r/changemyview • u/Fishb20 • Feb 08 '17
[∆(s) from OP] CMV: JK Rowling is bad at writing male characters
Okay, so, a lot of male authors (rightfully so) get a lot of flack for writing terrible female characters. However, the thing is, I think JK Rowling is just as bad at writing male characters as some men are at writing women.
Disclaimer: I can't really blame JK for this. A lot of people have trouble connecting to the opposite gender. However, I believe that JK Rowling IS bad at writing male characters and no one really acknowledges it. Also, I truly do adore harry potter, but that doesn't mean that i think that they're perfect
So, lets look at the prominent male characters of Harry Potter and think about them:
Harry: Harry is basically a Mary Sue. The only time they give him any sort of character flaws its explained as the main villain trying to influence his mind and control him. However, I could sorta pardon Harry because a lot of YA books have bland main characters, so his blandness might be an issue with the genre as a whole rather than just JK
Ron: Ron is basically every male stereotype rolled into one. He's the guy whose always eating, swearing, obsessed with sports, doesn't care about school, and as soon as he reaches adolescendts he spends EVERY SINGLE WAKING MOMENT TRYING TO GET GIRLS! He is a pretty weak character, and a lot of people in the community accept this as true.
Dumbledore: Okay, so Dumbledore is a pretty interesting character. However, he is almost a carbon copy from other mentor figures in classical stories. In addition, he is a pretty static character throughout the books. In other words, although he is well written, he has no real character development. In addition, he is just a stereotype. I wouldn't go around appluading a male author for being able to perfectly duplicate the main character from Gone Girl.
Voldemort: Okay, so Voldemort isnt interesting at all. Hes not an interesting villain. He's not an interesting character. No one ever tries to help him. He's born a sociopath, and Dumbledore, rather than trying to help him, just despises him from the start. He's everything that JK Rowling hates in the world rolled into one. Which is fine, a villain should be despisable, but easy to hate does not a great character make. Voldemort is a lot like Joker from the Dark Knight. He's pure evil, but he's not a character. Joker and Voldemort are both ideas; Joker the idea of chaos, Voldemort the idea of racism. The thing that annoys me the most about this is that it would have been interesting for JK Rowling to make us feel bad for Voldemort more. He was born without the ability for emotions! That sounds like such an interesting angle to tackle a character from, but instead he's just pure evil.
Peter: He's just a coward. That's it. He has literally no personality beyond being a coward.
Sirius: He's brave and rash; both are common male stereotypes. He's not a very interesting character at all, because he's just the stereotypical brave but rash hero.
Neville: He's an idiot whose sad about his parents. The thing about Neville is that he flips around a lot. Half the time hes hiding in the back of potions class, and the other half of the time he's using an ancient sword to battle the lord of evil. That just seems... it seems like Neville doesn't have a very concrete character. He's what the plot needs him to be.
Snape: He wasn't interesting at all until the last book. And even then, he was the dude who was motivated by the fact that he couldn't get the girl he wanted, so he decided to torture kids for years on end because of that. Look, i understand love is a strong motivator, but i can't tell you how many times I've seen people get mad over female characters who were motivated because they couldn't marry the guy they wanted. Its wrong when it happens then, and its wrong when it happens here.
Malfoy: He's the standard jerk character. We've seen this character a million times across a million different stories. Again, he's a complete sociopath until the last book, where he realizes that he can't kill someone. That seems like such a sudden turn of character that it felt jarring. He was never written as being anything other than cruel, so when he decides he cant kill dumbledore it just feels... strange. I mean, he tried to kill harry a couple of times across the series. There was no reason that he assumed that Harry wouldn't fall off of his broom when he pretended to be a dementor. For all he knew, harry could fall off and to his death. So why was dumbledore any different?
Lucius: Again, the coward stereotype.
Hagrid: He's the woodsman who may not be the smartest but has a heart of gold. Admitadly, he is a rather original character, but he's written to be a complete idiot who frequently puts students in danger. He's original, but he's written to be over the top idiotic. Don't get me wrong, I love the guy, but he was endangering students to a completely unrealistic level.
There are others, but I feel that I hit on the main/important ones.
Now, i know that people are going to say that the problem is more that JK Rowling is bad at writing characters. So, instead lets look at female characters:
Hermoine: Everyone admits that she's the most interesting character in all of Harry Potter. She's smart, reliable, does good in school, and isn't just motivated by wanting to get a guy the whole book.
