SMART CHARACTERS - Terrible Writing Advice

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Terrible Writing Advice

Terrible Writing Advice

Күн бұрын

Let Audible help you discover new ways to laugh, be inspired, or be entertained. New members can try it free for 30 days. Visit www.audible.com/terriblewriti... or text terriblewritingadvice to 500-500.
Be smart by watching my video on writing smart characters! From scientists, professors, to even mad scientists, writers need not fear having to appear smart. In fact, smug ego will more than cover for that. The rest is just cheap tricks. Why write smart when you can outsmart your audience instead?
TIMESTAMPS
00:00 Intro to Smart Characters
01:05 You don't need to be smart to write smart
02:04 Telling rather than showing
03:05 Use big words
04:02 Technobabble
04:46 Exposition puppets
06:05 Doing actual research
07:43 Mad Science!
09:05 Reed Richards is useless and Doctor Doom isn't much better
09:50 Eccentric intelligent characters
10:35 Smart characters that cheat the plot
11:00 So "smart" yet the villains are always ahead
11:34 Forget to write a character
12:04 Sponsorship Wars
15:07- Outro
Terrible Writing Advice merchandise has arrived! Get it here: standard.tv/collections/terri...
SOCIAL MEDIA LINKS
My Website: jpbeaubien.com/
My Facebook: / authorjpbeaubien
My Twitter: / josephpbeaubien
My Goodreads: / 15180667.j_p_beaubien
Buy my book!: mybook.to/AeonLegionBook1
CREDITS
Music: "Quirky Dog", "Monkeys Spinning Monkeys", and "Son of a Rocket" by Kevin MacLeod (incompetech.com)
Licensed under Creative Commons: By Attribution 3.0 License
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Hide and Seek by Shane Ivers - www.silvermansound.com Licensed under Creative Commons: By Attribution 3.0 License creativecommons.org/licenses/b...
Sound Effects by Epidemic Sound: epidemicsound.com/

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@TerribleWritingAdvice
@TerribleWritingAdvice Жыл бұрын
JP’s Inner Greed here. Let Audible help you discover new ways to laugh, be inspired, or be entertained. New members can try it free for 30 days. Visit www.audible.com/terriblewritingadvice or text terriblewritingadvice to 500-500. Greed’s Audiobook Recommendations I still recommend World War Z since it has an all star cast. Seriously the guy who plays the original Tron does a voice-over as does Mark Hamill. I guess Max Brooks knows everyone in Hollywood. I also recommend Dresden Files. James Marsters gives an excellent performance that elevates the already good urban fantasy book series. As much as it pains me to admit, the General is right. The Ciaphas Cain audio books are quite good with multiple talented narrators. A strong recommendation for anyone who likes Warhammer 40000. For some non fiction, I recommend So You’ve Been Publicly Shamed by Jon Ronson and narrated by him as well. JP will need it in the future, I’m sure. I did also enjoy the Expanse Series even if it did kind of lurch over the finish line. Then again, I’ve seen far worse endings to be sure.
@pyeitme508
@pyeitme508 Жыл бұрын
Bruh 🤣
@WikiHL
@WikiHL Жыл бұрын
...inner?
@The_Masquerade_of_Evilhos
@The_Masquerade_of_Evilhos Жыл бұрын
Lol
@draketheduelist
@draketheduelist Жыл бұрын
Careful, Inner Greed. Even _you're_ not ready to take on the sheer power of Games Workshop's greed...
@aaronfield7899
@aaronfield7899 Жыл бұрын
PLEEEEEEAAASE TALK ABOUT SUSPENSE!!!!!
@trinaq
@trinaq Жыл бұрын
One of my pet peeves is when the smart character, usually a scientist, babbles on about a theory, and another character will just blankly stare at them, and reply "Ugh, in English, please?" It was funny once upon a time, but now reads as clichéd.
@Breakaway-ic5gj
@Breakaway-ic5gj Жыл бұрын
It can be funny if they instead quickly cut them off saying "English, four eyes!" and if Solid Snake says it
@Albino_Basilisk
@Albino_Basilisk Жыл бұрын
What if one day, the smart character replies with “I am speaking English” then rambles about the history of the English language
@youtubeuniversity3638
@youtubeuniversity3638 Жыл бұрын
Response I want: "...that was English. And also your station is one where you should know all of those terms and more. Will I have to file the paperwork for your immediate dismissal from service?"
@MortMe0430
@MortMe0430 Жыл бұрын
It could be revived a bit if the techno-expositing character, without batting an eye, switches to explaining in Old or Middle English (or as close as possible where scientific words don't have translations). Complete with Beowulf-esque background music.
@whensomethingcriesagain
@whensomethingcriesagain Жыл бұрын
What I usually hate is techspeak that just throws in random scientific terms or misuses them to string them together as a justification. That annoys the hell out of me since I can actually understand what all that means and it comes off as really distracting. The one exception I really know of is Kill la Kill, where whenever Inumuta says something overly long and scientific whatever he's saying actually adds up, more or less
@Duothimir
@Duothimir Жыл бұрын
"But I don't want to cure cancer. I want to turn people into dinosaurs."
@cam4636
@cam4636 Жыл бұрын
Valid!
@victordeluca7360
@victordeluca7360 Жыл бұрын
Is this a Killing Bites reference?
@jimluebke3869
@jimluebke3869 Жыл бұрын
All you need to do to turn people into dinosaurs is make them notice that heir great-grandparents were right about the facts of life after all.
@orangeapples
@orangeapples Жыл бұрын
@@victordeluca7360 I thought it was Amazing Spider-Man.
@MasonGreenWeed
@MasonGreenWeed Жыл бұрын
Dr Ferdinand: 👀
@tskmaster3837
@tskmaster3837 Жыл бұрын
"The military doesn't need physics and chemistry. It needs rockets and explosives!" Perfection, utter perfection.
@julietfischer5056
@julietfischer5056 Жыл бұрын
A lot of non-military people think that way. Soldiers should be roided-up, rock-stupid, thugs barely capable of forming a sentence, backed by extreme firepower. Strategy? Tactics? Knowing how stuff works? That's for nerds and wimps.
@joshcrackedboooi2392
@joshcrackedboooi2392 Жыл бұрын
the random Jewish person in the shower at one point in history
@marley7868
@marley7868 Жыл бұрын
I mean he's not wrong over hyping into experimental tech can be worse than just getting alot of guns and explosives even if there subpar
@marocat4749
@marocat4749 Жыл бұрын
Ha ha. , not like you ned psysics or chemistry to make that more deadly.
@eisgnom7383
@eisgnom7383 Жыл бұрын
@@marley7868 rockets and explosions were once the experimental tech
@poweroffriendship2.0
@poweroffriendship2.0 Жыл бұрын
*Fun Fact:* If a smart anime character finally found a solution to solve the problem, their glasses glows brighter than the thousand suns.
@starmaker75
@starmaker75 Жыл бұрын
Or in The case of jojo, one piece and lupin the third make everyone be really dumb and smart at the same time
@panlis6243
@panlis6243 Жыл бұрын
As someone who wears glasses, I can confirm that adjusting them makes me suddenly come up with an idea
@MrDj232
@MrDj232 Жыл бұрын
Except Aizen. He ditched his glasses during his villain reveal.
@jackmanleblanc2518
@jackmanleblanc2518 Жыл бұрын
@@MrDj232 He was just so smart that he ascended beyond glasses and switched to contacts.
@MusicoftheDamned
@MusicoftheDamned Жыл бұрын
@@jackmanleblanc2518 Given he eventually put on a body condom that also covered his eyes before essentially getting magical lasik surgery that changed them, this checks out.
@leontriestoart
@leontriestoart Жыл бұрын
How to write smart characters: have them refer to animals by their full latin names for literally no reason whatsoever
@brunop.8745
@brunop.8745 Жыл бұрын
Don't forget to have them say sodium chloride when referring to table salt, even tho table salt isn't made of just those 2 chemicals because it'd be inedible then
@johnnylee782
@johnnylee782 Жыл бұрын
@@brunop.8745 hey take that back I like Jimmy neutron.... No wait your right he is a smart-ass
@chimera9818
@chimera9818 Жыл бұрын
I want one to actually call some of the correct scientific names (that ones is literally:gorilla gorilla gorilla)
@snekysneks
@snekysneks Жыл бұрын
If they are super into animals it works. I love knowing the scientific/botanical names of my favorite animals and plants. but then again liking animals counts as a reason...
@nightcollapse
@nightcollapse Жыл бұрын
Takes me back to role-playing when people would say canis lupus and use the thesaurus alllll the time No shade bless those rpers
@kaleenar963
@kaleenar963 Жыл бұрын
I hate it when Smart Characters will be like “There’s only a 32% chance we survive this, I did the math!” instead of using their vast intellect to actually get them out of the situation.
@benrex7775
@benrex7775 Жыл бұрын
For one how do they quantify that number and why do they always succeed no matter how low that number is?
@carrot7868
@carrot7868 Жыл бұрын
@@benrex7775 32% is not that low, to be honest.
@benrex7775
@benrex7775 Жыл бұрын
​@@carrot7868 If that happens once then yes. If that happens 10 times in a row we have a 0.001% chance.
@carrot7868
@carrot7868 Жыл бұрын
@@benrex7775 randomness can be strange.
@benrex7775
@benrex7775 Жыл бұрын
@@carrot7868 The problem is not randomness. The problem is that the author tries to make a person appear smart by making him say smart sounding stuff. And if we take the smart guy serious then we end up with unrealistic situations.
@axelprino
@axelprino Жыл бұрын
I love it when one of the characters just assumes that the really smart scientist will surely have the answer to a question and the scientist response is something along the lines of "I'm an astrophysicist, why would I know about ancient alien death tongues?"
@arianewinter4266
@arianewinter4266 Жыл бұрын
Thing that happens to me regularly. I am not a genius or super smart scientist, but have a good memory and am well read. In many cases I can offer something relevant if asked about a certain pool of topics..... But that leads to people mock me as all knowing and being scandalised when I do not know something about a topic I never claimed to have any level of knowlage of..... How leads me knowing about poisons or mental disorders to people assuming I am the one to ask questions about physics or promi travia?.... It astonishes myself what my brain can unearth at times but expecting someone with lots of knowlage in one topic to be all-knowing is stupid... Sometimes the clever one is not decided by virtue but by process of elimination.... And it is more often the case then I would like.... Being good at not falling for bs and predict how a story will go also does not mean one is a genius and master strategist. Way to many different skills and fields of knowlage get indiscriminately thrown togeather and theb"clever"one is supposed to excel in all of them without any rhyme or reason.....
