as a rule- if theres 3 members, the girl is typically gonna be slightly more gentle, and the main boy is gonna be more dorky
if theres 4 of them, the girl will be more rough and "not like other girls", the main boy will be KEWL and the 4th guy will be a nerdy little poindexter
Reboot she-at has a two girl one boy dynamic that is similar to Owl House. Skinny female protagonist, fat Asian female friend (yes Glimmer is at least implied to be Asian), and effeminate black male friend.
>if theres 4 of them, the girl will be more rough and "not like other girls", the main boy will be KEWL and the 4th guy will be a nerdy little poindexter
Grojband?
in groups of 5 the girl is plain and feminine. although occasionally she secretly has a tomboyish side that is revealed later when they run out of ideas
in groups of 5 the girl is plain and feminine. although occasionally she secretly has a tomboyish side that is revealed later when they run out of ideas
groups of 5 usually have 2 girls the tomboy or nerd and the girly girl.
It is popular because it makes sure the beta sidekick will not be a threat to the alpha male romance with the only female, but just to be sure they also make him moronic or autistic.
The opportunistic nihilistic "intelligent" cowardly lanky baggage guy is preferred over the "lolsorandumb" fat butthole baggage. Not referring to Coop in any way.
It’s basically dead now thanks to changes in how western media wants to represent and distribute different demographics of people in it’s cast of characters. Nowadays, the protagonist might be a girl, or the whole main cast might be girls, or the fat male is the protagonist, or the fat friend is female instead.
>dorky protag whos not from around here enlists in a school of magic and meets two equally dorky kids and a school bully and learns about friendship and crap more than they learn actual magic
the genders may be flipped but the trope is still old and trash
I absolutely fricking hate this archetype especially because the morons don't put it to good use just like Dolores Umbridge tier characters.
When you have this dynamic you gain some NEEDs/WANTs, you want the overly competent sidekick girl to be the main character, you don't feel strongly about the dorky self-insert neutral competence MC and then you utterly hate the third wheel baggage that sabotages everyone but the moronic MC keeps him around while the overly competent sidekick girl fricking hates him and wants to get rid of him to frick the MC.
This actually can be an amazing thing because you control your audience's perception but the imbeciles absolutely do not put to good use.
I much prefer the 4 team dynamic because it's less tedious, less predictable, creates less of a hate/love dynamic for certain characters.
I had the biggest sadistic grin on my face when these 2 got literally left back home and put on the sideline in the movie. I hate background characters who don't know their place. In the comic books they're not even characters, they're backgrounders. Nurarihyon No Mago had the same problem where school kids are featured way too much in the anime as characters instead of the background props they're suppose to be in the manga. Juniper Lee also set MC's friends to the side and made it a "family only b***hes" I love it when shows do that. Fangbone was kinda different in that it gave more chances for them to shine but they still kept their damn distance where they belong.
I didn't like the fact Twig(the pet) in Hilda wasn't handled more like an efficient Pikachu and was still something more of a useless accessory, especially in the cartoon.
The Black person Frida over here was also interesting. First she starts as the leader, you think you'll actually get 2 leaders, but then Hilda overwhelms her and she's back to being the useless nerd then she downright has a rage fit and quits the show for a few episodes then comes back as a full time nerdy loser who prefers the book over the sword. Netflix writers are fricking dogshit, they tried to turn Hilda into the next Star Vs/Amphibia/Owl House/Harry Potter with the witchery bullshit when these 2 characters in the comics are school friends you see for 1-2 minutes at the start and end like in Atomic Betty and Totally Spies with the high school rivals.
I'm writing a comic and so far I worked out the whole plot with just a boy and a girl duo as the protagonists (sometimes joined by various other characters) and I'm wondering if I should add a third character to round out a trio, I feel like adding one this late simply can't work, I've already worked out so much of the dynamics and plot without him
I'm not a big fan of trios in general. Fat kid sidekick, "black best friend," the hot girl, etc. All the best stories from the Epic of Gilgamesh, to Robin Hood, to the Prince and the Pauper have had Duo pairings tell their stories. There's no need for third wheel characters to exist. Secondary characters can exist - but they must either have their own subplots that are important to the plot, or they must have minor roles that don't impact the Duo.
as a rule- if theres 3 members, the girl is typically gonna be slightly more gentle, and the main boy is gonna be more dorky
if theres 4 of them, the girl will be more rough and "not like other girls", the main boy will be KEWL and the 4th guy will be a nerdy little poindexter
What about the ones where there are more girls than boys?
too rare to notice a theme
What two girl/one boy shows even are there? The only one I can think of is Cyberchase.
Reboot she-at has a two girl one boy dynamic that is similar to Owl House. Skinny female protagonist, fat Asian female friend (yes Glimmer is at least implied to be Asian), and effeminate black male friend.
Interesting, characterization for girl and 4th guy is spot on for Danny phantom, despite there only being 3 of them.
Danny phantom may have skirted the trope but it surprisingly didnt nail it
>if theres 4 of them, the girl will be more rough and "not like other girls", the main boy will be KEWL and the 4th guy will be a nerdy little poindexter
Grojband?
