Pear, I'm having a problem with my writing, and I've just given it a name. I'm having "The Crown" problem. I love the Crown and I love reading about the show. One of the most common complaints about it is that the show is more interested in everyone around Elizabeth instead of Elizabeth herself. I'm having the same problem, for the same reason. My supporting characters are flawed, messy, ridiculous. My protagonist is overpowered, noble, and literally not human. How do you fix The Crown Problem?
I haven’t been keeping up with “The Crown,” so apologies in advance.
I think you have to figure out what kind of story you’re trying to tell. Nick Carraway of The Great Gatsby is the narrator’s focus, for all intents and purposes, the main character, but he’s actually not the main character at all. The story isn’t about him, but rather about the people surrounding him. He participates in the narrative, but he’s not the point.
So. What’s your point? What story are you telling? Who’s your focus? Are you telling the stories of these other characters as they deal with whatever your protagonist is doing? Or are you telling the protagonist’s story? Who has the most important emotional arc? Whose growth are you trying to highlight most? (I say most because everyone can have growth and have emotional arcs, but I want you to try to hone in on what I say all the time: whose story are you telling?) Maybe your protagonist is a filter to see these other characters’ stories through. Whether that’s true or not is up to you and your story.
If it is true, take a look at the structure of the story as you have it now. It might mean you need to make some changes to the way some scenes are focused or to the rest of your plot.
If it’s not true–if it really is this protagonists’s story you’re trying to tell–then you must make sure your plot is structured around that character. Look at your protagonist and find ways to bring them trouble. You say they’re overpowered–how can you make them vulnerable? They’re noble–what could make them messy? How does their nonhuman status influence the way they make decisions and the way they interact with others that could create plot and development for the protagonist as a character? Refocusing the story again may call for a restructuring, or maybe just slimming down some of the extra information and scenes with your supporting cast.
To be entirely honest, I have a hard time thinking that this problem is really a problem unless your story isn’t supposed to be about those characters. A little while ago we talked about static vs. dynamic characterization, and I think a story like this may be a great way to utilize that juxtaposition. You have the static, non-human character as a foil for the constant flux, change, and growth of the people around them, and I don’t think that’s a wrong way to structure a story. Again, you just have to know what story you’re trying to tell.
Where this does become a problem and calls for a hard yank in the right direction from the writer is when the story doesn’t fulfill the promises that it sets up. What I mean is that stories set up expectations about what the story is in the way it’s told, who the main character is, what the blurb on the back implies with its perspective, the scenes that are included; and if the writer has given the implication to the audience that this is a story about [this topic] but in truth they’re trying to showcase [that thing], the audience will feel it. It will feel wrong, it will feel out of focus, as though the story they were told to expect was only a side tangent.
Re-evaluate what your focus is and what you’re trying to achieve, and re-focus the story if it needs that. Without reading the story, I can’t tell you exactly what to pull or tweak or emphasize or slim down or whatever, so it’s up to you to decide that and decide what needs to change.
