Character development and Character Expansion

[Lockgar]

Now when I mean Character Expansion, I mean that a specific character stays the same way, but you learn more about them. They might never change, but you get to see them react to different situation. Generally used for comedy, but not always. There is probably a better word.

What I mean by, Character Development? What it usually mean. How the character changes during the course of the narrative book/series/movie. Most seen example. Take your typical angst teenager from most animes "actually from most anything when I think about", and how they learn how to accept the power of friendship and so on. Generally used for drama.

I'm NOT asking which one is better, since both would serve a different purpose in different situation. I would Hate to never see that angst teenager never changing, that would be pain full. Nor would I want to see that lovely wacky character changed into a mild manner, and boring character.

What I'm asking for are your thoughts on the two. I'm bringing this because I remember reading someone posting how they didn't like a certain series because the characters didn't "Develop" yet the series in question seemed to have been focused on putting "interesting characters" in different situations. Which too me, seemed like they lost the point of the series.

[yezhanquan]

Personally, I'll like to see both. Take the recently-concluded Code Geass. I believe some of us who wanted to know the source of Suzaku's superhuman strength were disappointed because the show just didn't explain it. Moreover, it was explictly mentioned that his strength was superhuman, if his exploits didn't already make that clear enough.

I think expansion of background would be quite welcome in most cases. Knowing the past of characters does keep you engaged. The recent Casshern Sins gave us Casshern, a man with no past. A large part of the story is to find out that past, and how it affected the present.

[Shadow Kira01]

Both character development and character expansion are important, but it is usually pretty difficult to fit all that into a standard 13-episode anime, unless the cast is extra small. Even so, it doesn't get much development and expansion either. For instance, the anime Devil May Cry featured only a few main characters: Dante, Lady, Trish, and the little girl Dante had to babysit. With only 4 main characters, it is still pretty difficult for people who never played any of the games to understand much about Dante alone, why he has the Devil Trigger and whatsoever. I guess in some of the anime, it is expected that the audiences must had either played the game(s) or read the manga(s) beforehand.

[Tiran86]

Both character development and expansion are important for longer series, or for a shorter series focused on that. The most important thing is having interesting characters. Watching boring characters grow is still boring.

[jedinat]

They're both good things. They're not both absolutely essential by any means, but they are nice to see. Like good animation is nice to see. You can still have a good anime without it, but who would say no to it?
It also depends on the anime. A gag comedy will fare much better without than a serious drama, obviously.

As to your specific concern... well, since you didn't mention the name of the anime, I can't say anything.

[gaguri]

Character expansion is interesting because you're changing the way you view your character without actually developing him (i.e. he still thinks and acts the same way from last episode, and will probably continue to do so in future episodes). It's like viewing a sculpture from different point of views, as more dimensions and depths of your character are revealed, he becomes that much more complex and satisfying to watch. However, the most common (and arguably most powerful) form of character expansion just might be those where he reacts differently to a certain event that provides window to his past and therefore imply/show how he developed as a character to his present self. I guess this can be considered as another form of character development.

[KholdStare]

Character expansion is one of the worst things in anime because it usually fails. It's one of those thing where if you do it right, then it's amazing, but if you don't, then it becomes fail and boring with fake suspense of some sort. Consider this scenario:

Episode 1: A character hints at main character's past.

Episode 5: OMG something incredibly sad happened in this dude's past.

Episode 10: OMG OMG This guy got angry again at some random event !!1one!~!! Something really bad must have happened in this guy's past.

Episode 15: Wow, something did happen in this guy's past but I don't really give a **** anymore.

Episode 24: Oh, so this is what happened in this guy's past? *yawn*

---

There is one thing I'll give full credits to Clannad for, and that's being successful at character expansion. Character development on the other hand, is just fun to watch and truly adds to the story if it's not some deus ex machina character X gains a new attack out of the blue oh nos.

[Kirarakim]

Characterization is the most important aspect of a series for me. Personally I enjoy both character development and character expansion. Although I would argue that in some respects they are the same thing or character expansion is a type of character development.

As you said with character expansion the character themselves might not change but as the series goes on we might be introduced to different facets of that character that will change our perception of them.