What about 5?
in groups of 5 the girl is plain and feminine. although occasionally she secretly has a tomboyish side that is revealed later when they run out of ideas
groups of 5 usually have 2 girls the tomboy or nerd and the girly girl.
Isn't the 3 member group archetype broken down more like:
>The main character (male): Brash, headstrong, bold
>The girl: Straight-(wo)man, intelligent, basically a tomboy with a slight effeminate side
>The other male: Village idiot with one or two hobbies he excels at, kind but ignorant, goes along with just about everything the MC does
It is popular because it makes sure the beta sidekick will not be a threat to the alpha male romance with the only female, but just to be sure they also make him moronic or autistic.
So anime and western cartoons aren't that different after all
Self-insert, fat, and girl
self-insert, skinny and girl
The opportunistic nihilistic "intelligent" cowardly lanky baggage guy is preferred over the "lolsorandumb" fat butthole baggage. Not referring to Coop in any way.
To be fair, the entire cast of Megas XLR are buttholes.
None of them are buttholes, not even Jamie. Just a lazy, laidback dude who's into chicks.
It’s basically dead now thanks to changes in how western media wants to represent and distribute different demographics of people in it’s cast of characters. Nowadays, the protagonist might be a girl, or the whole main cast might be girls, or the fat male is the protagonist, or the fat friend is female instead.
>dorky protag whos not from around here enlists in a school of magic and meets two equally dorky kids and a school bully and learns about friendship and crap more than they learn actual magic
the genders may be flipped but the trope is still old and trash
>fat male is the protag
we fatsos will never have a good cartoon and you know it
One post above you.
What about Chowder
and Clarence
stonetoss, ugly and s-o-y-boy
>White dude
>Black Bro
>Ambiguous gender person
This is my favourite
>ambiguous gender
thats a chick.... i dont give a shit what it claims or whats in them panties man thats just a girl to me
It wasn't even ambiguous in the show, I have no fricking clue what that anon is on about.
I absolutely fricking hate this archetype especially because the morons don't put it to good use just like Dolores Umbridge tier characters.
When you have this dynamic you gain some NEEDs/WANTs, you want the overly competent sidekick girl to be the main character, you don't feel strongly about the dorky self-insert neutral competence MC and then you utterly hate the third wheel baggage that sabotages everyone but the moronic MC keeps him around while the overly competent sidekick girl fricking hates him and wants to get rid of him to frick the MC.
This actually can be an amazing thing because you control your audience's perception but the imbeciles absolutely do not put to good use.
I much prefer the 4 team dynamic because it's less tedious, less predictable, creates less of a hate/love dynamic for certain characters.
I think Jimmy Two-Shoes has that dynamic.
>Normal kid MC
>Girl
>American kid
It's pretty good bit of everything
Bonus points if they also include a dumb mascot-type character
Just now I realized how Diana and Gwen look alike
I had the biggest sadistic grin on my face when these 2 got literally left back home and put on the sideline in the movie. I hate background characters who don't know their place. In the comic books they're not even characters, they're backgrounders. Nurarihyon No Mago had the same problem where school kids are featured way too much in the anime as characters instead of the background props they're suppose to be in the manga. Juniper Lee also set MC's friends to the side and made it a "family only b***hes" I love it when shows do that. Fangbone was kinda different in that it gave more chances for them to shine but they still kept their damn distance where they belong.
I didn't like the fact Twig(the pet) in Hilda wasn't handled more like an efficient Pikachu and was still something more of a useless accessory, especially in the cartoon.
The Black person Frida over here was also interesting. First she starts as the leader, you think you'll actually get 2 leaders, but then Hilda overwhelms her and she's back to being the useless nerd then she downright has a rage fit and quits the show for a few episodes then comes back as a full time nerdy loser who prefers the book over the sword. Netflix writers are fricking dogshit, they tried to turn Hilda into the next Star Vs/Amphibia/Owl House/Harry Potter with the witchery bullshit when these 2 characters in the comics are school friends you see for 1-2 minutes at the start and end like in Atomic Betty and Totally Spies with the high school rivals.
If the main characters are a duo one of them should be short and angry and one should be extremely tall and more laid back
It works better when the boys are rivals and the girl secretly wants to get the double D
I'm writing a comic and so far I worked out the whole plot with just a boy and a girl duo as the protagonists (sometimes joined by various other characters) and I'm wondering if I should add a third character to round out a trio, I feel like adding one this late simply can't work, I've already worked out so much of the dynamics and plot without him
InoShikaCho
I'm not a big fan of trios in general. Fat kid sidekick, "black best friend," the hot girl, etc. All the best stories from the Epic of Gilgamesh, to Robin Hood, to the Prince and the Pauper have had Duo pairings tell their stories. There's no need for third wheel characters to exist. Secondary characters can exist - but they must either have their own subplots that are important to the plot, or they must have minor roles that don't impact the Duo.
how come they never make male protagonist, fat female friend and boy trios