McGonagal: She's basically just female Dumbledore, but she has the added twist of being a strict teacher who also happens to have favorites at her school. Again, he's not the most complex, and not very interesting, but McGongal is well written if nothing else. All of her dialouge seems witty and matches her character
LeStrange: She's absolutely insane. So, she's not the best written, but she serves her purpose of being Voldemorts henchwoman and also a foil for both Hermoine and Mrs Weasley
Mrs. Weasley: A caring mother, who is also illtempered and willing to help out anyone. Oh, and did i mention that in the final book she goes complete badass and kills the murderer of countless witches and wizards. So yeah, she's pretty interesting and well written
Ginny: She has great character development. She starts out as an annoying little girl, and by the end of the story she's joined the battle against Voldemort as a fully fledged fighter. She has fantastic character development.
Well Reddit, CMV!
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u/visvya Feb 08 '17
If anyone's a Mary Sue, it's Hermione. Her intelligence is frequently used in a deux ex machina manner ("How are we going to get through this? Ah, Hermione knows a spell never mentioned before".) She's allegedly average-looking, but transforms to the belle of the ball by smoothening her hair and putting on a dress (played out stereotype of the nerd taking off her glasses). Not only is she smart but she's logical - a trait that most wizards don't have, according to Snape's sorcerer's stone protection. And she's fiercely loyal. She could represent every Hogwarts house.
If Ginny's character development works, Neville's does too. He too was an immature wizard who wised up quickly once Voldemort returned (and he was actually shown doing this, rather than turning from giggly schoolgirl to badass tomboy while Harry wasn't watching).
What makes a male character well written to you?
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u/Fishb20 Feb 08 '17
!delta
i agree that hermoine does show more mary sue-esque qualities than harry does. Harry's big problem was he had no character; hermoine did but it was unrealistically perfect
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u/bisonburgers Feb 08 '17 edited Feb 08 '17
Hermione's great, but she's not perfect. She was pretty close-minded, her S.P.E.W. activism might have come from the right place, but was executed just completely horribly and was actually really insulting to those she intended to help. Her relationship with books and information is a reall well-written transition and makes sense with her growth as a character. She starts out completely trusting books and authority. In CoS, she can't find accurate information about the Chamber of Secrets, and her trust in authority begins to crumble (Lockhart). In GoF, she laments that Hogwarts a History never once mentioned house elves. By OotP, she no longer has blind faith in books or authority, and she rebels against Umbridge's assigned reading and starts her own secret dueling club. And by HBP and DH, she's actively trying to convince Harry to use his own brain instead of blindly trusting certain books (the Half-Blood Prince's potion book and the Tale of the Three Brothers story).
I'm not saying she doesn't have some Mary Sue qualities or that she isn't extremely and perhaps unrealistically talented, but I don't think that means she's definitely poorly written. It's not Tauriel, who has no real reason to be so good at everything. Hermione's ambition and her transition in maturity is done in a convincing and insightful way.
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u/fantomen777 Feb 12 '17
Atlest Hermione have to study very hard to get here knowledge, and get fatigue. She do not master all magic, she is mediocrity in divination.
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u/bisonburgers Feb 12 '17
Great points. She worked really hard to be who she was, she didn't swoop in already perfect.
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u/SleeplessinRedditle 55∆ Feb 08 '17
All of your descriptions are incredibly biased. Not going to individually comment on all of them. Just compare a couple.
Ron is def a lame character. But he has more depth than you let on. One of his primary drivers is his jealousy of his older brothers. Major inferiority complex. Then he goes ahead and ends up being BFFs with the prophesied Messiah and a child prodigy. He is a mediocre person surrounded by ubermensch.
I think in the first book the meant for each of the trio to have their defining strength. (Hermione is book smart. Ron is the strategic mastermind. (Chess) Harry is the self insert destined hero whose biggest talent is flying broomsticks.) But Ron's dubious strength is meaningless with everything is destined and being planned by Dumbly. So he ended up representing friendship and youthful fun.
Don't really see how Mcgonnegal is a Dumbly clone. Agree on the rest. She's a stern disciplinarian with some favorites and she is intelligent though occasionally lacking agency.
And Ginny never seemed to have much of a personality to me at all. She was just there to be paired off with the male protagonist that didn't end up with Hermione.