@taviebrown2271
@taviebrown2271 Жыл бұрын
'Dammit Jim I'm not a Doctor! I mean, I am but not that kind!'- Treasure Island
@deen7530
@deen7530 Жыл бұрын
I have a running joke with one of my characters where whenever she's in trouble she goes to her lawyer mother for legal advice, only for her mom to be like "For the last time, sweetie, I'm not a criminal justice lawyer, I'm a COPYRIGHT lawyer!"
@axelprino
@axelprino Жыл бұрын
@@deen7530 as someone who's mom is a lawyer I find that hilarious, specially because that stuff does happen irl
@jackbaxter2223
@jackbaxter2223 Жыл бұрын
Ironically, South Park did this really well in their parody of The Core. Cartman gets Randy on the team because he needs 'a scientist' and then he tells him to set up some sort of electrical system (I can't remember what it was). Randy: "What? I don't know how to do that." Cartman: "You're the scientist!" Randy: "I'm a geologist!"
@silverdust4197
@silverdust4197 Жыл бұрын
Fun fact : the very first actor who played the doctor , when shown the Tardis , he asked the crew to show him what each button would do , because kids would notice if he was inconsistent with them (Kids are actually pretty smart for things that have there attention than they are given credit for )
@GrndAdmiralThrawn
@GrndAdmiralThrawn Жыл бұрын
I feel like a way to show the character’s absent-mindedness would be for everything to just be labeled. Like, the scientist/engineer knows WHAT they need to do, but they just can’t keep straight WHICH button does it.
@yeeoof1995
@yeeoof1995 Жыл бұрын
i did not know that. makes me appreciate hartnell even more
@battlesheep2552
@battlesheep2552 Жыл бұрын
I think there could have been a case for the controls to not be consistent to show how time travel isn't exactly a trivial thing.
@julietfischer5056
@julietfischer5056 Жыл бұрын
I think some were labelled so he wouldn't forget. Retakes were few and far between in those days.
@marocat4749
@marocat4749 Жыл бұрын
Yep, like kids media can neglect a lot of worldbuilding details, but what gets attention, kid are the worst critics.
@mistertwister2000
@mistertwister2000 Жыл бұрын
“In other words, the character doesn’t actually have to be smart, we just have to make them seem smart to the audience.” That’s . . . actually great advice? “Got all that? Good! Now throw it all away because we’re gonna cheat and use shortcuts” Ah, there it is.
@cringeconnoisseur6037
@cringeconnoisseur6037 Жыл бұрын
That is every single one of his videos lol. Reels you in with useful information. minutes in you realize you've been had, but still stay because you realize it's a how NOT TO guide.
@txorimorea3869
@txorimorea3869 Жыл бұрын
That is an accurate description of Chat GPT3, only the clueless believe it gives great answers and not just the equivalent of a compilation of 10 google searches. That AI is only an expert at gaslighting n00bs.
@abderianagelast7868
@abderianagelast7868 Жыл бұрын
@@txorimorea3869 It's not even gaslighting, that would require intentionality. GPT is just putting words together based on statistics, it doesn't have the capacity to deceive anyone because it doesn't actually know what the words mean.
@rxndomfxndom7405
@rxndomfxndom7405 Жыл бұрын
​@@cringeconnoisseur6037 Agreed
@johnynoway9127
@johnynoway9127 10 ай бұрын
basically Batman. Everyone around him has to be stupid for hik to seem smart
@Raph___A
@Raph___A Жыл бұрын
How to write a smart character: • Have them wear glasses • Have them always inventing machines • Make them the physically weakest of their team • Love triangle consisting of their smart crush and a hot guy/girl pretending to yearn for them
@patrickbuckley7259
@patrickbuckley7259 Жыл бұрын
Its weird but every smart character love triangle I can think of has a smart girl pretending to like the guy, or only interested in him as friend, while the hot girl of average intellect genuinely likes him but is afraid to admit it. Either cause she's shallow and afraid of what others might think, or more commonly because she's afraid she's not smart enough to maintain his interest, (or that she thinks they won't have anything in common) and thinks the other girl is a better pick for him.
@Curooror
@Curooror Жыл бұрын
An overwhelming majority of scientists don't focus on physical things, so making them jacked wouldn't really make sense.
@trinaq
@trinaq Жыл бұрын
Yep, that's typically how the majority of them are written. I'd love to see a subversion of this stereotype in the future.
@RIlianP
@RIlianP Жыл бұрын
The glasses must be at least size too large so they have to constantly push them up, also physically weakest but have visually great physique, especially the females, and bonus points for lolies.
@pianotm
@pianotm Жыл бұрын
Make them mispronounce "gigawatts".
@77professional
@77professional Жыл бұрын
Remember you can have 3 PHDs but common sense is still optional.
@What-he5pr
@What-he5pr Жыл бұрын
PhD is about obedience.
@sophiedowney1077
@sophiedowney1077 Жыл бұрын
To be fair, once you study quantum physics, chemistry, and/or cellular biology/biochemistry, common sense becomes more of a hindrance. Quantum physics doesn't work in a way our brains evolved to understand, cell biology is a system engineered by RNJesus, and chemistry is just weird. Also you don't start studying this really hard stuff when you have the intelligence to make more money in an easier field unless there's already something wrong with you. (Speaking as someone studying biochemistry and planning to get a PhD in it) That said your point is completely valid.
@louisduarte8763
@louisduarte8763 Жыл бұрын
As I read on a Demotivational Poster with Deadpool in it, "COMMON SENSE: actually so rare now, it's a goddamned superpower."
@rvawildcardwolf2843
@rvawildcardwolf2843 Жыл бұрын
@@sophiedowney1077 I love this comment. Actually added to the video a lot. Thank you!
@icecreamhero2375
@icecreamhero2375 Жыл бұрын
There are different types of intelligence. That is very true.
@Longshanks1690
@Longshanks1690 Жыл бұрын
If late Game of Thrones taught me anything, it’s that the key to creating a smart character is having all the other characters say over and over and over again how dangerous and intelligent the smart character is often, and especially, when all the evidence in the actual story contradicts this idea. You don’t have to worry about ACTUALLY crafting a strategic, cunning, meticulous planner when you can just have everyone else say that’s what they are. Much more straightforward!
@user-co3uc8vt7e
@user-co3uc8vt7e Жыл бұрын
I learned the very same thing from Legend of Galactic Heroes.
@What-he5pr
@What-he5pr Жыл бұрын
Lol
@samg.5165
@samg.5165 Жыл бұрын
They did my boy Tyrion wrong
@thabangpatiko9869
@thabangpatiko9869 Жыл бұрын
Who needs show dont tell
@williamerickson520
@williamerickson520 Жыл бұрын
I think it was supposed to be part of Tyrion's arc to show that he's not as smart as he thinks he is.
@tonymaverickzane6899
@tonymaverickzane6899 Жыл бұрын
How to write smart characters: Make everyone else dumber than dirt on a dirty sea.
@unicorntomboy9736
@unicorntomboy9736 Жыл бұрын
Tony Stark comes to mind
@RJLbwb
@RJLbwb Жыл бұрын
otherwise known as the Batman stupidity field lol
@sophiedowney1077
@sophiedowney1077 Жыл бұрын
Like Idiocracy!
@zappodude7591
@zappodude7591 Жыл бұрын
Every Isekai protagonist:
@thabangpatiko9869
@thabangpatiko9869 Жыл бұрын
Zappodude more like raising of shield hero
@carlrood4457
@carlrood4457 Жыл бұрын
What's really annoying is when the "smart" guy becomes dumb because the plot needs to happen.
@audreyharris7643
@audreyharris7643 Жыл бұрын
Oh yeah
@youtubeuniversity3638
@youtubeuniversity3638 8 ай бұрын
At very least explain it with Field Confoundment (I. E. "I'm an astrophysicist not a xenobiologist why would I know this‽") or have moments beforehand where lower stakes related issues come up and the character is shown to be on some shaky ground.
@pickyphysicsstudent201
@pickyphysicsstudent201 Жыл бұрын
Also be aware of "Sherlock Syndrome" where the smart character knows everything in every field and is a walking encyclopedia of omnipotence. He speaks 7 languages, understands the history of typewriters, can identify references in classical music, can spot flaws in a car engine, is an expert in multiple martial art fighting styles and hundreds more unrelated fields of study. Despite the fact that smart people tend to be smart only in a select field.
@julietfischer5056
@julietfischer5056 Жыл бұрын
To be fair, there was a brief time in the 19th Century when a sufficiently disciplined and intelligent person could be familiar with nearly the entire corpus of knowledge. Doyle also had Holmes consult encyclopedias and collect information. (He was also helping invent the detective genre, and it shows.) Then the world really got cranking and technical and scientific knowledge increased to the point that nobody could keep up.
@mer_acle8101
@mer_acle8101 Жыл бұрын
Can't say I disagree exactly, even though "Study in Scarlet" basically starts with Watson noting down with how much commonplace stuff Holmes doesn't know (eg. that the earth rotates around the sun) Anything that cannot possibly be of interest to his crime solving is not worth remembering to him, he specializes, though in a large field. I'm not definitely sure what I think, I'm going to be careful and say, well, maybe it's possible for Sherlock. It probably sounds more than it is, for his way of thinking, this might be easy to keep in mind simultaneously, just thinking a bit I could name numerous things that aren't my designated field but that I know a lot about. Not saying I'm like Sherlock, lol, I'm just a nerd. Just meaning, I didn't have that problem when looking at Sherlock bc it just felt like he spend his whole life expanding and learning more knowledge which was immediately boosted by the skill of deduction. Still something to be wary of though, for sure. The more you specialize, the less time for different fields.
@juliaturk7054
@juliaturk7054 Жыл бұрын
Not exactly. People who ONLY have "book smarts" tend to hyper specialize in one field. However, there are different kinds of intelligence. The smartest people I've ever known weren't scientists or professors (in fact, those people in my experience were really thick in the head over most things, even basic things. Also they tended to be extremely arrogant, though not always). Rather, they were pretty "normal" people. Blue collar workers, factory workers, etc. They knew so many things and were able to think incredibly deeply, and would say genuinely profound things, yet they were able to explain their thoughts and knowledge to anyone, even children, in ways anybody could understand. They also, most of the time, didn't really think they were that smart and would be genuinely confused that everybody else didn't know the things they knew, or considered the more deep and complex ideas and ideologies they had, in a humble way of course.
@abadminecraftplayer
@abadminecraftplayer Жыл бұрын
Omniscience means all knowing, if that's what you meant
@renatocorvaro6924
@renatocorvaro6924 Жыл бұрын
A FUCKING BOOMERANG
@thomanator1000
@thomanator1000 Жыл бұрын
Remember: if you want to write someone smart, you dont have to be smart. You have all the time you need to come up with a plan and then have the smart character do so in as little time as you need.