What is important about character development is "change" it doesn't matter if that change comes from the character themselves (example a growing up story) or from added details about who that character is. Overall good character development just means the characterization does not remain static.

Although I do agree that character development is more important in some genres than others. As others have mentioned it is less important in a comedy series compared with a dramatic one.

[pparker]

The best recent example to me of what you call character expansion is Higurashi. Character revelation might be a better term for it. The point is that you learn to know the character. If they change, it's incidental to the story.

In Higurashi, time keeps rebooting with the same characters, the assumption being they are always the same, just their actions and responses change. But I thought that show brilliantly revealed each character, keeping you glued to the screen while gradually building each character's story. You really understood each one from watching them respond differently in the same situations. Of course, the story was a lot of the glue, but without interesting, authentic characters, you can't have a great story.

The two viewpoints aren't mutually exclusive, and one is not better than the other. Every coming of age story is a character development story. Gurren Lagann is almost pure coming of age, and oddly enough it's like the characters didn't actually exist until the story started. Almost no time is spent on their past. It's all about getting on with their "arc". You don't necessarily have to explore the past in a character expansion/revelation type story, but that is a common device used. Higurashi spent a lot of time telling backstories of its characters to deepen the understanding of their current personalities.

[blewin]

Character expansion is one of the worst things in anime because it usually fails. It's one of those thing where if you do it right, then it's amazing, but if you don't, then it becomes fail and boring with fake suspense of some sort. Consider this scenario:

Episode 1: A character hints at main character's past.

Episode 5: OMG something incredibly sad happened in this dude's past.

Episode 10: OMG OMG This guy got angry again at some random event !!1one!~!! Something really bad must have happened in this guy's past.

Episode 15: Wow, something did happen in this guy's past but I don't really give a **** anymore.

Episode 24: Oh, so this is what happened in this guy's past? *yawn*

---

There is one thing I'll give full credits to Clannad for, and that's being successful at character expansion. Character development on the other hand, is just fun to watch and truly adds to the story if it's not some deus ex machina character X gains a new attack out of the blue oh nos.


Ginko from Mushishi! I think slice-of-life shows seem to be the best genre to support character expansion because of so many little happenings that make the plot itself interesting. The supernatural aspect (for Clannad too) shifts the viewers' focus to the mysterious too.

whereas character development is much more prominent in action shows for the obvious action. Need a brain and personality to match the awesome action too!

[roriconfan]

Damn, and I was about to begin a topic concerning this...

Anyway, for me any character is actually three things.

Presence: The impression he gives just by his looks or way of moving (body language)

Development: How he matures or changes or gets to be colorized better (called "expanded" in this topic)

Catharsis: If the above is left incomplete

Most shalow characters are just presence. Funny or archetypical have usually coloring. Somewhat realistic ones get development. And rarely, the story ends and they get all there is to get by the theme of the story.
By the way, death is not the best form of catharsis. Usually they are killed off or turned to stunts when their purpose in the story is over. Catharsis means they have nothing else to offer to the story and are left out of the action or plot.

A simple example would be Muten Roshi, the turtle hermit of Dragonball. After he gets surpassed by his students, he stops participating in their adventures but still remains the erojiji we all know. He doesn't develop much; he just gets colorizes along the way. But at least he is left out of the story after he has nothing else to offer. This is not the case with the other Z warriors besides Picolo who even during the Saiyan arc they were nothing but cannon fodder to stall the enemy until the lead arrives. They remained in the story without being further colorized or offering anything to the plot. They even get ressurected all the time thus canceling any drama on part of dying and having their friends crying about it.

[Haak]

I think both are important. I think the best way to tell the difference between character development not occuring and character expansion is to look at the situation they're put in. If the situation, in your opinion, calls for character development and you would expcet it to occur, then it can't be character development. But if someone complains about a character not developing and can't give a reason as to why they would need to change then it may simply be character expansion. Just my thoughts. If I've just spouted a load of nonsense then tell me.

I personally consider Eden of the East to be the best in Character Expansion.

[coren]

By character expansion I guess you are talking about static characters, which doesn't necessarily mean the character can't be complex or interesting. I guess this may be more suited to stories with older characters who have already experienced a lot (unlike most anime characters).

I think character development works better as a gradual thing, rather than the sudden and sometimes inexplicable changes which are all too common.