The Mary Sue Discussion

[Fireminer]

What about Mahouka Koukou and Tatsuya?

[Marcus H.]

^ In a nutshell, the universe where Mahouka Koukou no Rettousei is set has an absurdly high and unpredictable powerlevel scale compared to the Toaru Universe. While Toaru only has a few characters that have global-scale magic, Mahouka has several characters much weaker than Tatsuya and several characters that can wipe the floor with him.

Overpowered as he is, Tatsuya may in fact be just mid-tier.

[Ithekro]

For Star Trek: The Next Generation, there were supposedly three Mary Sue types for Gene. You have the aged veteran version in Picard. The adult action man gaining experiance in Riker, and finally the youth in Wesley. All suppose to be basically the same character at different point in their life, or by proxy the same, without being the same. At least in the first season.

[Idealist 99]

I wonder if Mary Sue that Bad !!!
Atem is definitely a Mary Sue But he still popular while Yuma started off as a Underdog But he was by far the most hated Protagonist .
I also notice most Popular Characters are OP/Mary sue ! They ether start off as OP/Mary Sue Or become an Underdog to OP/Mary sue.

[Dr. Dahm]

Originally Posted by Ithekro

For Star Trek: The Next Generation, there were supposedly three Mary Sue types for Gene. You have the aged veteran version in Picard. The adult action man gaining experiance in Riker, and finally the youth in Wesley. All suppose to be basically the same character at different point in their life, or by proxy the same, without being the same. At least in the first season.

The only one of those that fits the bill for me is 1st and 2nd Season Wesley. Picard is a man that considers the moral weight of pretty much everything he does and is obviously very experienced from a long career in Starfleet but has his flaws like being cold and distant from his crew emotionally and even from his own brother as we see in one episode. Riker started off the series as kind of a clone of Kirk being all dashing and handsome and kind of arrogant but eventually evolves into that kind of guy that is good enough as a commander that he could be captain but obviously lacks all the insights of Picard at times even though overall he's generally seen as the jovial XO that's always there to lend a hand whereas people would be too intimidated to approach Picard even though he'd do the same because of the image he projects.

Wesley to start the series is just some snot nosed brat in bad 80's costume design that somehow despite lacking any officers training at that point is able to solve all these problems and notice all these things like Lore replacing Data or things that are wrong with the ship before any of the other adult crew can and even saves the ship with his science experiments on more than one occassion. Many people accuse including Wil Wheaton himself feel the character early on was just a self-insert for Roddenberry and when he came back after Roddenberry had died and the writers and Rick Berman could take full control of the show as producer he wanted to get to work on making the character more flawed.

I've seen people call Miyuki Shiba from Mahouka a Mary Sue but I don't think that fits since she's kind of a main character. She does have an absolutely overwhelming number of positive traits for one though, especially if you know anything about Japanese cultural standards of Yamato Nadeshiko so I can see why people would want to call her one.

[Esclair]

Originally Posted by Idealist 99

I wonder if Mary Sue that Bad !!!
Atem is definitely a Mary Sue But he still popular while Yuma started off as a Underdog But he was by far the most hated Protagonist .
I also notice most Popular Characters are OP/Mary sue ! They ether start off as OP/Mary Sue Or become an Underdog to OP/Mary sue.

Atem is not a sue. He is quite flawed, especially early on. He needed Yugi to help 'humanize' him throughout the series. Remember when he and Kaiba have their first rematch at Duelist Kingom? Atem would have let Seito die in order to seize victory, only Yugi stopped him at the last moment. There are many moments in the story where he loses hope, especially against opponents that represent the mistakes he made in past, and he needed Yugi or Joey to rekindle his battle spirit.

Not to mention he would have lost to every single major antagonist if he didn't have the help of his friends. He could not have won against Pegasus if Yugi didn't convince him to use the Mind Shuffle technique. Against Marik Atem probably would have lost if Kaiba didn't give him the Fiend Sanctuary card. Finally, even with 3 God cards in his deck he still lost to Yugi in the final duel.

[IceHism]

The main problem I have with this term is that no one can agree on a definition of the word and that the meaning is extremely vague which makes it pretty meaningless when you are trying to understand what is happening on a literary level.

Not to mention, there are people who don't pay any attention to the series they are even watching or reading. Stuff that makes sense would easily make sense if they paid attention and thought a little but it seems like they watch without thinking. But no, let's shout that this is bad while giving it a shallow look.