@ShadeSlayer1911
@ShadeSlayer1911 Жыл бұрын
I find that a lot of writers are too lazy to even research though. Like if they're writing a story that takes place in space, they won't even bother to actually look up the actual scale of the universe. They'll portray the moon as being like a mile from the Earth, when in reality it's so much further, and they won't even bother to look up that distance to correct themselves.
@mer_acle8101
@mer_acle8101 Жыл бұрын
Kaz Brekker approves of this comment
@spacenoodle8207
@spacenoodle8207 Жыл бұрын
You kinda still need to be smart, you just have an advantage of not having a time limit and having the ability to problem-solve backwards, by coming up with great ideas first and then making sure the plot provides your characters with opportunities to actually use these ideas.
@headphonesaxolotl
@headphonesaxolotl 7 ай бұрын
@@ShadeSlayer1911 I come up with basic explanations like "Ships are fast, so going between planets is akin to a 20-hour plane trip, which is why the cast doesn't leave the main planet too often because it's really expensive to explore the universe"
@ShadeSlayer1911
@ShadeSlayer1911 7 ай бұрын
@@headphonesaxolotl that's fine. You don't need to explain in detail the universe and how it works, if that sort of thing doesn't come up often.
@rowboat3940
@rowboat3940 Жыл бұрын
If your making a tactical genius, there’s only three options: A: Make every other officer incompetent B: Have them make guesses about the enemy (That are always right) C: Have them perform crazy, risky, and esoteric tactics (that of course, always work)
@scragar
@scragar Жыл бұрын
D: They somehow have some amazing understanding of how the enemy thinks which justifies why they do weird things that win even though it would be a bad move under most circumstances(see Empty Fort Strategy which works only if you're already a renown genius and people second guess their own actions).
@DonVigaDeFierro
@DonVigaDeFierro Жыл бұрын
Ah, General Mary Tzu.
@konstantinosnikolakakis8125
@konstantinosnikolakakis8125 Жыл бұрын
Grand Admiral Thrawn from Star Wars is the best military genius character! Read the books!
@djdragondrawer9339
@djdragondrawer9339 Жыл бұрын
*glares at "saga of tanya the evil"*
@karolnowak6423
@karolnowak6423 Жыл бұрын
@@scragar or E, steal enemy's rules (People;s Booke) but still have a wrench thown because of unconventional tactics used by enemy (see Artemis Fowl and troll by LEP)
@MrDj232
@MrDj232 Жыл бұрын
Smart people can't always teach. Sometimes their intelligence is more talent than effort, and it's pretty hard to walk others through solving a problem when you can just look at it and jump to the answer.
@Eric6761
@Eric6761 Жыл бұрын
My teacher once said: "You can be the best on School but giving a class is hard"
@karolnowak6423
@karolnowak6423 Жыл бұрын
Yeah I mean look at Snape in HP series. Is he a master in Potions and an inventor of spells? Yes. Does he teach efficiently usually to all? Not really. Unless you have the actual notes of his (6th book).
@mer_acle8101
@mer_acle8101 Жыл бұрын
YESS! Try teaching someone your native language without saying "Idk, that's just how it is" Or generally try teaching someone with a different way of thinking, they will not understand why the solution is obvious and logical to you, and you will struggle to break it down because to you it's one of the baselines.
@ari3903
@ari3903 Жыл бұрын
@@Eric6761 Yup, smart people can give you basic simplifications and summarization in a conversation, but they are just as regular as anyone else when it comes to teaching.
@Newfiecat
@Newfiecat Жыл бұрын
And it can come down to lots of other things, too. People skills. Confidence. Hard to teach when you're shy and everyone is staring at you. Or just presentation skills! I once had a horrible teacher who was a brilliant mathematician. He mumbled in a monotone and stood in front of everything he wrote on the board at all times.
@MagWasMinimal
@MagWasMinimal Жыл бұрын
I once heard of two pretty neat way to make to make a character seem smart: 1. Have then solve a complex problem with a simple solution (or simplifying something very complex things to the point even the dumbest of doors could understand it in some way.) Or 2: have them bring up the many problems a very simple idea could lead to by analyzing it,like yeah blowing up the castle's door might be a easy way to get in but what about the price of all the gunpowder they'll gonna need? The structural damage that might lead the whole thing falling down on them or the fact they can just enter trough open sewer system that is two steps around that corner,which then leads back to point 1.
@G102Y5568
@G102Y5568 Жыл бұрын
When I write (I'm just a hobbyist) I have the character go through multiple solutions in their head and explain why he chose one over the others. This also helps address plotholes, for example, "why doesn't the character just assassinate the bad guy in his sleep?" "Because he has the nobles on his payroll and if he tried and failed, he'd get the death penalty."
@marocat4749
@marocat4749 Жыл бұрын
I saw the tip of, do your rsearch how you could do that plan reasonable , and then have it a character say lik its easy. But seeing through complex nonsense pointing out a simple solution works too i guess.
@ineednochannelyoutube2651
@ineednochannelyoutube2651 Жыл бұрын
@@G102Y5568 There's also charaterization to factor in. "Why Does he not realize this woman is obviously manipulating him?" Because he's actually as dumb as a rock. "Why does this lord not make an alliance with the commander of the gate, and just engage in costly assault?" Because his pride refuses him to ally with a man who rose up from the common folk. Even smart characters can have well characterized blind spots.
@G102Y5568
@G102Y5568 Жыл бұрын
​@@ineednochannelyoutube2651 Absolutely.
@victordeluca7360
@victordeluca7360 Жыл бұрын
Alice from MGQ is point 2) through and through
@_decaysea
@_decaysea Жыл бұрын
Don't forget the "mastermind" archetype, who can be written as smart by simply handing them a copy of the script so they know everything ahead of time! It doesn't matter if there's no way they could have learned about some of those things with the instruments at their disposal, and you certainly don't have to show them gathering evidence or thinking anything through. Just let them be mysteriously vague about how they've solved everything and handwave away that audience skepticism by insulting their intelligence.
@Eric6761
@Eric6761 Жыл бұрын
L from death note? Or any detective?
@dimitriosdrossidis9633
@dimitriosdrossidis9633 Жыл бұрын
@@Eric6761 really? Nothing against this assertion, but my immediate guess was kira from death note. He feels way more like a sentient script, than a character, the longer this goes on
@Eric6761
@Eric6761 Жыл бұрын
@@dimitriosdrossidis9633 i just talked about L because he would be the most recognizable as a detective but yeah Kira is waaaayy too conscious about script the longer it goes on
@karolnowak6423
@karolnowak6423 Жыл бұрын
And then you have Artemis Fowl which actually does steal rules of the enemy ( the Peoples' Booke) but still has troll and Holly having still an acorn is possesion (1st something against the LEP rule and 2nd as something he did personally interfere and put a precaution in form of of freshly made concrete in cell, which proved not enough) thrown a wrench in his plans but still succeed due to badass subordinates xD
@icecreamhero2375
@icecreamhero2375 Жыл бұрын
@@Eric6761 Nah L is just really good at Picking up Clues he isn't that OP. Also Light killed him.
@AlienFriend
@AlienFriend Жыл бұрын
"The only impressive thing in terms of size is their own ego." *I never knew how much I would need to hear this line.*
@oboretaiwritingch.2077
@oboretaiwritingch.2077 Жыл бұрын
One of the most grating way (and obviously Mary Sue-ish) to write a smart character is having an actual career scientist/teacher/researcher/wtv try to deny said character's idea, only to have the character simply go "you're wrong, I'm smarter than you and therefore automatically right. I don't need to explain myself how, I just know better by being the protagonist". AKA the "Batman can outsmart everyone including literal omniscient characters just by the fact that he's Batman, but also let's ignore how he's not smart enough to solve Gotham's corruption".
@longphan7656
@longphan7656 Жыл бұрын
hell yeah, i hate this so much about the Justice League as a whole. They have to purposefully nerf everyone to suck up Batman. Superman in his own series is extremely smart, can create freaking robots, machines and gear that help him combat outer world threats. Flash can think, process and learn things super fast in his own story,... But when Batman appear, Superman is nothing more than a potentially emotionally unstable brute of the team, and the flash is nothing more than the punch line/clown of the Justice League. This is why ill never take DC, JL and batman as a whole seriously, because they need to nerf everyone else in order to make Batman look badass The dude who can put a collar on the entire JL, stand face to face with DarkSeid and solve some 5th dimensional murder case or something cant even think of a solution to lock up the villains in Gotham for good
@rvawildcardwolf2843
@rvawildcardwolf2843 Жыл бұрын
The usual copout to that is that Batman is brilliant but also very damaged and uses his "crusade" to justify his hobbies rather than truly devoting himself to his stated goals. He won't solve systemic corruption because he wants to solve metahuman mysteries and beat people up, not sit at a desk compiling airtight cases to get corrupt judges off the bench or extensively trace organized crime money laundering. He doesn't solve Gotham because he either deep down doesn't think he can, or doesn't want to. Or the moral thing where he doesn't trust himself not to turn gotham into a totalitarian fiefdom if he took it upon himself to fix all its problems and impose final justice personally. He's too devoted American neoliberal philosophy to wholeheartedly take those steps. And when he toes that line it tends to backfire spectacularly!
@battlesheep2552
@battlesheep2552 Жыл бұрын
It did always bug me how one week he's punching literal gods in the face, and the next he gets nearly killed by gangsters
@alastor8091
@alastor8091 Жыл бұрын
Aka, trust the experts.
@bencox3641
@bencox3641 Жыл бұрын
Got to love how the most overpowered superhero is the one who is just a normal guy with a infinite bank account (when he's not broke for a story that will be undone anyways)
@VioletNKisHere
@VioletNKisHere Жыл бұрын
“I never met a smart person who bragged about their intelligence” That’s because every smart person in existence thinks they are of average skills and that plenty of people can do what they do.
@finngswan3732
@finngswan3732 Жыл бұрын
My weirdest experience is always going "What, I thought everyone knew that?" when I do something everyone thinks is smart.
@GrndAdmiralThrawn
@GrndAdmiralThrawn Жыл бұрын
Imposter Syndrome hits actually talented people the hardest
@hannahpense9973
@hannahpense9973 Жыл бұрын
“What, like it’s hard?”
@icecreamhero2375
@icecreamhero2375 Жыл бұрын
Tell that to Elon Musk. LOL That actually proves the point.
@braindavidgilbert3147
@braindavidgilbert3147 Жыл бұрын
@@icecreamhero2375 difference is, he suffers a big old problem of having a good pr team, thinking he’s smarter than he actually is, and some good old Hubris
@ComedyPlastic
@ComedyPlastic Жыл бұрын
Don't forget that the smart character must always be a scientist or engineer. They can never be a humanities nerd, especially not...*a writer.*
@GrndAdmiralThrawn
@GrndAdmiralThrawn Жыл бұрын
Wait, wasn’t that the entire premise of Castle? And Psych?