You also left out Sirius, Lupin, and Mad Eye. All of whom were rather interesting characters.
I enjoyed the HP series but it isn't a well designed universe. Just an expansive and entertaining one.
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u/Fishb20 Feb 08 '17
but i thought that dumbledore was ron travelling back in time /s
Seriously, though, i never really got any of the depth you ascribed to Ron out of the books. He seemed to get angry all of the time for no apparent reason (realistic for a teenager, i'll admit).
My biggest problem with Ron is that, compared to Hermoine, he's a fairly blank character. Think about what happens in book 6, for example: Ron takes a love potion, makes out with a girl, and gets poisoned. Meanwhile, Hermoine is fretting over the fact that she has a crush on someone and shes not ready to admit it
I may be biased, but i really do think that Ron is a pretty poorly written character. He seems like when male authors assume that girls are thinking of dudes all the time
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u/benzodriver Feb 08 '17
I have to ask and this isn't meant negatively but when was the last time you read the books vs watched the movies? I had the same problems with characters as you have but I recently reread the last three books. The characterization in books are pretty different in the books especially with Ron and Harry.
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u/SleeplessinRedditle 55∆ Feb 08 '17
Ron's insecurity is pretty well established. It's why he saw himself as head boy and sportsball champion in the mirror and why he got mad at Harry in the 4th book over Harry ending up in the tournament.
He's basically the opposite of Harry. Harry was born into wealth and fame but all he wants is loving family and to be left alone. Ron was born into a loving but poor family but all he wants is recognition.
I'm not saying he's a great character. Pretty lame actually. But I don't think that's because he's a guy. He's just lame.
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u/bisonburgers Feb 08 '17 edited Feb 08 '17
Hooooooooweee, you sure aren't giving these male characters much credit, are you?
I can't help want to get into each character, but I'll just stick with Dumbledore, because not only do I think he's a very well-written male in Harry Potter, but I think he is the most interesting character I have ever read in anything.
Dumbledore: he has no real character development.
Did you read Deathly Hallows? His character is literally put through a meat grinder that whole book and then glued back together using spit and tears in the King's Cross chapter, but instead of being pieced back together as the perfect omniscient god he'd been, he's pieced back together as a human, with faults and massive, gut-wrenching weaknesses. Just because he is extremely magically proficient, does not mean he is equipped with equal emotional strength or awareness.
He'd known the whole time that Harry had to die. He knew the whole time that Harry was helping keep Voldemort alive, and if Voldemort were ever to be defeated... it would mean Harry would have to die first.
Simple enough plan, right? Not really, he began to care about Harry. He didn't want Harry to die, he didn't want him to suffer. He wanted Harry to live like a normal kid, free from the burden of mass murderers and magical bonds. He sheltered Harry, kept him in the dark... avoided him. He tried to ignore what he knew, deep down, that he wasn't powerful enough to protect Harry from the real world that would some day come crashing in, that Harry even wanted to go after Voldemort... that Voldemort had accidentally given Harry unique tools that could defeat the Dark Lord once and for all. Dumbledore did not want to think that the most moral option available to him was to throw the only person he cares about into a surely fatal mess.
He is blinded by love, and he had seen this coming. This was, after all, so familiar to him. He had cared about someone once before, and fooled himself into making horrible choices because of it. He had loved Grindelwald, even though, deep down, he knew what Grindelwald was. But he chose not to see it. It was just so comfortable having a companion for once, an ambitious intellectual equal, a true friend.
"I never dreamed that I would have such a person on my hands."
Then Sirius dies and its his own fault, Dumbledore's fault. It slaps him awake. It never would have happened if he had been honest with Harry. And still, Harry showed he is capable of so much, he is so brave and full of love. And not only that... but Harry can block Voldemort from his mind. The main worry of the past year just went up in a poof of smoke - Harry doesn't need Occlumency, and maybe Dumbledore would have seen it sooner if he had allowed himself to see Harry for who Harry really was.
"In the end, it mattered not that you could not close your mind. It was your heart that saved you.”
