As we celebrate Dishonorable Graves being open just over a week, we wanted to give everyone the opportunity to take a closer look at their character and maybe learn something new about them. The questions below have been taken from here.
This task is not at all required, but if you do complete it, please tag it #dishonorabletask! Please feel free to personalize it however you like, if you want to make a graphic or a playlist to go along with it. We can’t wait to see what you come up with.
Describe your character in a few words.
What do you know about your character that they don’t know yet?
What are your character’s major flaws?
What would your character give their life for?
What is your character’s greatest asset?
What would completely break your character?
How does the image your character tries to project differ from the image they actually project?
What is your character afraid of?
Where would your character fall on a politeness/rudeness scale?
If your character could choose a different identity, who would they pick?
In what or whom is your character’s greatest faith in?
What was the best thing in your character’s life?
What was the worst thing in your character’s life?
What is your character’s biggest nightmare?
What seemingly insignificant memories stuck with your character?
What is your character’s secret wish?
What is your character’s greatest achievement?
What is your character’s deepest regret?
What is your character’s deepest disappointment?
What is your character reluctant to tell people?
What is your character hiding from themselves?
What makes this character angry? What calms them?
List situations in which your character would not have control over themselves.
How strong is your character’s emotions? Controllable? Uncontrollable?
What wakes your character up in the middle of the night?
Describe a recurring dream and/or nightmare.
Describe your character’s family.
Name your character’s favourite person and why.
How many friends does your character have?
How many friends does your character want?
How would a friend or close relative describe your character?
Who depends on your character? Why?
Who does your character most want to please? Why?
How does your character feel about sex?
How does your character feel about romantic relationships?
If your character had to live in utter seclusion, what six items would they bring?
What is your character’s most noticeable trait and most noticeable physical feature?
Sociable, impulsive Ukrainian tries her best 2 survive.
What do you know about your character that they don’t know yet?
Rivkele thinks she can kill someone else to save her life with no problem-- a Flores, in this case, according to the deal. If the terms are upheld. However, while she puts her own self-interest above others every day just by nature of her passive participation in the mob’s workings, she’s never willingly taken a life with her own hands in order to better hers. The distinction is a thin line but a real one, and she’s going to find herself a lot more morally conflicted than she anticipates, I think.
What are your character’s major flaws?
Her lack of self-control and her fear.
What would your character give their life for?
Almost nothing-- she’s a fighter, tooth-and-nail, to the point where self-sacrifice isn’t a viable option. The only situation I could think that would even come close would be if someone was holding a random innocent child at gunpoint and made her choose between her or the kid. And even then, in the back of her mind she’d be certain that the kid was in on it and it was all a setup.
What is your character’s greatest asset?
Her mind-- she’s sharp as a tack. And an associated asset would be her open-mindedness. Everybody’s got flaws, and she knows that, so she’s willing to get to know people from varied walks of life.
What would completely break your character?
Good question, good question. I think-- if she finally does manage to kill a Flores and it turns out that the whole thing was pointless and she can’t get out of the mob even then.
How does the image your character tries to project differ from the image they actually project?
Usually, what you see is what you get with Riv-- although in situations with new people, she tends to try to appear more apathetic than she actually is.
What is your character afraid of?
The main two would be being tortured & being trafficked.
Where would your character fall on a politeness/rudeness scale?
She doesn’t purposefully try to be rude but it sometimes does happen if she can’t control her brain-to-mouth filter, so I’d put her at a 6/10 leaning towards rude, but usually non-intentionally.
If your character could choose a different identity, who would they pick?
I don’t think she would-- though maybe herself, but with a few adjustments.
In what or whom is your character’s greatest faith in?
I think her greatest faith is in her own resilience.
What was the best thing in your character’s life?
When she was still on top of her game, she owned her own apartment-- owned, not rented-- that actually had a bedroom instead of just being a studio. It had a giant window, and wasn’t on the first floor, and hardwood floors. And for a span of about eight months she also had a dog, a huge black Newfoundland named Andrei. She loved that dog. She had to sell the him, and the apartment, but they were the best things in her life at one point.
What was the worst thing in your character’s life?
Essentially, everything that has happened since she had to sell her dog.
What is your character’s biggest nightmare?
Anybody finding out what she’s been tempted to do re: the Flores family.
What seemingly insignificant memories stuck with your character?