@vxicepickxv
@vxicepickxv Жыл бұрын
@@GrndAdmiralThrawn and Murder She Wrote
@myself2noone
@myself2noone Жыл бұрын
Do you know what they call a smart humanities nerd? An engineer with a minor in humanities.
@sophiedowney1077
@sophiedowney1077 Жыл бұрын
And they must be both scientists AND engineers, despite the fact that scientists and engineers have almost no overlap in skill sets because science and engineering are completely different fields. (Broadly speaking, scientists do the discovering and theorizing while engineers take what scientists found and scale it up/make it actually useful. This is a broad generalization though so take it with several grains of salt)
@pikminman13
@pikminman13 Жыл бұрын
@@sophiedowney1077hard disagree. As someone who will soon have a masters in chemical engineering, they’ve pretty much tracked us into both. It’s not that you’re wrong as much as it is somewhat overlapping it’s just hard to tell because despite wanting to be a process engineer they’ve forced me into research so we are all more or less a mix of each.
@Shatterverse
@Shatterverse Жыл бұрын
My favorite smart character I ever used had a tendency to do rather than explain and I liked to use it for comedy. "I'd _love_ to spend the next nine hours condensing my entire college education down so that I could explain how this works to you, but it'll be easier if I just tell you that it's magic so that you'll shut up and I can get some goddamn work done."
@Tayanator
@Tayanator Жыл бұрын
bruh lol where is this character from?
@OverlyPositiveFanboy
@OverlyPositiveFanboy Жыл бұрын
You've just reminded me of Tech from Star Wars: The Bad Batch. It was practically a running gag for a while that he kept not telling the others crucial plot info because he "thought it was obvious."
@R462venom
@R462venom 11 ай бұрын
Wibbly wobbly timey wimey stuff
@MrFleshyMan
@MrFleshyMan Жыл бұрын
The fact it has only been 3 days since your last upload and you still made another one is astounding to me.
@trinaq
@trinaq Жыл бұрын
Preach, JP is really treating us ahead of 2023!
@Bahr-im7pn
@Bahr-im7pn Жыл бұрын
Ditto, friend.
@-starrysunrise-2908
@-starrysunrise-2908 Жыл бұрын
He probably made both in advance
@MrFleshyMan
@MrFleshyMan Жыл бұрын
@@-starrysunrise-2908 maybe, but it's still cool to not have to wait a month for each episode.
@NeoShameMan
@NeoShameMan Жыл бұрын
I think it's greed's machinations, who knows what he is scheming again
@maxmetalknight
@maxmetalknight Жыл бұрын
JP totally found the word Jejune while looking for synonyms for this script and loved it.
@marocat4749
@marocat4749 Жыл бұрын
That inclusion of hjejune, was not jejune.
@jimluebke3869
@jimluebke3869 Жыл бұрын
@@marocat4749 You didn't look up jejune, did you.
@yungstilla5685
@yungstilla5685 Жыл бұрын
@@jimluebke3869 why would you jejune that
@jimluebke3869
@jimluebke3869 Жыл бұрын
@@yungstilla5685 I didn't know it was jejunable.
@NerdyCatCoffeeee
@NerdyCatCoffeeee Жыл бұрын
@@jimluebke3869 looking jejune up was jejune at best, which is ironic
@BillTheChill654
@BillTheChill654 Жыл бұрын
There’s a term for a writing trope called “Loves The Science” It’s where the writer wants to write a character who’s passionate about some field of STEM (Science Technology Engineering & Mathematics) but the writer doesn’t actually KNOW anything about those subjects, so their character never goes into detail about what they love about science or why.
@spacejunk2186
@spacejunk2186 Жыл бұрын
This is really bad in Marvels Iron Heart comic. The main character is told that she is too smart and genius to be around normal teenagers and that she loves the science and engineering, but it never shows us these things besides her vaguely putting a wrench in some "complex device". Extra points when there are useless holograms everywhere displaying "data".
@BillTheChill654
@BillTheChill654 Жыл бұрын
@@spacejunk2186 it’s kinda ironic how writers will show characters looking at holographic data displays to show how smart they are, when it’s honestly more impressive to see a character derive meaning from a giant block of computer code. Like, what’s more impressive? Cutting down a tree with an Axe, a Chainsaw, or your Bare Hands?
@carrot7868
@carrot7868 Жыл бұрын
That makes me want to create a character who likes to look like their into science, but doesn't actually want to study it.
@annasolovyeva1013
@annasolovyeva1013 Жыл бұрын
And the writer is too lazy to find a top university group on that exact subject and ask them a question online. Like "what you like and hate on your research field".
@canaisyoung3601
@canaisyoung3601 Жыл бұрын
Is that on TVTropes or did you make that up?
@AMenacingCloudofBlackPeople
@AMenacingCloudofBlackPeople Жыл бұрын
What's a way to show a character is smart? GLASSES! Yep, glasses. Totally a sign of intelligence and not at all a tool that people use to, I don't know, *see.*
@julietfischer5056
@julietfischer5056 Жыл бұрын
Glasses=smart at least has a nugget of fact: children with vision problems have trouble learning things. When they get glasses, their grades improve. It's a tiny nugget. The dark side of the stereotype appeared during China's Cultural Revolution: people who wore glasses were 'intellectuals' and 'elitists' which meant arrest and imprisonment.
@Tevildo
@Tevildo Жыл бұрын
"[The hollow-earth theory] was bending dangerously in the wind of Wensleydale's searingly bespectacled logic." Terry Pratchett, _Good Omens._
@TheMamaluigi300
@TheMamaluigi300 Жыл бұрын
To be fair, in the Rivals video, it was explained as a symbol that helps the wearer see clearly, as in see through fallacies and BS, so it definitely could also signify intelligence to an extent
@HaHaHaHolowence
@HaHaHaHolowence Жыл бұрын
Denji and Power (from Chainsawman) approve this message.
@dereenaldoambun9158
@dereenaldoambun9158 Жыл бұрын
I mean yeahhh??? All the smart people I knew are wearing glasses.
@GrndAdmiralThrawn
@GrndAdmiralThrawn Жыл бұрын
Also remember that the smart character must be smart in everything, regardless of their actual occupation or field of study. It’s not like you can have a bunch of different smart people such as chemists, mathematicians, and historians who defer to each other when outside their own area of expertise.
@vanillabatcave5677
@vanillabatcave5677 10 ай бұрын
And if they actually are polymaths versed in many fields, never show them thinking and making sense of the information or crossreferencing from different sources in any way shape or form, just have them be gods that can piece together vastly different pieces of information in a whim with no struggle!
@MariOmor1
@MariOmor1 2 ай бұрын
Lol your username is basically someone like what your comment is describing
@krzysztofbyrtek7848
@krzysztofbyrtek7848 Жыл бұрын
Honestly "sell the illusion" tip encapsulates the entire storywriting trade You are supposed to make your story so awesome it generates margin of willing suspension of disbelief in the viewers, and then make it even more awesome WITHOUT crossing it. Internal consistency above external, but being externally "muh sci fi realism" accurate is a nice bonus too as long as it won't tread on quality of rest of the components
@pabloibarz1577
@pabloibarz1577 Жыл бұрын
this made me feel like a badly written "smart" character 10/10
@appleg.3218
@appleg.3218 Жыл бұрын
Felt called out at the Big Words part
@kyubeyo
@kyubeyo 4 ай бұрын
@@appleg.3218same ☠️
@gabrielrussell5531
@gabrielrussell5531 Жыл бұрын
You forgot a vital method of writing smart characters: Making everyone else dumb to make them seem smart. See: Any story where only Batman can figure out the Riddler's riddles. Also having them anticipate things and having them fall exactly how they anticipated even when many other outcomes are just as probable.
@panlis6243
@panlis6243 Жыл бұрын
Ah yes. The Sherlock Holmes route
@tsm688
@tsm688 Жыл бұрын
@@panlis6243 You just pinned down what I dislike about sherlock. It was such a vague feeling but that totally explains it Come to think of it a lot of detective stories could spice things up by having the police be occasionally useful, sometimes even revealing unexpected things the detective must accept / reinvent
@panlis6243
@panlis6243 Жыл бұрын
@@tsm688 That's a pretty common critisism of Sherlock. I've heard it even before I started reading books and that definitely checks out. I found that the story is much better enjoyed if you just pretend that Sherlock's "deduction" is just some magical ability that doesn't involve actual logic. Still I wish the author wouldn't be so focused on constantly showing off how smart Sherlock is
@tsm688
@tsm688 Жыл бұрын
@@panlis6243 especially funny when you think about the author's delusions of grandeur later. He took Sherlock's method of logic and used it to "prove" the existence of pixies ...
@matteo-ciaramitaro
@matteo-ciaramitaro Жыл бұрын
Or make the smart character seem smart by making the answer completely unsolvable but having the character figure it out anyways based on a series of logical fallacies and made up observations not available to the reader
@tinyetoile5503
@tinyetoile5503 Жыл бұрын
In a manhwa I'd read, "Beware of the Villainess", there was a fun take on this. There was a character described as a genius in the original story, but the main character notes that he's actually not that smart in reality, because the author wasn't smart enough to actually write him as smart. Fun stuff!
@sneakerdoodle0612
@sneakerdoodle0612 11 ай бұрын
It's the guy with the name Peacock right?
@davidhoffman6980
@davidhoffman6980 Жыл бұрын
One way to depict a smart character is to have them come up with a plan that requires a lot of variables (that he/she can't predict or control) all go in the protagonists' favor, then when they try it, it succeeds, and everyone calls it "genius". In fact, make sure all the smart character's plans always succeed.
@cam4636
@cam4636 Жыл бұрын
You don't want the audience to assume this is due to chance, though--first make sure the smartypants says "We have to account for every possible variable" so that the audience understands how much brain energy they used for this flawless plan
@benjaminthibieroz4155
@benjaminthibieroz4155 Жыл бұрын
any good plan crafting implies taking as many possibilities of failure into account and prepare corrections. Having a character devise a plan, then progressively showing along it happening how they imagined outcomes (even unexpected ones) and found solutions or alterations for it can do wonders. Readers will try that game too, so impressing them is really effective.
@davidhoffman6980
@davidhoffman6980 Жыл бұрын
@@benjaminthibieroz4155 True, but there's a difference between having a character say "We need to account for ever possiblity" and showing him/her accounting for every possiblity. If after saying that we only show them accounting for 3-4 of say 12-15 possibilities, then pretend that's all of them, and have the plot validate them, then that would be bad writing. So yes, it can be done right, but it can also be done wrong.
@ari3903
@ari3903 Жыл бұрын
There are 2 problems with this approach. The first is that the character always gets lucky, and the other is that every character pretends that the result was predetermined. One way to fix it is to have them admit that their plan is risky and have them suffer failures a few times. That one guy in the group who everyone only turns to when they are desperate because of the riskiness of his plans would actually be pretty read or watch.