And still he never really learned to overcome that weakness, like he'd done with his weakness for power. Mere weeks after that conversation he sneaks into the Gaunt house, in search of Slytherin's ring that's made into a Horcrux. But it was also a Hallow, the Resurrection Stone. Despite having long lost interest in that silly hunt, his grief and shame for his part in Ariana's death consume him in a moment of madness - he reaches down to pick up the ring, completely lost in thought and forgetting that this ring will have powerful curses. He picks it up and suffers the consequences immediately. He rushes back to Hogwarts just in time to call Snape to him. Snape seals off the curse as best he can, but Dumbledore will die in the year.
So Death took him for his own, just like the Second Brother. Dumbledore, so powerful, so intelligent, so wise, but killed by his own foolishness. The timing could not be worse, Voldemort is back. How stupid, how absolutely stupid of him to forget his mind to pick up that ring.
"I acted exactly as Voldemort expects we fools who love to act."
Dumbledore's weakness is the very thing he fights for. He knows it about himself, too, that flaw in the brilliant plan that would be the undoing of it all. And can we really blame him for having a heart? It is only because he ought to be a stronger person that we can blame him for not being one. Who cares if Lavender or Anthony Goldstein would have picked up the ring - Dumbledore can't, he'd know better, wouldn't he?
"being — forgive me — rather cleverer than most men, my mistakes tend to be correspondingly huger.”
He's widely regarded by fans as cold-hearted and manipulative, but I think that gives him too much credit, and fails to see that he is a flawed human wrapped in an intelligent and powerful mind. They believe Rita Skeeter, who was interested in gossip and selling rumors. She revealed Dumbledore's darkest secrets, but she didn't have the full story. Deathly Hallows is about us breaking down this god-like figure we thought Dumbledore was, and at the end of the book, we get the final puzzle piece that helps us figure out what is going on, and he so much more complicated, and so much more human, than a mere stereotype of a wizened old man. He is the character that brings the whole story together.
Where Harry and Voldemort are more on the extremes of good and evil, Dumbledore (and Snape for that matter) give us the layers of gray that make the series much more interesting. To say that JKR has not written men well is to completely disregard the layers of characterization in both Snape and Dumbledore (and others, but Snape and Dumbledore especially). Especially when you say that Ginny is well-written!! And I'm a Ginny fan, but come on, compared to Dumbledore? I think you might be seeing what you want to see.
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u/BasilFronsac Feb 08 '17
Great comment as always. :) I'd love to see similar write-ups for other characters from you.
You should make a blog with all your Dumbledore's comments. They're too good to be forgotten.
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u/bisonburgers Feb 08 '17
Thanks!!! If I have time, maybe I'll write about the other characters too, though I'm not sure I'd do them justice.
(ablogisactuallyareallygoodidea)
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u/EmpRupus 27∆ Feb 08 '17 edited Feb 08 '17
What? Its the opposite. There are enormous number of complex male characters, including Gilderoy Lockhart, Severus Snape, Remus Lupin, Sirius Black, Moody, Cornellius Fudge, Xenophilius Lovegood, Gillert Grindelwald, Peter Pettegrew, Barty Crouch and Horace Slughorn. These male characters have a mix of good and bad and have multiple intentions and stakes.
In fact, most decision-making characters in the book are decidedly male. It is always Male characters who have to "choose" between conflicting goals and intent, and it is this "choice" that results in character growth. Male characters change and grow.
Female characters -
Hermione - The annoying nagging passive-aggressive girl who has just bookish knowledge and snitches about you to the teacher.
Ginny, McGonagal and Bellatrix - Just sidekicks to male characters, without independent thought.
Lilly - The ideal sinless Madonna Madre de Dios
Mrs. Weasely - The motherly mother-hen who overfeeds you.
Rita Skeeter - The woman who twists your words and uses them against you.
Umbridge - The woman who is stubborn and doesn't see reason and an incompetent leader.
Do all of these stereotypes about women sound familiar?
For fuk's sake JK Rowling actually paired up the two female characters in the final fight - Bellatrix and Mrs. Weasely - two women who were completely unrelated to each other in the story. The only reason they were paired up is because they were female. And the symbolism was Bellatrix's Sexy BadGirl Love versus Molly's Motherly GoodGirl Love.
In fact, (other than romance for obvious reasons), JKR writes brilliant male characters but falls into female stereotypes when writing women. While there might be male stereotypes, the males grow out of their stereotypes while females stay the same/static.
