The Difference Between a Strong Character and a Cliche Character

   

   With the rise of the feminists, comes the fall of the 'every-girl-needs-her-prince-to-save-her' type of stories.
(Please note: This post is not about my views on feminism, it is about the effects of it on writing).
   
   In centuries past, all the great tales include a brave, dashing prince or knight going off to fight something and then in the end, he saves the swooning princess from the monster and then they get married and live happily ever after.

That is quite different now.

   A lot of writers (especially women) feel that it is their duty to show the world that women can fight for themselves. But you know what happens now? The overly-independent FMC who has a gun on each hip and a snarky attitude has become a cliche! *offended gasp from every YA and NA writer there ever was*. But seriously though, a female character who is like I just described that has a wimpy male sidekick does NOT mean that you have a strong character. It means you have a cliche character. They are getting quite annoying to read about.
   Here are some ways to avert that platitude:

1. Redemption. Maybe the character is like that in the beginning, but as the character goes through certain things, it softens her towards being less cold-hearted.

2. Be Sweet. Seriously though. Believe it or not, there is NOTHING wrong with a female character being sweet! It would be a nice change from the hardness of so many FMCs these days. People like likable.

3. Let the Girl be Saved by the Guy. How odd would this be? The girl actually being saved by the guy! Insane. right? I'm not kidding. It would give the story a nice, vintage feel to it. Especially if the genre is dystopian or post-apocalyptic or something where the mean-girl cliche is strongest. It would give the story an ironic element that would make it interesting.

4. Let there be AWKWARD! So, the cliche is always that the girl is sleek and can throw an amazing punch and owns like, a bajillion guns and has those perfect catsuits. Well, add a twist to the norm by making the sarcastic one have a quirk that feels wrong for her character. Maybe she has a fear of guns, or can't stand any type of clothing except loose jeans and a sweatshirt, or maybe she has a lot of allergies and starts sneezing at the worst possible times.

   Writers, there are so many ways to evade this kind of MC. Let's do it.

-The Bandit