@benjaminthibieroz4155
@benjaminthibieroz4155 Жыл бұрын
@@ari3903 I think the initial comment was sarcastic
@jakvos342
@jakvos342 Жыл бұрын
im kind of proud that i understood all of JP's word salad example on the first listen despite not being a native English speaker
@almondjoy4938
@almondjoy4938 Жыл бұрын
Kinda pathetic on my end, since I am a native English speaker.
@karolnowak6423
@karolnowak6423 Жыл бұрын
@@almondjoy4938 Well, you do tend to expand your vocabulary greatly if you learn to obtain CAE or especially CPE. In opposite to many of the native English speakers (CPE owner with hobby in translations from, and to, native language (Polish) to English here). However, part of being proficient in communication is beign able to properly adjust the level of conversation to person you are trying to speak to. You can use higher level vocabulary to someone who you know is intelligent or when you need to use technical/nuanced language, but when you speak with layperson/ person who has lower level of knowledge or lower proficiency of language you are speaking in, you would use simpler language to convey your ideas efficiently. Tip: oftentimes those fancier words would have more specific and detailes meaning that would suit exactly the idea you try to sell, but you run the risk of other not knowing them and going nowhere with it as the result).
@marocat4749
@marocat4749 Жыл бұрын
I think th most important skill ther is to ignore bs and try getting what has substance. Makes any word salad less bad. And he is actually having a point, if unnessesary long, unlike most word salads.
@blaisemomin1106
@blaisemomin1106 6 ай бұрын
"word salad" Definitely adding that to my vocabulary
@skylark1491
@skylark1491 Жыл бұрын
"There's only one thing left to do, I'm running for federation president!" This show has officially jumped the shark and I love it.
@yjlom
@yjlom Жыл бұрын
yeah was expecting more of a coup (like seriously what corrupt government fires its whole military in one go and expect to stay in power more than a few days) but nice subversion
@karolnowak6423
@karolnowak6423 Жыл бұрын
Well Lex Luthor did run for President solely to troll Superman and he is def a genius xD
@MasonGreenWeed
@MasonGreenWeed Жыл бұрын
Dojyan~
@bleepblock2177
@bleepblock2177 Жыл бұрын
Dojyan~
@WolfDB
@WolfDB Жыл бұрын
I like how there are actual bits of good writing advice that you give, both in JP's sarcastic dismissal of good ideas, or with the metaphor about the magician to talk about how you can write a smart character without needing to be so yourself
@matityaloran9157
@matityaloran9157 Жыл бұрын
JP used to link his honest thoughts in the description. I wish he still did.
@tsm688
@tsm688 Жыл бұрын
@@matityaloran9157 I wish there were more of them too. more good ideas instead of constant negativity
@Blockio1999
@Blockio1999 Жыл бұрын
One thing about writing academics: A really good shortcut to making them dump exposition without iut feeling boring is to give them a niche subject that they are really, REALLY passionate about. Don't let your resident nuclear engineer rattle down how your own ship's reactor works, let them have an angry rant about what idiot configured the reactor of the ship next to it in the fleet formation that it produces those kinds of readings on its signature when increasing the output
@jamesmccallum3781
@jamesmccallum3781 Жыл бұрын
One thing I'm surprised you didn't mention - the idea of being 'smart' can be split into two parts: wit and knowledge. Wit refers here to the ability to rapidly make useful conclusions out of the data points they have. Knowledge is just how many of those data points you have. One can emulate wit in their writing by thinking for a long time and considering a problem the characters are facing from many different angles, maybe even asking others how they'd solve it given the information they have access to, and then having the smart character come up with your final, refined plan to solve that problem really quickly.
@thereccher8746
@thereccher8746 Жыл бұрын
Writing smart characters is easy, or at least it comes naturally with the process. The plan or witty comeback that took you months to craft took your character seconds. You can manipulate time in your screenplay. That's really all it takes.
@benrex7775
@benrex7775 Жыл бұрын
I'd like to add one thing. I agree that smart people are quicker at thinking of something. But that also changes their way of thinking. Smart people are less repetitive and are less patient when people are repetitive. If a smart person explains something then he gives the most crucial concepts of it once and thinks you understand it. Also he might draw comparisons to other things which have the same underlying concepts but seem quite different on the surface. If a dumb person explains something then they focus on the symptoms and the superficial aspects. And they combine that with repeating it a bunch of time to memorize it. They might also draw connections to other things, but the connections are more related to the symptoms and how it appears on the surface.
@sarahvunkannon7336
@sarahvunkannon7336 Жыл бұрын
@@benrex7775 Smart people may bungle their explanations by drawing too many comparisons, because the comparisons make the subject matter clearer for them but confuse their audience. They may also give their explanations too quickly, failing to insert the proper amount and/or length of pauses to give their audience time to digest the information. In addition, they may start their explanations in the wrong place. They may explain the underlying principle before discussing the different ways said principle can manifest, or vice versa, thus leading the audience to tune out the first half of their explanation because they have no frame of reference for it yet and be completely underwhelmed by the second half.
@benrex7775
@benrex7775 Жыл бұрын
@@sarahvunkannon7336 I can see that too.
@jhutt8002
@jhutt8002 4 ай бұрын
​​@@benrex7775What you say is completely wrong. It's simply based on your narrow definition of what intelligence means. There are many ways that peoples brains and thinking works. Some work much slower, and may still be far more intelligent and think deeper than a person with really quick wit. Also something that someone understands as superficial or repetitive can be way different in meaning, context or depht than someone else understands it to be. It only relates to others intelligence based on how well they can understand what is being said. But it's up to them to actually try. Which relates your point of getting annoyed by repetition: Was it repetitive, or did you discard it before you could figure out what was the point? Was other person being thick and talking beside the point, or were you actually talking different things from to the get go. Or did you just miss the difference in point of view. Debating things is fun and interesting, because people can have so vastly different ways of seeing things.
@benrex7775
@benrex7775 4 ай бұрын
​@@jhutt8002 I agree that being smart can have various aspects to it. I usually use intelligent as a loose synonym to IQ. Being smart also includes being knowledgeable, being educated, being wise, being curious, being creative, understanding humans, understanding world views and so on. Also what a person is interested in hugely influences of how smart someone appears to be. Based on what you say you sound like a person who has always spent time in the presence of people with a similar standard deviation of IQ. Have you ever talked to someone with an IQ of at least 2 standard deviations higher than you. And have you ever talked to someone with an IQ of at least 2 standard deviations lower than you? _(2 Standard deviation = 30 IQ points)._ I know people like this in both directions and I interact with them on regular basis. The difference is large enough that this type of generalization starts to make sense. Of course there is always some variance in everything. There can be highly intelligent people with world views so dumb that they believe in the most stupid ideas without seeing the obvious. Or a person who is curious and hard working can compensate a lot when it comes to IQ. PS. I don't intend to say that people with little intelligence are less valuable or less interesting to be around. It is just that this specific aspect is the way I described it according to my experience. It's not just about not getting their point when they say it. It's about hearing the same point or same question for months at a time.
@davidhoffman6980
@davidhoffman6980 Жыл бұрын
Another way to write a smart character is to nerf the intelligence of everyone else in the cast: make sure no one else ever proposes the most obvious solution to the problems they face, and have their minds blown when the smart character finally comes up with it at the last second.
@A350Airways
@A350Airways Жыл бұрын
And that gets on my nerves...
@SimonClarkstone
@SimonClarkstone Жыл бұрын
11:51 Mispronouncing big words isn't bad; it can just mean they only learnt it from books and not from speech, which might mean they know more about it than any of their peers.
@synonymouswithjello2359
@synonymouswithjello2359 Жыл бұрын
As a person who has a much bigger book count than person-I've-spoken-to-in-real-life count, I have a few embarrassing moments related to this. I was so disappointed when I found out the c in scintillating wasn't pronounced. Also, yeah, I'm sure I sounded like an idiot.
@ExValeFor
@ExValeFor 11 ай бұрын
cope take learn to speak
@IAmTheStig32
@IAmTheStig32 Жыл бұрын
Edelgard from Fire Emblem Three Houses is my go-to example of a well-written intelligent character. She isn't intelligent because she can prattle off technobabble or engineer a gigantic contrived conspiracy that only works perfectly because random plot elements all align perfectly, she is intelligent because she repeatedly shows she can string together simple plans and change them on the fly based on new information and unseen setbacks. She is often played a bad hand and sometimes her plans are upended because of something she never expected, but she remains calm and her moves always make sense given what she would know in the moment.
@Dr.juiceboxtv
@Dr.juiceboxtv Жыл бұрын
Nothing irks me like a smart character that seems invulnerable to outside factors. Like Batman when he's with the Justice League or the Cumberbatch Sherlock
@darlhiatt8136
@darlhiatt8136 Жыл бұрын
I agree, and add that we get that even more in 3 Hopes. Since you get to see more of the actual war there than you do in 3 Houses, there's a lot more opportunity to show her character, and Edelgard especially shines for it. I love both of the Fodlan games so much, and I hope that the upcoming release of Engage doesn't stop them from making DLC for 3 Hopes, it deserves more and I'm not ready for the Fodlan era to be over yet
@starmaker75
@starmaker75 Жыл бұрын
Or even Claude, where like edelgard he can set up alliances and persuade people. He also will research things and get to know the area and people . Claude(and Yuri to extend) is more emotional intelligent.
@callumbreton8930
@callumbreton8930 Жыл бұрын
Ah yes, Xanatos Speed Chess
@mx-7i-0n5
@mx-7i-0n5 Жыл бұрын
Reach for my hand, I soar away ....
@dutch_asocialite
@dutch_asocialite Жыл бұрын
About Exposition Puppets, I sort of ran into this issue with my own fanfiction. Since it was from the protagonist perspective expounding the story's events to an anonymous party, I had difficulty in trying to have him recount the events succinctly and within character, which ultimately led to the guy just rambling and bloating chapter to unimaginable degrees. My solution was to just have the second person become impatient and interrupt whenever the rambling started.
@forixiom7410
@forixiom7410 Жыл бұрын
Based.
@valhatan3907
@valhatan3907 Жыл бұрын
@@forixiom7410 based on what?
@epistimonkapetanios
@epistimonkapetanios Жыл бұрын
69 likes xd
@epistimonkapetanios
@epistimonkapetanios Жыл бұрын
@@valhatan3907 Based has gained a second meaning recently. It's mainly used by Authoritarian Rightists (which can range from simple Paleoliberals all the way to Totalitarians, and everything in between). By saying that something is based, without saing that it is based on something else, you agree with it. However, this new meaning has not erased the old meaning of the word. Both are being used across the internet.
@dutch_asocialite
@dutch_asocialite Жыл бұрын
@@valhatan3907 A true story.
