Teen Wolf and Lack of Character Development - Scott McCall
Incoming Rant: Re-watching the first season of TW I have realised why I never felt that Scott was The Hero of the story even if the writers did not stop hammering the idea that he was pure and perfect and always right. He never sacrifices himself. This is a classic of fiction, the hero will always be the one who makes the greatest sacrifices for the common good and for those they love, renouncing happiness, normality and even their own life.
But Scott never does that. Even in the first season this is very clear. The first few episodes emphasise that playing lacrosse and dating Allison are things he wants, but are dangerous to himself and those around him. The narratively logical thing would be that, after a period of selfish refusal, he would realise that the right thing to do is to give up what he loves until he has better control of himself and his new powers, sacrificing his temporary happiness for the good of others.
Instead, the narrative rewards Scott with control gained through Deux Ex Machina and not hard work, he gets to date Allison and becomes a Lacrosse star without sacrifices and therefore doesn’t grow or evolve at all. This keeps up for all 6 seasons. Meanwhile, everyone else around him is constantly sacrificing their safety, sanity and even life for the common good. And ten years later in the movie nothing has changed. Scott’s still not the one performing the sacrifice, he’s still not the hero yet. He gives nothing, but the narrative rewards him with true love. Meanwhile Derek gives his own life to save those he loves he is The Hero.
I have made a countless number of posts about Scott’s development. Specifically, his lack of development. The writers had every opportunity to make him a decent character – and Posey could have performed it and done everything at least moderately well – but instead, they caved into Jeff Davis’ whims.
There were other writers in the room who should have held Jeff accountable and written Scott as a proper hero: a hero who sacrifices his own selfish wants for the greater good.
They do not have the right to tell us not to like characters such as Stiles or Derek more because they were the ones who wrote those characters using the hero’s journey narrative that they very easily could have written for Scott…but they didn’t. When the creator of Teen Wolf speaks up against those fans, he has no one to blame but himself and the other writers, and to say anything to the contrary just makes him look like a hypocrite.
You cannot expect your audience to believe your main character is a hero when you do not give them faults to overcome and make them a better person.
They wrote Scott as never taking consequences for his own actions – instead, they had everyone else suffer the consequences of his actions and had them clean up his mess and deal with the repercussions. (not going into detail here because I have already done so on many other posts)
But when you show characters such as Stiles and Derek dealing with complex emotional and physical traumas and then doing things to try and improve themselves, while also dealing with their own mistakes and growing from them…but then don’t hold your main character to the same standard, how can you be surprised when no one relates to them? The accountability for Scott’s lack of accountability can be traced right back to the writers’ room.
I genuinely could have liked Scott. In fact, when he was being sweet and helping his mom, I loved him! He had the potential to be a fantastic main character…but the writer’s neglected their responsibility as writers.
To put it simply: the writers suck.
The only reason the show lasted was because they had good cinematography, and they brought on some experienced older actors into the cast, and they had two natural talents on screen: Dylan O’Brien and Tyler Hoechlin.
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