It’s hard to treat princesses as anything other than plot devices because then you’d be taking away time from the main cast.
First, some basic definitions:
Personality is who a character is, in terms of how they act and behave towards others. Kindness, friendliness, understanding, or aloofness are some of the words we can use to describe a character’s personality.
Character on the other hand, is what a character does. What they do, what they want, and how they react is how we define their character. In a narrative sense, the best way to build and define a character is to present them with a challenge or a conflict to overcome, so that they can learn and grow as a character.
A static character is a character whom doesn’t change to any major degree with the evolving narrative. A dynamic character is the opposite, in that they evolve and change with the narrative. The mane six are dynamic characters, in that they have changed with the narrative to varying degrees.
Although others have asked me to define personalities as well, I have decided not to, as I feel it is outside the bounds of the core points that I’m trying to make. In summary, yes personalities can be static and dynamic too, since they are tied in character as much as character is tied into personality.
Where am I going with this? As much as I like Cadance, I have to admit that she’s a static character, in that she’s the same character that we met in A Canterlot Wedding. I think that she has a good personality, but that doesn’t excuse the fact that she’s a static character.
I hear that there is a book that explains her origins, but all that does is give her character more depth. What do I mean by this? Depth comes from character development, which can happen during, before, or after when the narrative is set. I consider a character to be static if they don’t majorly change when the narrative is set. Yes, Cadance got some further development, thus more depth, but that happened before the narrative, thus I still consider her static.
The thing is, now that I think about it, Celestia is exactly the same in that regard. She too is a pretty static character, even though she is endowed with a good personality like Cadance, and even with that character history episode that a lot of us want, she’ll still be a static character, though one with a bit more depth than before.
I’m not saying that it’s a bad thing to be a static character with a lot of depth, but people have to realise that a setting can get stale if the characters don’t grow in some way.
What do we all think?
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