@lordgrunwalder1607
@lordgrunwalder1607 Жыл бұрын
Dont forget, being smart means your character can calculate ANYTING with his mind, even the movement of the air molecules in air... Without any needed tool
@laranjapera8825
@laranjapera8825 Жыл бұрын
Could we talk about how his ego has a physical existence?
@antoinelachapelle3405
@antoinelachapelle3405 Жыл бұрын
It was the real cosmic horror all along
@tomkerruish2982
@tomkerruish2982 Жыл бұрын
Props for sneaking "irregardless" into your sesquipedalian fusillade!
@cam4636
@cam4636 Жыл бұрын
What's wrong with that, it's a perfectly cromulent word/s
@KingKayro87
@KingKayro87 Жыл бұрын
Truly a professional at mastication, always so articulate and homunculus.
@ActuallySatan
@ActuallySatan Жыл бұрын
1:04 Wait, this is supiciously good advice. Has JP reached a more nuanced understanding o- 1:59 Oh, there it is. That males more sense.
@andrasfogarasi5014
@andrasfogarasi5014 Жыл бұрын
males?
@BlossomPathOnStage15
@BlossomPathOnStage15 Жыл бұрын
@@andrasfogarasi5014 makes. Probably a typo
@genericprotagonist2842
@genericprotagonist2842 Жыл бұрын
I believe it females more sense, but that's just my _too sense._
@lordanubis1458
@lordanubis1458 Жыл бұрын
It's "makes" In English, bro
@valhatan3907
@valhatan3907 Жыл бұрын
@@genericprotagonist2842 so, it's actually "femakes"? _Ah yes, the invention of language._
@echothenardier8053
@echothenardier8053 Жыл бұрын
Has anyone else seen a smart character who questions if they’re smart because they don’t also have the kind of intelligence everyone else seems to have (mainly social intelligence/practical knowledge)? Maybe I’ve just been looking in the wrong places, but I’ve had trouble finding them (Edit: Recommendations would be appreciated if you happen to have any :) )
@karolnowak6423
@karolnowak6423 Жыл бұрын
I believe Artemis Fowl did curse his puberty to hell and asked Butler repeatedly if it is normal to have lapses of judgement during it and the adrenaline rushes. Also asked Butler how to deal with apology to Holly for the end of the second novel, and still was being awkward as hell.
@danielstreeter6738
@danielstreeter6738 Жыл бұрын
Fairly obscure, but there's an "idiot" side character in Star Trek called Rom, and he gradually becomes essential to the plot. Also, I've heard secondhand that one of the people involved with inventing the limpet mine was usually dismissed as unintelligent by those who didn't know him well, and didn't seem to disagree with that assessment despite his own brilliant ideas, but I'm afraid I don't have a name or any sources to give for that.
@PrototypeSpaceMonkey
@PrototypeSpaceMonkey Жыл бұрын
Hanekawa Tsubasa from the Monogatari series comes to mind. Although she's impossibly, supernaturally intelligent because of... reasons, she's convinced she's nothing special. Great example of a truly smart character written by a truly smart author.
@Kallastar.
@Kallastar. Жыл бұрын
Not a character, but this is me, lol
@moemomomo
@moemomomo 7 ай бұрын
@@PrototypeSpaceMonkeymono in the wild… “I don’t know everything, I only know what I know.”
@sophiedowney1077
@sophiedowney1077 Жыл бұрын
And don't forget! If you do manage to write a smart character who's relatable and lovable, make sure to give them no screen time!
@benrex7775
@benrex7775 Жыл бұрын
I've seen you below a few comments here and appreciate your insight. Since you are here I assume you like reading. I can recommend a book to you. It's called "Forty Millenniums Of Cultivation". I recommend that book because the author is quite a smart guy and it is apparent in the plots which his characters have. Also it has a well thought out world building. You can read it online for free but it might take a while. According to my reading speed its a bit less than 600h. I've read about a third of it so far. The genre is a mix between sci-fi and a cultivation novel.
@Vnx
@Vnx Жыл бұрын
One advantage writers have in writing intelligent characters - even ones the writer considers smarter than themselves - is that the writer can spend hours, days or even weeks coming up with ideas or plans. The character within the story can then have those ideas or plans in a fraction of the time.
@Hust91
@Hust91 6 ай бұрын
They can also search topics or literally just ask a bunch of other people how to solve a particular problem. A fictional character can literally have the output of a hundred people brainstorming for a few minutes.
@chrisschirripa5917
@chrisschirripa5917 Жыл бұрын
Just remember to always tell the audience that a person is smart even when their actions contradict it.
@luizcastro5246
@luizcastro5246 Жыл бұрын
Their*
@Albino_Basilisk
@Albino_Basilisk Жыл бұрын
Sad that it happens in real life too, lol
@chrisschirripa5917
@chrisschirripa5917 Жыл бұрын
@@luizcastro5246 well I never claimed to be one.
@boozecruiser
@boozecruiser Жыл бұрын
@@chrisschirripa5917 Sansa Stark after season 6?
@marocat4749
@marocat4749 Жыл бұрын
@@boozecruiser Maybe its because she is the least ruined, but sansa isnt th one thinking of there.
@purplehaze2358
@purplehaze2358 Жыл бұрын
I tend to outright avoid writing notably 'smart' characters - mostly just focusing on people of average intelligence - because I am, by all conceivable metrics, kind of an idiot.
@ShadeSlayer1911
@ShadeSlayer1911 Жыл бұрын
I feel the same way. Except I like to write dumb characters, not even average intelligence. It's sort of fun that way, because it's easy to give those characters a moment to shine, when everyone around them has gotten used to assuming that they're too stupid to understand anything.
@carrot7868
@carrot7868 Жыл бұрын
That's cool too :) Honestly, a character doesn't have to be smart to be likeable.
@TheNN
@TheNN Жыл бұрын
As one thing I personally like to say: A smart character should be used as a wink and a nod for the audience/reader/etc who have pieced enough together on their own, while bringing anyone else not quite in the know up to speed, without completely ruining any plot twists. To see examples of this, watch/read any really good whodunit/murder mysteries.
@carrot7868
@carrot7868 Жыл бұрын
That's an interesting thought.
@leahnzastrzelecki5217
@leahnzastrzelecki5217 Жыл бұрын
"Jejune" sounds so much like one of my favorite English words "jejunum" that I kept mishearing it so that JP called himself "small intestine".
@jhoughjr1
@jhoughjr1 Жыл бұрын
I thought of that as well, also though of Jeune in French which means yellow if I recall.
@luxill0s
@luxill0s Жыл бұрын
@Leggo MuhEggo jeune → young jaune (as in jaundice) → yellow
@legrandliseurtri7495
@legrandliseurtri7495 Жыл бұрын
@@jhoughjr1 Uh...no. Jeune means young. *Jaune* means yellow.
@wolliveryoutube
@wolliveryoutube Жыл бұрын
It kept reminding me of Camp LeJeune
@Foxmagik
@Foxmagik Жыл бұрын
It just makes me want a French Dip sandwich with a side of jejune sauce.
@JoshTigerheart
@JoshTigerheart Жыл бұрын
The only bit of advice this video seems to be missing is that your characters should have one or more non-specified PHDs and have earned them all at a well known prestigious college, like Harvard. Or Yale if you're feeling spicy. Also they should have earned all that before 25, ideally no later than 20. Unless you have a young target audience in which case then you should scale the age back even more.
@leeroyjenkns5182
@leeroyjenkns5182 Жыл бұрын
To be fair, "Reverse polarities on the flux capacitors" must make as much sense to starship engineers as "Reset to HEAD branch and perform a clean with -fdx" to software engineers.
@mr_mist7891
@mr_mist7891 Жыл бұрын
My biggest pet peeve with most smart characters is that they're scientists most of the time. Of course, there are exceptions (Dr. Stone actually pulls this off really well by having characters be experts each in their own field, with Senku just being an expert in a specific section of them)
@marocat4749
@marocat4749 Жыл бұрын
I actually like that in stargate atlantis, like mckay is one smart character, and brags, but then john is also very smart, and that is shown by how he like hows he is petty smart actually and just playing it down, but like that make them hhaving that fun dynamic that they get really close too and even have rivalries. I jut like that the are characters good at different things. like in the original oneil is far more smarter than letting on,or just wiser. I mean yeah , why cant you have a smart like whatever. or artist, or athleth, or, hat else.
@TheDawnofVanlife
@TheDawnofVanlife 7 ай бұрын
This is why I like Miles O'Brien on Star Trek, he's just this relatable down to earth guy that is also a brilliant engineer. But in general Star Trek has a wide range of characters who are smart in their own ways and expertise. Which I appreciate about it most of the time.
@cheyenneoliver5184
@cheyenneoliver5184 Жыл бұрын
Ah yes, the greatest struggle of writing smart characters: They can only be as smart as the person who wrote them...
@TheAlexSchmidt
@TheAlexSchmidt Жыл бұрын
I've thought of this when it comes to detectives, I feel like that could make a good follow-up.
@forkgodsdescendant2503
@forkgodsdescendant2503 Жыл бұрын
When you want to write a scientist but you are atrociously bad at math and would struggle with IKEA instructions:
@pallingtontheshrike6374
@pallingtontheshrike6374 Жыл бұрын
this isn't actually 100% accurate, as a person who's not super smart can still use their experiences esp with smarter/cleverer people (or just straight up anomalous occurrences) to write a smart or at least clever character, while being unable to come up with those solutions on their own. To frame it more rigorously, the character can only be as intelligent as the source from which it was based upon. in the cases where a writer has little life experience to use, that means the writer's intelligence is taken to task. in the case where the writer can burn other stories as fuel, then the most intelligent characters in those stories are the upper limit. worth noting, this is an upper bound, and not always tight; the end result may be much lower or it may approach the bound, depending on writing skill, and this upper bound does not account for variance that naturally applies when people do things. One more case worth noting is that, thanks to aforementioned variance, just by editing a work enough (given the editing itself is reliable), a person may be able to reach a good ways above the theoretical bound as well, to a point.
@Salty_Kitsune
@Salty_Kitsune Жыл бұрын
I was about to say what the guy above me said so just pretend I did
@americanidiot41
@americanidiot41 Жыл бұрын
As jp said, writing is all about slight of hand. You don’t have to be smart, just clever enough to make people think that they are smart
@MikhailSamunin
@MikhailSamunin Жыл бұрын
2:24 As a wisdom says: "The smart person is the one who knows there will always be something he doesn't know".