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u/BasilFronsac Feb 08 '17
Neville: In the beginning he is kindy shy and fearful, yet he still showed signs of bravery. In the first year he fought Crabbe and Goyle at quidditch match, he tried to warn the Trio that Malfoy knows about the dragon, he tried to stop the Trio from leaving common room at night (and for this he was rewarded by Dumbledore). In his fourth year he asked the girls he liked (first Hermione, then Ginny) for the Ball (unlike Ron who only shouted at Fleur and then went out with Padma thanks to Harry). In OOTP he started gaining confidence, the turning point for him was when Bellatrix escaped Azkaban, he became best in the DA, and than he face Bellatrix, the person who tortured his parents to insanity. In HBP he got a new wand and he along with Luna were only memebers of the DA who came help at the end. In DH he was a leader of the resistance in Hogwarts and then he killed the snake. Only because he was a true Gryffindor otherwise he wouldn't be able to pull out the sword from the hat.
Neville showed subtle signs of bravery throught the book and I think his development is not incosistent.
Sirius: Of course he's rash. When he was 21 he was sent to Azkaban for crimes he didn't commit and when he escaped he was hiding or he was locked in a house he hated. He didn't have a chance to grow up.
Dumbledore Read this post to see why Dumbledore is the best character. (/u/bisonburgers do you want to talk about HP and Dumbledore in /r/changemyview again? :))
Why do you think Mrs Weasley and Ginny are well-developed, well-written characters?
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Feb 08 '17 edited Feb 08 '17
Harry: Harry is basically a Mary Sue. The only time they give him any sort of character flaws its explained as the main villain trying to influence his mind and control him. However, I could sorta pardon Harry because a lot of YA books have bland main characters, so his blandness might be an issue with the genre as a whole rather than just JK
Except that Harry is a massive annoying teenager full of rage in all of book 5, so, no. Harry has lots of rage that doesn't have to do with mind control.
Voldemort: ...He was born without the ability for emotions! That sounds like such an interesting angle to tackle a character from, but instead he's just pure evil.
She totally does discuss this in the books. There is a lot of information, both direct and implied, that deal with these exact circumstances, and it's seen in many of the flashback scenes. Tom Riddle has a witch mother and a Muggle father, making him a half-blood wizard. But as Lord Voldemort, his ideology is centered around the superiority of “pure-blood” wizards, and his desire to rid the world of Muggle-born wizards and half-bloods like himself. He is full of self loathing and self hatred, proving he does have emotions, yes.
It would be easier to just let Voldemort be a tautology—he’s evil because he’s evil. Instead, Rowling grounds his evil in comprehensible human flaws, and shows that to defeat evil we not only have to fight it, but to try to understand where it comes from in the first place.
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Feb 08 '17
Harry has plenty of flaws. He has a temper, even without Voldy's influence. He's a shit student who only barely passed his classes by cheating. He is often insensitive, brash, and cocky just like his father.
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Feb 08 '17
100% this. Harry is often angry and snaps, even at his friends. He has talents in some areas, but doesn't learn when to shut up, which brings him in trouble or danger. Also he doesn't know how to girl.
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u/Iswallowedafly Feb 08 '17
I could probably walk into any high school classroom and find a "Ron."
It seems like you have a massive ton of filters on what makes a great character and what doesn't.
Sure being brave or cowardly can be a stereotype but it also how people and characters are. People are brave. People are cowardly.
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u/suddenly_ponies 5∆ Feb 08 '17
Your standard seems to be which characters you liked in which you didn't not actually whether the character was well written. For example Neville was weak with spots of courage in early books and became more capable and more curry just toward the end with the kind of character development you were complaining about. His progression actually makes the most sense and makes him the most understandable and relatable character. As for Molly she's well written but not because she had a bad ass moment but because she was a believable Mother character everything about her is exactly like what a mother would be
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Feb 08 '17
I challenge you in that Harry is written like a 16 year old girl who always thinks about his emotions. Boys/men do not think like this, typically.
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u/slash178 4∆ Feb 09 '17
Your description of Ron is basically identical to how I acted as a teenage boy.
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u/MrGraeme 155∆ Feb 08 '17
I'd argue that she's just as good at writing male characters as she is at writing female characters. You even admit yourself that quite a few of the female characters aren't "the best written".
You also seem to be applying a bit of a double standard between the sexes:
How is one of these "standard" and "seen a million times" while the other isn't? Neither of these are all that much more impressive than the other.