonder Hill and Dale- Aaron Kenny

Seclusion- The Tides

[InquisitorThomas]

Instructions unclear, accidentally crippled the actors instead.

[DulcetCatharsis]

One thing to clarify that makes Roy Mustang's scene even more badass. He didn't draw the transmutation circle with his blood, he *carved it into his hand.* There are multiple episodes after where he still has scars from carving it

[alondite]

An old high school English teacher of mine, who is a writer, once said to me on writing characters: "If you love your characters, put them through hell, " which has always stuck with me and has served me well. Similar idea.

[Marcus-evbq]

"When we hit our lowest point, we are open to the greatest change."
-Avatar Aang

[patchesm]

"(Toph) didn't just give up, she uncovered a power that no one thought she had"
I mean if I'm remembering correctly, she uncovered a power that NO ONE had. She invented a new technique on the spot.

[AsAs]

To quote Hirohiko Araki, creator of JoJo's Bizarre Adventure: "Throw your protagonist into peril".

Also, your characters should be able to win battles through their own strength and cunning, instead of being rescued at the last second.

[johnhelfrich]

Another great example of this is the BBC show Merlin, where the main character is an insanely overpowered sorcerer but lives in a kingdom where magic is illegal and so a lot of episodes center around him finding ways to solve the problems without using his powers, or they explore the character by putting him in a situation where he needs to use his powers but would have very bad consequences for doing so. Great video, as always!

[wafflingmean]

Jaime losing his hand had even more consequences in the book. His entire personality up to that point had essentially been him saying "Fine, you all call me Kingslayer, the most dishonourable man alive (despite saving 500, 000 people from burning to death and being the only one to object to the Mad King raping his wife) no matter how much I try to be a good man? Fuck it. I'll be the villain."

And so much of Jaime's presence as a villainous entity was through combat. With that removed, he is nowhere near as influential as before. For example, in the books he is placed in charge of the Kingsguard upon returning to King's Landing. And he is genuinely intimidated by Loras Tyrell. Loras is headstrong and only listens to a word Jaime says because he is afraid Jaime could kick his arse even with one hand. And Loras is very, very skilled. Cersei filled the Kingsguard with people like the Kettlebacks, who are average swordfighters at best. If they found out they could beat the fucking Kingslayer in a fight, Jaime would become a complete joke. Ultimately Jaime has next to no official power. It's his reputation and forceful personality that gives him power.

[trinaq]

Ah, once I got into the video, I realised what you meant by the title. I really admire this concept, by making the character vulnerable and seeing them struggle, that's when we see their true strengths.

[tsuritsa]

This is why in the Legend of Korra I was so excited when they took Korra's bending away at the end of S1. She had been defined as a bending prodigy, an Avatar who was bending three elements at five years old. She had mastered them by the time when she was 17. She based her identity on her bending skills.

Then the show returned her powers half an episode later and it was a huge mistake. It made everything she could do feel unearned. It was really unfortunate.

[kaksspl]

Even as a kid I recognized how cool it was to play as Altair having lost his rank for his recklessness. Still my favourite AC game. It's nice to have it put into actual words and writing analysis.

[emberdragon]

Altair: Loses all equipment and skills
Samus: "First time?"

[essidus]

Connected to this, I love nothing more than when a hero is permanently crippled. Either they try something and fail, and in failing they develop a new weakness they need to overcome, or even better, when they succeed in a way that permanently damages them.

[actualteddybear]

Logan is my second favorite movie ever behind Treasure Planet.

Logan is a heartbreaking film especially for people who wanted to grow up and be Wolverine. Watching him in his haggard, weakened, and bitter state was hard. At the end of the film though he reminded me why I looked up to him in the firs place (besides being cool amd tough). He protected people and he's brave and heroic. He has a good heart which unfortunately ended up with a tree branch through it.

[codyteach]

Another great shout in favor of this is the turn-based video game "wildermyth." If you lose a character in battle, you can choose to keep them alive at the cost of a life altering injury. This plays into the emergent story telling and Permadeath mechanics of the game, and really helps the player get invested in the struggles of the in-game party.

[luigi]

All this crippled comic book character talk has made me remember one of my personal favorite superheroes, Daredevil. The Man Without Fear has had his fair share of stories in the past decades. One of my favorite arcs of his is where he loses his radar sense and has to learn how to overcome his fear of mortality and losing his radar vision. Losing his radar sense brought out his true strength, his bravery. When stripped of his incredible sense he had to fight his fears before he could earn it back. Matt had to look death in the eyes and march on towards unwaivering. Now lets jump forward a few years to really prove my point on how brave Mr. Murdock is. In this arc our Man Without Fear gets doused with fear gas by budget scarecrow. Matt loses all sense of anything and starts tripping. In his fear fueled bender he sees anyone that has ever hurt him and they sow in every insecurity and fear he could ever have. Matt sees this and has to truly learn what it means to be without fear. He realizes he has to be brave but not without fear. Because to be utterly fearless you must shut yourself off from people entrirely, but what kind of man would he be if he did that? He uses his bravery to beat Mr. Fear. Bravery isn't the absence of fear. It is fear. Bravery is having the amount of fear that could destroy someone and overcoming.
TLDR; Daredevil is a brave guy.













P.S i just wanted a reason to gush about daredevil.

[SSingh-nrqz]

One of the ideas of "crippling" and while we are so fascinated from it comes from the natural aging process. When you are Young, you are faster, stronger, sexier, etc. Then you get older and thing you took for granted go away. You get better at other things. You maybe even regain some qualities of the past, but you realize life is about change and how you adapt and what it turns you into. A good life example is watching someone you have loved for years die of a sickness. You might have been their caretaker and hero for years, but when an illness happens, you are really powerless. How you handle that defines who you really are, and when someone passes that is so central to who you are, you are forever changed by that loss. You might become stronger, or self destruct, or be a person you never imagined you would be.

[Sigart]

In fact, Roy is crippled on multiple levels, when he also gets all his loyal subordinates reassigned. Arakawa really enjoyed exploring him under duress, huh..?

[saltlakeatrocity]

I see the merits of this thought process. Oftentimes, taking away a character's power seems like a bit of a crutch (especially in cases when there wasn't anything foreshadowing that losing powers was even a possibility that could happen). Another alternative to this that I like is giving a player a challenge, or even a multitude of unrelated challenges, that their powers are simply no good for.

[GrouPHuGgaming]

I feel like an important point to Mustang's character is that he is crippled by his own rage and wrath towards those who killed his friend. An emotional crippling can be as effective as a physical one