@jvts8916
@jvts8916 Жыл бұрын
Two scientists I really like are Doctor Light and Albert Wily. The two used to be friends until university, where Light's research on robots with free will was accepted by the university at Wily's expense. Light became a famous inventor thanks to the novelty of his research but ended up blaming himself for both Protoman and Wily going down a dark path. Meanwhile, Wily got so caught up on his idea being denied that he becomes more and more egotistical, to the point that he starts calling himself Doctor Wily despite never actually getting a doctorate. Wily also has an increasingly serious cash flow problem due to his constant attempts at making robots (to the point that he either makes them Junk Man level quality or just reprograms other robots and calls them his own) and giant bases. By the time the X series rolls around, it's implied Light no longer wants to fix their friendship and all but confirmed that Wily/Serges/Isoc's ego has grown so large that losing to a robot that isn't Zero makes him absolutely livid.
@SlapstickGenius23
@SlapstickGenius23 Жыл бұрын
Something similar happened to poor Doctor Hell in most Mazinger Z incarnations, because he inspired Dr Wily.
@carbodude5414
@carbodude5414 Жыл бұрын
One of the reasons I hope X is a separate continuity The fate of the old Megaman characters would be _way_ too grimdark, otherwise
@isauldron4337
@isauldron4337 Жыл бұрын
​@@carbodude5414 it's confirmed megaman Legends, x zx and classic are SADLY on the same continuity
@DDSForbbiden
@DDSForbbiden Жыл бұрын
Ahhh, yes. Every (vaguely) science fiction series or story needs the omni-diciplinary scientist, who's also an engineer, technician, physician and historian!
@gagaplex
@gagaplex Жыл бұрын
Before I even watch this: One of the worst things about smart characters is that the writer has to be kind of smart, too. Nothing is sillier and less believable than a moron's idea of a smart character. This goes for supposedly tricky or clever puzzles created by morons, too.
@ShadeSlayer1911
@ShadeSlayer1911 Жыл бұрын
Either the smart thing that the smart character does really isn't that smart and can even actually be stupid, or the intelligence is written more like it's magic. For the latter, I point to Batman as an example. His intelligence is written like it's magic more than anything.
@wolliveryoutube
@wolliveryoutube Жыл бұрын
8:26 that being said, the very similar torturous experiments of Japan's "mad science" division, Unit 731, were considered valuable enough by the United States that they let a lot of their members of the hook in exchange for the data they collected.
@annasolovyeva1013
@annasolovyeva1013 Жыл бұрын
In that case... scientists in the labs of superpowers doing morally vague science aren't mad psychiatrically, nor chaotic like the movie clishe. Both superpowers and science like discipline, so an LE personality is more suitable. Maximum - a bit weird around socially. Working on biological weapons or a nuke actually requires a lot of extra discipline. Look up the rules of biohazard lvl 5 lab.
@dimamatat5548
@dimamatat5548 8 ай бұрын
"JAPANESE SCIENCE IS THE WORLD FINEST!"
@maddie9602
@maddie9602 Жыл бұрын
On the note of an expert in one field not necessarily being knowledgeable about others, I saw a Tom Scott video recently where, in one section, he was interviewing a physicist about the synthesis of radioactive compounds. She discussed the physics side in very technical detail, but the chemistry side she just described as "and then the chemists work their magic". She didn't know how the chemistry side worked, because that's not her field. I've experienced that personally, working with air purifiers. I could go into technical details about the chemistry side of things, but things like explaining bacterial kill mechanisms or how they measure bacterial kills? That's biology, my knowledge in that area's rather lacking. I wish that was something we saw more often in fiction: an expert being asked a question, and just answering "fuck if I know, that's not my field". Only example I can really think of is Bones in Star Trek, and his signature protest of "damn it Jim, I'm a doctor, not a _________" Another thing I wish I saw more often, to reflect what real-life experts are like, is giving them _really_ strong opinions on really obscure topics. I've met people who are practically willing to throw hands over something only a few dozen people in the world are even aware of.
@alexhussinger3550
@alexhussinger3550 Жыл бұрын
There's a fine art in using Technobabble that is still mostly nonsense (since it usually refers to technology that does not exist yet) but that is close enough to real tech to be relatable. "We need to reverse the polarity of the flux capacitor" is meaningless, but "We need to discharge the reactor's overflow capacitors" is still nondescript enough to be applicable to warp drives/fusion cores/whatever but actually means something understandable--we need to eject some excess energy from this device or it will fail/explode. Instantly tangible stakes presented in a way that does not take the audience out of the story The worst kind of Technobabble is when you describe something that only means "We have to hit a few buttons on a console and the colored lights will change back to normal, immediately fixing the problem". No only does the audience have no idea what was wrong, it doesn't feel like any actual effort went into to fixing the problem, retroactively reducing the stakes. If you want to sell the danger or potential of a situation, it should be something that can't be fixed by reading the instruction manual of the device the operators are presumably already familiar with.
@Starsmasher287
@Starsmasher287 Жыл бұрын
All the characters I write are just as smart as me! Now that I think about that, that's probably not a good thing.
@benrex7775
@benrex7775 Жыл бұрын
I think that is a good thing. It is difficult to write characters which think different than you do. This makes it that your characters are more realistic. If you were to write people with a different intelligence level you are bound to make it wrong and make it feel unnatural. But if you try to bring in some variety to the intelligence then I can give you a few tips. I have thought of that topic every now and then and I might have certain insights which are new to you. I hope I didn't write too much. I had to split the comment due to the character limit of the KZfaq comments. :-P By the way I'm in very male dominate environments so that might have a bit of an influence on what I write here. Also even though I would love to write stuff, I rarely do it so my comments are just from an observer point of view and I don't know how to use it as a writer. Smart people are way quicker at understanding something. Dumb people need to hear it several times to understand it. A really smart person takes a look at it, compares it to a seemingly unrelated thing and notices that they have the same underlying reason for why they work. After that one look he has understood it. If he tries to explain it to someone he just explains the underlying reason and skips everything else. Since that was enough for him to understand it he assumes the same applies to the other people. A really dumb person doesn't grasp most difficult concepts. They understand enough to go through daily life. Whatever they need to understand they look for how the effects are and repeat them long enough to memorize it. And that memorizing process can take months. As you see intelligence is not just about how quick you notice it but it also influences other aspects of life. For example a smart person hears it once and from then on looks at it as a given and finds it annoying if it is repeated again. The thinking of a dumb person is mostly about repeating stuff so that they can understand it. So far I've only focused on intelligence. With intelligence I mean IQ or pattern recognition. If you want to get a better grasp of it try to make a friend who is 40 IQ points smarter than you and one who is 40 IQ points dumber than you. Then it starts to get quite obvious. The problem with smart people is that their behavior is probably adjusted to interacting with people of normal intelligence since they are around them all the time since young. Because of that their natural way of thinking is covered up with an act which is more approachable by a person of normal intelligence. It is not a perfect act but enough to work in most situations. So perhaps you should find two friends who are both 40 IQ points smarter than you and look how they interact with each other. But smart is not just about having a high or low IQ. - I've seen scientists and engineers who are very successful, but according to my judgement they have only a slightly above average intelligence. They compensate a lack of IQ with curiosity, persistence and experience. With those traits you can get quite far. Never underestimate them. - Then there is the world view. Let's take a simple example. Peter intentionally hurts a person just for the joy of it. Paul sees that. His world view assumes that all humans are good. Since Paul is a smart guy who likes to have a consistent world view he finds a solution: The environment causes Peter to do such a horrendous action. And now Paul is trying to find an reason how the environment caused Peter to do this atrocity. As Paul is a smart guy he finds a lot of things which might cause Peter to do it. But all of them are wrong and those wrong conclusions cause Paul to fail to predict the next action of Peter. By the way this can be a problem in foreign policy. For example China might have different global warming goals than Germany. This is just one specific example of how the world view can influence our reasoning. Another example would be about the left/right divide. Left leaning people think that we should help the poor by giving them money. After all if you are in debt you can't get your life back on track. But they miss that just handing out money does not motivate people to start being self dependent. Right leaning people on the other hand notice that just throwing money at the poor does not motivate them to get the life in order. Their approach is to give them a job. And they miss that some people are in such a bad mental state that they are not capable of working at a job. Both see the same problem and want to help but fail to do so for different reasons. - EQ. Although EQ is a dubious concept psychologically speaking, Emotional intelligence is a thing which exists. If you don't pay attention to your emotions at all you can either bury them deep until you break down or you can be a volatile bomb ready to explode in them most inconvenient situations. People who have their emotions under control are capable of listening and reacting to their emotions when they are helpful and putting them on pause when they get in the way. - Knowledge of human nature. Humans are not machines or mathematical functions. Some people are good at prediction how humans react and some are bad with it. Some use that to manipulate humans and rise in society while others use that to help other humans or understand themselves better. _(I don't want to imply that rise in society due to knowledge of human nature is always a manipulative thing. It can be but does not have to be)_ By the way if you want to have a bit of inspiration of human nature then I can recommend things like 16personalities for general personality traits or the socio-sexual hierarchy for how men behave in a group. - Rhetoric. Some people are very good at giving speeches and convincing people of what they want. They don't try to make a logical case for why things are in a step by step manner. They are masters in inducing emotions in the listener, often through the use of telling stories. This can be used for good (most likely your favorite teacher) or for bad (most dictators). - Topic of interest. Let's say I have a highly intelligent farmer who is creative, innovative, well read, persistent and so on. He puts 110% into his work and is successful in what he does. But he doesn't have the aspiration of making a nationwide farming chain. After all his job can feed the family and if he were to expand he would have to start making more management related work. Now we have a nuclear physicist who knows the theories which the teachers taught him but he does not do any research on his own and he is not really that good at coming up with new ideas. Who appears smarter? Most people would say the nuclear physicist just because of his choice of interest. - Wisdom. Actually I don't yet know what wisdom is. My current definition is something like this: _"A respected person who agrees with you and is capable of explaining things in a simple manner."_ I think wisdom is often related to a person who is high in a social hierarchy. And it doesn't matter how wise someone is, if they have a different enough world view compared to the listener then people just think of him as a cult leader. And in the end what makes us think a person is wise is his speaking skills. I deliberately didn't write _"[...] is capable of explaining _*_complex_*_ things in a simple manner."_ Wise words don't have to be complex. They don't even have to make sense. They just have to agree with what you wanted to say but couldn't.