And I don't want to talk about adaptions. People who judge characters from adaptions without taking account of the source material annoys me a lot. Hearing people think Tatsuya is a saint annoys me to no end.

[Archon_Wing]

Originally Posted by Dr. Dahm

The only one of those that fits the bill for me is 1st and 2nd Season Wesley. Picard is a man that considers the moral weight of pretty much everything he does and is obviously very experienced from a long career in Starfleet but has his flaws like being cold and distant from his crew emotionally and even from his own brother as we see in one episode. Riker started off the series as kind of a clone of Kirk being all dashing and handsome and kind of arrogant but eventually evolves into that kind of guy that is good enough as a commander that he could be captain but obviously lacks all the insights of Picard at times even though overall he's generally seen as the jovial XO that's always there to lend a hand whereas people would be too intimidated to approach Picard even though he'd do the same because of the image he projects.

Wesley to start the series is just some snot nosed brat in bad 80's costume design that somehow despite lacking any officers training at that point is able to solve all these problems and notice all these things like Lore replacing Data or things that are wrong with the ship before any of the other adult crew can and even saves the ship with his science experiments on more than one occassion. Many people accuse including Wil Wheaton himself feel the character early on was just a self-insert for Roddenberry and when he came back after Roddenberry had died and the writers and Rick Berman could take full control of the show as producer he wanted to get to work on making the character more flawed.

I've seen people call Miyuki Shiba from Mahouka a Mary Sue but I don't think that fits since she's kind of a main character. She does have an absolutely overwhelming number of positive traits for one though, especially if you know anything about Japanese cultural standards of Yamato Nadeshiko so I can see why people would want to call her one.

I think in the context of Star Trek: TNG, the entire human race could be considered somewhat "Sue" (but mostly the first season, and that's because season one was awful). You have to realize that afterwards when Roddenberry wasn't in charge that there was a sudden burst in personality and there was conflicts and such. But yea there was a strong sense that humanity was always perfect and flawless, and that they were always right and enlightened the wayward aliens, even more allegedly wise and older race. This is of course a sci-fi cliche to some degree, and since Star Trek has always been about glorifying humanity's potential to be somewhat acceptable but those first parts of TNG were just obnoxious as it was always another alien influence and never anything wrong with the Federation which knows best. (And also why DS9 is quite memorable by challenging that). And of course the crappier treks from Voyager on would take these problems and make it worse, especially in bad episodes of Voyager where Janeway would always be portrayed in the right by default of being the main character.

And speaking of Janeway, for those of you that don't know about Star Trek, Janeway was the first female main character that captained the series's starship and thus there was a lot of hype around it. But the thing was that they always had to emphasize she is a woman and made sure that whatever she did was justified by the plot. Now that may or may not be a Mary Sue thing but it's the same kind of thing that rubs the audience wrong. It's one thing to have a strong female character, but it's another thing to contrive a strong character and define it by saying it is female. To contrast, Star Trek: Deep Space Nine had an captain of African decent which also got played up a bit and was relevant in his backgrounds and backstory but the show didn't go out of his way to say he was that every episode... unlike Voyager we have here.

Though yea, despite all this we still had some things worth talking about such as Picard being distant, and Riker... well honestly early Riker was quite an annoying asshole but fortunately Wesley is there to make everyone look sane.

In any case, I don't necessarily think it's even about being "OP". I mean some people just win more easily than others and life isn't fair like that. The problem is when you're sort of emphasizing certain things that they become more than traits-- but overshadow the characters themselves such as say in Oreimo, where otakudom is something to not only tolerate but basically be celebrated to a degree that sort of handwaves away any flaws the characters may have, and thus causing a disconnect. To me of course; I just don't like stuff like that.

[aohige]

Originally Posted by Fireminer

What about Mahouka Koukou and Tatsuya?

Well, to be fair, I'd say about 80-90% of novels to come out of the Narou site, including Mahouka, are Gary Stu stories.

I read a lot of novels there, but have to shuffle through countless self-insertion novels before finding a good one.

I'm not saying that's necessary a bad thing, but it's just way too oversaturated with the same stuff.

[Esclair]

Originally Posted by aohige

Well, to be fair, I'd say about 80-90% of novels to come out of the Narou site, including Mahouka, are Gary Stu stories.

