If somebody is living a “normal” life, it’s seen as a positive. If somebody is living an “average” life, it’s seen indifferently. However…if somebody is living a “mediocre” life, then shame on that person. Normal, average, and mediocre all have the same meaning, yet their connotations are different across each word. Normal and average characters are relatable, but mediocre ones are looked down up with disgust. But when a critic is talking about a mediocre character, they’re not usually talking about the character’s upbringing, education, or work life. Mediocrity often means the character has no ambitions, dreams, or aspirations. Three-dimensional characters are the best kind and a character cannot be three-dimensional without at least one feasible goal or lifelong dream. That’s what we’ve been taught as writers because that’s what makes a story interesting to begin with.
But is that always the case? Do characters HAVE to have big dreams and aspirations? Commonsense would dictate that a character-driven story would mean having the MC pursue an end game. But what if the character had no dreams or aspirations at all? Sounds pretty boring, doesn’t it? Until you dig a little deeper into why that is. Maybe the character is so depressed that he can’t see a future for himself. Maybe he’s older and subscribes to the “don’t follow your passion” rhetoric that conservatives of his generation like to preach. Maybe he’s a younger child who’s been brainwashed by the school system into believing that STEM jobs are the only kind that matter. With the latter case, the brainwashed child in question has a goal, but not the one he originally intended. Does that count? Not if he’s going through the motions.
Mediocrity isn’t fun to read about, but the reasons behind it can be. In fact, the reasons alone could turn an otherwise dull character into someone to root for. Maybe the goal is to break the cycle of mediocrity and become his own person. Maybe the goal is to murder the people responsible for creating his dull situation. Wait a minute. Did that get a little too extreme for you? Is it really reasonable for a mundane character to go around stabbing people to death if they forced him into a life of boredom? Maybe it is. Maybe it isn’t. Either way, you’ve got a compelling story on your hand.
Conformity through brainwashing or creative suppression can be a powerful thing. That’s why millennials and Gen Z people tend to dislike Mike Rowe, because he’s using his platform to encourage capitalistic conformity. Conforming to society will make you more presentable in the eyes of the CEO’s writing your checks. Okay, Boomer, enough is enough.
While most people do want to break the chains of capitalism and tell Mike Rowe to suck a big fat one, there are legitimate slackers in society. I’m sure you, my lovely audience, have gone to school with a few of these guys. They don’t do homework. They spend their time in class shooting spitballs and fucking around. They mouth off to the teacher when they’re receiving genuine criticism. While these students don’t make up an entire generation nor can they not be saved, they do exist and they can often be interesting characters to read about.
It’s easy to tell this lackadaisical student to “get a job” and “stop screwing around”. But have you ever been inside the mind of one of these students? Maybe the sour attitude is a cover-up for suppressed trauma. Maybe he doesn’t feel like there’s any hope for him after all. Or maybe he just wants to play videogames and fuck the world. Even the latter of those choices can be made into three-dimensional character work if an author knows what the hell he’s doing.
You’re probably reading all of this and are digging into the recesses of your mind trying to find examples of mediocre characters that are fun to read about. You want to find the difference between being lost in a dream due to aspirations and lost in a dream because he doesn’t want to wake up and face the world. Not a book, per se, but the 1994 comedy Clerks is a good example of this. Dante works at the Quick Stop Convenience Store and has no plans of bettering his life, yet he constantly complains about the situation he’s in. His friend Randal works at RST Video Store and doesn’t mind slacking off every once and a while as long as he gets to anger the customers.
Two mediocre workers, different clashing mindsets. They have little goals here and there. Dante wants to get back together with his ex-girlfriend Caitlin while still dating a superior woman in Veronica. He wants to play hockey on the rooftop. He wants to go to a funeral to say goodbye to one of his exes. But are any of these goals really going to get him out of his depressive funk? No fucking way. Even if he somehow achieves these goals, he’ll go right back to where he was the next day: tedium and shitty customers. Dante and Randal have painfully ordinary lives, yet Clerks is considered a cult classic and Kevin Smith’s best movie of all time.
But if you’re going to intentionally write a mediocre character and have him lead the charge, his uncaring attitude should mesh well with his environment. If the character is a humanoid dragon barbarian fighting for his life in a dark fantasy kingdom with demons, devils, and zombies chewing on his flesh, that MC cannot afford to be mediocre for even a second. Yes, Gary-Stus exist, but in a fantasy or sci-fi setting, they’re frowned upon. Speculative fiction is known for having colorful worlds where the author’s imagination runs wild. Crystal castles in the sky, fireball magic spells, temptress witches, electromantic dragons, sneaky goblins, they’ve got it all! If a character is mediocre in an above-average setting, then that’s a problem.
But…what if a character is mediocre in a BELOW-average setting? What if the fantasy world has turned to absolute shit and the character gives into his urges to give up all hope? It doesn’t even have to be a nuclear apocalypse, no, no, no. It could be worldwide blight. It could be constant darkness. It could be monsters and zombies overrunning everything. Or it could be an actual world of shit, because there’s nowhere else to go to the bathroom. Losing hope and giving up easily would be perfectly understandable in a below-average hellscape. At that point, the character has two choices: give up entirely and submit to the Lovecraftian negativity, or find smaller goals to achieve if only to make life a little more bearable than it was before.
By choosing the latter of those two scenarios, your characters cease to be mediocre. An example of this is a 2009 movie called Zombieland. As the title would suggest, zombies have taken over the world and are chewing on humans like bubblegum. Fuck hope, because it’ll never come back no matter how many shotgun shells are popped off at these undead cannibals. The world will never return to its normal state. So what do the characters do? They cope. They don’t solve everything. They cope. Woody Harrelson’s character wants to find Twinkies and eat them like he was a zombie himself. The two girls in the zombie-escaping team want to go to a theme park and party it up. The main character? He just wants to see his family again. By having these little goals to keep them company in an otherwise shitty world, a run-of-the-mill comedy has become a three-dimensional story that deserves all the praise it gets.
In case it wasn’t apparent by now, mediocrity itself isn’t good or bad (that’s the very definition of the word). It’s what an author does with it that counts the most. Hell, it can even apply to real life, even in a nonconformist setting. It doesn’t have to be all about brainwashing and Boomerisms. Sometimes those big dreams aren’t what they appear to be when examined further. I had lots of dreams when I was younger, but didn’t realize how damaging those pursuits will be until I grew older. I wanted to be a pro-wrestler, but that would involve exhausting exercise, injuries, tedious travel, and bullying from the higher ups. I wanted to be a heavy metal singer, but that would also involve tedious travel, along with clashing egos, heavy criticism, potential drug and alcohol use, meaningless sex, and yes, sometimes injuries. I wanted to be a screenwriter, but that would involve traveling to Hollywood and potentially being molested by Harvey Weinstein or someone just like him.
After all of those options, the one I decided was least detrimental to both my mental and physical health was the life of an author. I can still indulge in my creative fantasies. I can still tell Mike Rowe to get fucked. I can still be a productive person. And above all else, no injuries! Have you ever heard about an author who broke his neck while typing a novel? No, and you never will. Maybe mental injuries could be more prevalent with worldwide criticism and general trolling, but that’s not enough to keep me from pursing my dreams of being an author. I live a normal life without submitting to mediocrity. I guess I could be a three-dimensional character in someone’s novel. Or I could just do a complete self-insert, one of the two.