She remembers exactly which floorboards creaked in her house when she was growing up; she remembers the first song that was playing in the background when she won her first big pot (Fergalicious, from the tinny overhead speakers); she remembers the exact feeling of air on her face when biking down the big hill outside her house when she was a kid.
What is your character’s secret wish?
Her secret wish would be to go back and re-do the last half of her life again so she wouldn’t be one foot in the grave before she finally has some measure of freedom again.
What is your character’s greatest achievement?
Winning when the odds are against her. In general.
What is your character’s deepest regret?
That she never kept in contact with her older sister.
What is your character’s deepest disappointment?
That she’s 38 years old and her life still continues to suck, on the whole.
What is your character reluctant to tell people?
She doesn’t ever want to admit why she works for the mob, especially to other people in the mob, because she’s worried they’ll think she’ll turn out to be a traitor (especially because they’re not technically wrong??). Her allegiance is out of necessity and not loyalty, which she always avoids mentioning.
What is your character hiding from themselves?
I think deep down she wants to find people she can genuinely trust, but because that seems impossible, she buries it deep enough to pretend like she doesn’t care. On a separate note, she also struggles with guilt because she’s complicit in such shady dealings on a daily basis-- but also, she doesn’t want to take responsibility for her actions, even though technically it’s her choice to continue participating in the mob’s nonsense. So I’d say she’s hiding from dealing with all of those paradoxical feelings just by... ignoring & burying them, again.
What makes this character angry? What calms them?
Direct personal insults. If you try to belittle her, or try to pull one over on her like she’s an idiot, she will get pissed. Yelling usually calms her down, in that situation. She’ll eventually wear herself out. On a daily basis, though “calm” doesn’t really cross her mind except for maybe popping in some earbuds.
List situations in which your character would not have control over themselves.
Too many to list.
How strong is your character’s emotions? Controllable? Uncontrollable?
They’re pretty strong; 8/10.
What wakes your character up in the middle of the night?
The guy in the apartment on top of hers doing jumping jacks at all hours of the night, or maybe sirens of police cars rushing down the street. Otherwise, she sleeps like a rock.
Describe a recurring dream and/or nightmare.
She’s drowning and there’s absolutely nothing and no one nearby-- just dark black water as she sinks.
Describe your character’s family.
She hasn’t talked to her mother or her sister in years, so it’d be difficult to describe them now. In her memories, her mother is perpetually frowning, which nicely balances out her sister Rina’s laugh.
Name your character’s favourite person and why.
Father Patrick. He’s not at all what she would expect from a priest, which she finds terribly amusing.
How many friends does your character have?
I don’t know that she would consider herself to have any friends. “Friends” is a loaded word that implies some loyalty and level of mutual truthfulness, and I don’t think she ever feels like she’s in a place where she can reach that level of real connection. But she’s friendly with many, many people.
How many friends does your character want?
Again-- the general concept is asking a little too much of her, honestly.
How would a friend or close relative describe your character?
Loud. Scrappy. Clever, yet also incredibly stupid.
Who depends on your character? Why?
No one really depends on her? She’s pretty replaceable, in most regards. Which makes it even more annoying that they won’t just let her leave.
Who does your character most want to please? Why?
As obnoxious as it is to be worried about his opinion, she wants to make sure she doesn’t disappoint the Englishman. Among others. Just for her own safety’s sake.
How does your character feel about sex?
Sex is fun, but only with people she doesn’t know.
How does your character feel about romantic relationships?
Ew. Then they have to deal with your problems, and you have to deal with their problems when you already have your own... she’ll pass on that. She’s not the romantic type anyway.
If your character had to live in utter seclusion, what six items would they bring?
A warm blanket, a pack of playing cards, a pack of cigarettes, a fully-charged ipod mini, earbuds, and a bottle of vodka.
What is your character’s most noticeable trait and most noticeable physical feature?
Her incredibly tight red curls. Just a massive amount of hair.
How does your character feel about work?
Inescapable. Shrug emoji
Write one headcanon.
She was raised in a Jewish household, but as an adult, she isn’t super engaged in religion & she doesn’t keep kosher.
Write one additional thing about your character.
Riv’s first languages were Ukrainian and Yiddish-- and Ukrainian is pretty close to German, enough that she can get by in a German conversation. She learned Russian in school so she’s pretty fluent in that. Her English skills are so-so; she won’t be able have a deep, philosophical conversation in it, though.