I read a lot of novels there, but have to shuffle through countless self-insertion novels before finding a good one.

I'm not saying that's necessary a bad thing, but it's just way too oversaturated with the same stuff.

Is it just me or is reincarnation the new 'fad' with those LN's.

[Archaeon]

Shiba Tatsuya is definitely a Gary Stu.

Spoiler:

For those who haven't watch Mahouka but just seen this montage,congratulation. You just finish watching all 26 episodes of Mahouka in a single post and most efficient way and I can guarantee you that you are not missing anything at all. You welcome. No need to thanks me though. I know I'm a nice person.

Mahouka,worst anime I ever watch.

[Idealist 99]

Originally Posted by Esclair

Atem is not a sue. He is quite flawed, especially early on. He needed Yugi to help 'humanize' him throughout the series. Remember when he and Kaiba have their first rematch at Duelist Kingom? Atem would have let Seito die in order to seize victory, only Yugi stopped him at the last moment. There are many moments in the story where he loses hope, especially against opponents that represent the mistakes he made in past, and he needed Yugi or Joey to rekindle his battle spirit.

Not to mention he would have lost to every single major antagonist if he didn't have the help of his friends. He could not have won against Pegasus if Yugi didn't convince him to use the Mind Shuffle technique. Against Marik Atem probably would have lost if Kaiba didn't give him the Fiend Sanctuary card. Finally, even with 3 God cards in his deck he still lost to Yugi in the final duel.

Doesn't Mary Sue mean Character that hardly lose at all !!!
It took several season before Atem suffered a true defeat .
He lose for real only twice .
I mean , When I say ''My version Ash Ketchum (Pokemon) is someone who only lose to E4 , Champion or Extraordinary trainer (Trobius) Then Other say I want Ash to be a Mary Sue.
Even though I didn't meant him to be unbeatable ! I only want him to be like a Trainer who truly conquered Battle Frontier & Beaten Legendary Pokemon.

Originally Posted by Archaeon

Shiba Tatsuya is definitely a Gary Stu.

Spoiler:

For those who haven't watch Mahouka but just seen this montage,congratulation. You just finish watching all 26 episodes of Mahouka in a single post and most efficient way and I can guarantee you that you are not missing anything at all. You welcome. No need to thanks me though. I know I'm a nice person.

Mahouka,worst anime I ever watch.

Then how come The series sold so many novel and was popular before the Anime!!

[Nicaea]

Originally Posted by Idealist 99

Then how come The series sold so many novel and was popular before the Anime!!

The series got an Anime adaptation precisely because it was popular as a LN. This thought kind of annoys me. It's not because a story has a Mary Sue/Gary Stu in it that it's a bad story. Whilst Gary Stu Tatsuya is pretty well written in Mahouka's world, Miyuki is a terribly written Mary Sue.

I don't really like how the terms have become indicators of "characters that don't have enough weaknesses/setbacks/flaws". If I were to look at people in society as characters, I'm pretty sure I wouldn't find balanced characters.

Personally I think the term shouldn't have been relevant outside of Fanfiction.

[IceHism]

Originally Posted by Nicaea

I don't really like how the terms have become indicators of "characters that don't have enough weaknesses/setbacks/flaws". If I were to look at people in society as characters, I'm pretty sure I wouldn't find balanced characters.

Personally I think the term shouldn't have been relevant outside of Fanfiction.

I don't know how the term progressed but i think that other people mean to say that unbalanced characters tend to be very polarizing and, in their opinion, doesn't make a good narrative. And you can see that pretty easily.

Another thing is that people tend to define the word struggle one-dimensionally.

[erneiz_hyde]

Stu/Sue discussion never goes anywhere because everyone has their own definition and everyone insists that they're right and everyone else is wrong. And it will almost assuredly devolve into fanboys protecting their favorite series/character from 'unjust' accusation.

Seriously, what's wrong with the Stu label if the show is enjoyable? Everyone wants their self-masturbatory shows once in a while.

[Idealist 99]

So Ash Ketchum (Pokemon) become like Atem (Yugioh) then he won''t be a Gary Stu , right !!

[Triple_R]

Originally Posted by Idealist 99

Then how come The series sold so many novel and was popular before the Anime!!

Some people like Gary Stus/Mary Sues. I've now come to accept that, as there's no other explanation I can see for Mahouka being as popular as it is. Tatsuya is probably the most clear-cut Gary Stu I have ever seen in anime. With SAO's Kirito, there was at least some degree of plausible deniablity, but not with Tatsuya. Archeon's image compilation really does say a lot about Mahouka, and how it presents its MC, Tatsuya.

So since some people like Gary Stus/Mary Sues, I'm just going to say that I personally tend to dislike them. But hey, there's clearly a market there, so I can't really fault LN/VN/anime/manga-makers for going after it. It's no less legitimate than going after moe fans or BL fans. Some people clearly like Gary Stus. C'est la vie.

I guess it's not that strange. People tend to like to cheer on winners, people tend to like heroes, and watching a Big Damn Hero kick butt with complete winning domination can be fun sometimes. The Falcon Punch became a major YouTube meme for a reason.

I tend to prefer protagonists who have to overcome actual hardships and significant setbacks and the occasional defeat, but cheering on a guy/gal that just seems totally unstoppable may be fun sometimes. I can think of some pro wrestlers like that, especially Bill Goldberg. Goldberg was very popular when he defeated Hollywood Hogan for the WCW World Title, and Goldberg was undefeated at the time.

[IceHism]

Originally Posted by Triple_R

as there's no other explanation I can see for Mahouka being as popular as it is.

As an ln reader, I would say Mahouka is popular mostly for its' grand, well-detailed, and immersive setting and the complexity of the web of plot events that happens in the series. And also, the complex relationship between miyuki and tatsuya(though other characters like mayumi are also quite popular). Even though the anime only sold 10-11k dvds which is decent, it was actually considered grossly underperforming. it has some interesting themes and symbolism as well.

What the anime did was try to turn it into a battle show and took out all the exposition.. which didn't work because battles don't even happen that much in it.
Though i wouldn't take those anime pictures seriously, they lack context. i probably hate the anime more than most anime-only viewers.

[Archon_Wing]

Originally Posted by Triple_R

Some people like Gary Stus/Mary Sues. I've now come to accept that, as there's no other explanation I can see for Mahouka being as popular as it is. Tatsuya is probably the most clear-cut Gary Stu I have ever seen in anime. With SAO's Kirito, there was at least some degree of plausible deniablity, but not with Tatsuya. Archeon's image compilation really does say a lot about Mahouka, and how it presents its MC, Tatsuya.

So since some people like Gary Stus/Mary Sues, I'm just going to say that I personally tend to dislike them. But hey, there's clearly a market there, so I can't really fault LN/VN/anime/manga-makers for going after it. It's no less legitimate than going after moe fans or BL fans. Some people clearly like Gary Stus. C'est la vie.

I guess it's not that strange. People tend to like to cheer on winners, people tend to like heroes, and watching a Big Damn Hero kick butt with complete winning domination can be fun sometimes. The Falcon Punch became a major YouTube meme for a reason.

I tend to prefer protagonists who have to overcome actual hardships and significant setbacks and the occasional defeat, but cheering on a guy/gal that just seems totally unstoppable may be fun sometimes. I can think of some pro wrestlers like that, especially Bill Goldberg. Goldberg was very popular when he defeated Hollywood Hogan for the WCW World Title, and Goldberg was undefeated at the time.

Goldberg's a funny case because Hogan was written to be quite the Stu himself so often so I guess that was acceptable to be overpowered to beat him. I didn't bother with WCW at that time, but I think a lot of the fanfare was because at the time the company loved to have the bad guys dominate for a looongggg time due to the NWO popularity so having the good guys finally beat them back felt refreshing. Still, I would have to agree with you anyways, since while Goldberg was entertaining, it also could only go so far, and this is especially true when they brought him back in WWE a while after.

Though this really shows that context matters. Good storytelling is dynamic and very push/pull.

[Last Sinner]

The only example you really need that Gary Stu/Mary Sue sell is Attack on Titan.

Levi and Mikasa are them. Levi in particular. And they get away with it due to the constant melodrama Eren and Armin provide since they're more like the balancing forces to the presence of a rage-inducing protagonist.


In the case of Sword Art Online and Irregular, the leads being that stereotype amplify it and swing things too far out of whack.


Action movies from the West are too prevlaent with this type as well. I honestly feel The Dark Knight was once in a generation to buck the trend in the way it did.


The upside is that watching Garry Stu/Mary Sue in action isn't mandatory.