@benrex7775
@benrex7775 Жыл бұрын
To end my comment of I want to write about writing characters of different smartness. I don't know how you write your characters, but if you want to make them a bit more different from each other you could for example say that one character is very good at noticing how people feel (knowledge of human nature + EQ) while another one is good at explaining things (rhetoric + wisdom). But the person good at explaining things first has to go to the person with a high intelligence (intelligence + generally social) as this is the one who is the one who actually understands the situation. Or you could make a very smart person (intelligence + persistence + introvert) who is just interested in some weird side topic which has no relevance to the story. And everyone keeps distance from him because they don't really know how to communicate with him and he has no patience to explain everything three times. Perhaps one arc requires them to interact with him. Please just don't change his character afterwards in a way where they force him to participate in their activities or he does so of his free will. I always dislike it if authors do so. I don't change from introvert to extrovert because of some group project. And if people force me to spend more time with them I'm not happy that I don't have my me time anymore. Such a character prioritizes working alone on his topic of interest with no disturbance over almost anything. More plausible reactions could be for example, that an extroverted person wants to include this person in all activities and he runs away. A more socially adapt person reminds the extrovert that his behavior is not helpful. But since they now know each other better they now greet each other in the hallway and if they have a problem which they can help they ask each other. The introvert first tries to do everything he can until he asks them while the extrovert might run to the introvert every time when it is moderately related. And then there is a person who is dumb. If it is in a school setting then the dumb person has to compensate by being extremely hard working. If it is some non-school setting no such compensation is needed. This person can go perfectly through life and understands the necessary thing and has even a good world view which makes him make surprisingly accurate predictions. But whenever this person talks it is on similar and very repetitive topics. He always asks the same questions and the life stories he tells are mostly known by the second chapter. The only reason to increase the number of stories is due to him trusting the group more. You could use that person to introduce new plots. For example this person suddenly comes and asks about a word he picked up. Everybody else heard it before and went on. But due to this person asking about it all the time they notice that it is actually quite relevant. Here the motive of the dumb person was just to figure out that new word he heard means and it takes him an entire chapter. But the rest of the group notice thanks to him that there is more to it than they first thought. And the reason why the others including the intelligent guy didn't notice is because they had a different world view which didn't allow for that anomaly to happen. Thanks to the dumb guy they noticed that anomaly and expand their world view a little. I gave you a bit of an overview on the topic of smart. But this does not come as a replacement of knowing such people personally. Especially in the case of dumb people. If you get a dumb person wrong it has a high risk of feeling that you are looking down on him. Give that person very positive character traits. And don't make this person vary in intelligence. Keep the being dumb at a constant rate. Perhaps make him more of an observer so that he doesn't start to annoy the readers.
@draketheduelist
@draketheduelist Жыл бұрын
"I am so smart! I am so smart! S-M-R-T! ...I mean S-M-A-R-T!"
@jimluebke3869
@jimluebke3869 Жыл бұрын
"Even if you get rejected [when you ask for information from experts], don't worry, you'll find one who won't shut up about it eventually" This is so incredibly true! A huge number of experts are experts because they're obsessed with a topic and it's the only thing they want to talk about.
@DunningofKruger
@DunningofKruger Жыл бұрын
Obviously the best example of a Smart Character is Sherlock and his many adaptations. The Wrong way to write sherlock: -Notice a group of seemingly disparate details -Imply something based on those details -Repeat -Reinforce implication by painting a cohesive picture -Conclude based on evidence -Slightly inaccurate but mostly correct The RIGHT way to write sherlock: -Notice minor trivial detail -Guess wildly -Be Correct
@giantclaw138
@giantclaw138 Жыл бұрын
Haven't watched yet but I'm predicting that "Talk about how smart your character is without ever actually showing it" will be in here Edit: Yup...
@ShadeSlayer1911
@ShadeSlayer1911 Жыл бұрын
A personal gripe of mine is when intelligence just becomes magic, with the genius character somehow knowing things that they couldn't possibly know.
@TheMamaluigi300
@TheMamaluigi300 Жыл бұрын
To be fair, that’s on you. “Telling, not showing” is a pretty common theme when it comes to poor characterization *like* portraying intelligence
@Magicghost23
@Magicghost23 Жыл бұрын
He’s got these bad writing advice videos down to an exact science.
@MatthewSmith-sz1yq
@MatthewSmith-sz1yq Жыл бұрын
Real talk, one of my favorite character archetypes is the accurate smart character. They are extremely intelligent in a specific field, but otherwise are just average, or even below average, compared to "normal" people. This extremely limited competence can lead to massive blindspots, which can create really neat character interaction. For example, someone who is extremely competent at all things warfare and military might collapse in despair or react irrationally when confronted with a nation that is overwhelmingly powerful, even though that nation is largely peaceful and friendly.
@youtubeuniversity3638
@youtubeuniversity3638 6 ай бұрын
"WE NEED TO LAUNCH THE NUKES!!!" "...they are literally asking us to run their nation for them because their king was murdered." "WHERE'S THE LAUNCH CODES‽"
@Hust91
@Hust91 6 ай бұрын
Or they might field options for unconventional warfare of the type less powerful nations use to fend off more powerful nations with a surprisinglt high rate of success. They might also have gone over something like rhe official plans for fending off alien invasions with the assumption that they want the planet and population intact which isn't unlikely given that humans and life is the only thing earth has that you couldn't get anywhere else in much greater quantities and quality (if they don't want the planet alive you are already dead).
@Wyattporter
@Wyattporter Жыл бұрын
I like the “big words” example at 3:10 for a variety of reasons. For one, you mispronounced a lot of the words, which serves as an illustrative example of why one shouldn’t use big words as an author if they can use simpler, more direct phrasing. Also, leaving in the pronunciations as you did really humanizes you as a creator and tells viewers that it’s okay to make mistakes
@linuxwizzerd5908
@linuxwizzerd5908 Жыл бұрын
I thought the mispronouncing was deliberate
@wolfetteplays8894
@wolfetteplays8894 19 күн бұрын
Nah, using bigger words is a good thing in most cases... ever heard of subtext and lexical variety? Like, sure, the word "Slavegirl" is straight and to the point, but it carries an icky connotation that its synonyms like "Servitrix", "Handmaiden," "Maid," "Domestic," Etc., just don't carry. Same thing with words like "Vestibule", like I can write in my novel a "Vestibule Pillar" and it will make sense, but if I write something about a "Foyer Pillar" or "Threshold Pillar," it just ends up sounding unintuitive and brings the wrong imagery to mind..
@icecreamhero2375
@icecreamhero2375 Жыл бұрын
Smart automatically means super genius who is good at everything rather than having expertise in a certain subject matter right?
@KnightSlasher
@KnightSlasher Жыл бұрын
Bro has probably watched death note at least 10 times and was able to figure out the answer of whether light or l was smarter
@DonVigaDeFierro
@DonVigaDeFierro Жыл бұрын
I mean, L figured out that Light was Kira pretty much at the beginning. He just lacked the hard, irrefutable evidence to make a good case.
@synonymouswithjello2359
@synonymouswithjello2359 Жыл бұрын
L didn't lose to Light's superior intellect, he lost to shinigami power. As would any regular human.
@johnathonhaney8291
@johnathonhaney8291 Жыл бұрын
5:56 That's EXACTLY what Tony Stark does in Marvel's Midnight Suns, use big words and snark to cover for a lot of his insecurities. And nearly all his big plans to resolve the plot DON'T WORK, which aggravates a lot of the preexisting conditions he came into this story with.
@TitusRedwind
@TitusRedwind 11 ай бұрын
I remember in highschool writing a story about a group of outcasts with vastly different personalities that somehow manage to become very good friends and the story focused on how they meet and grow closer. Looking back it wasn't my most exciting work but I was very proud of my main character Lucas and his father George. George was a biochemist and medical engineer and seen by many of his colleagues as brilliant. His wife died of a rare terminal illness (one that I completely made up and can't remember the name of). This caused George to fall into a deep depression and develop an obsession with finding a cure. He spent countless days without sleep spending hours upon hours working at his company's lab rarely ever coming home. And when he was home, he was often delving through numerous medical journals for anything that might help him. He was a flawed man who was torn between his work and raising his family. He felt immense guilt over not being there for so many important moments in his son's life. One of the best lines I've ever written was from Lucas. He said "I know what loss is, Dad. You aren't the only one who misses Mom. The only difference is, when she died, I lost *both* my parents." The climax of the story is when the group of friends graduates and Lucas looks out and sees his father in the crowd smiling back at him with a tear in his eye. After the ceremony, the two embrace and share a tender moment where George tells Lucas that from now on his family will always come first. I don't know why I felt the need to write all this. Maybe it was all the talk about scientists.
@Yuti640
@Yuti640 Жыл бұрын
An alternate solution to the research issue, is to make your own sort of science, if it is a fictional world, you just gotta explain it well, in a simple but concise way that can be adapted to any situation since science is something that’s all imposing, it’s in every situation For me, I try a hybrid style, a mix between fictional science and real science, using just the more simpler aspects of real science in combination with my own interesting fictional science that the smart person can adapt in because I can give the smart person the same infinite intellect on the fictional science that I have since, as the creator, I’d know everything about it
@unicorntomboy9736
@unicorntomboy9736 Жыл бұрын
Please do heists next. The Fast and the Furious movies are one of the best heist stories out there today, especially the 5th movie.
@PossumReviews
@PossumReviews Жыл бұрын
If one's prerogative is to inculcate the illusion of sagacity, the foremost method is to intersperse one's parlance with supererogatory sesquipedalian circumlocution. Because that's how smart people talk.
@starvalkyrie
@starvalkyrie Жыл бұрын
1:05 I was genuinely disturbed by how long the good advice went on. Worried I was having a stroke.
@strangeaelurus
@strangeaelurus Жыл бұрын
I was wondering where all the sarcasm went in the beginning of the video until JP was like "throw that all away" XD
@stayedhumblereese3447
@stayedhumblereese3447 Жыл бұрын
My favorite smart character will always be Spider man/Peter Parker. He isn’t your typical smart character that thinks he’s better than anybody what’s comes to intelligence. He’s character comes cross as humble, responsible, and trying to help others with their struggles. Most smart characters to me have one- dimensional personalities, by having a passion they love as their personality. With Peter he doesn’t make science his personality.
@spanishSpaniard
@spanishSpaniard Жыл бұрын
The ego joke improves year by year.
@liamjensen2025
@liamjensen2025 Жыл бұрын
0:34 I love the little thrawn off to the side, he's probably my favorite smart character.
@crediblesalamander8056
@crediblesalamander8056 Жыл бұрын
Remember, when writing a smart character you can work backwards. Instead of constructing a difficult situation and trying to figure out how a smart character can resolve it. You can come up with a smart solution and adjust the conflict or variables so that the solution makes sense. Thus, you don't actually need to have amazing analytical skills yourself. The character looks smart and the reader is none the wiser.
@nikoladedic6623
@nikoladedic6623 Жыл бұрын
Wait, two videos in a week? Greed must have truly taken over.
@theluminousone5883
@theluminousone5883 Жыл бұрын
I expected there to be a multiple month wait, not simply a couple days. Love triangles can do ANYTHING!
@marocat4749
@marocat4749 Жыл бұрын
And its nor even jujune either.
@theluminousone5883
@theluminousone5883 Жыл бұрын
@@marocat4749 whats jujune?
@marocat4749
@marocat4749 Жыл бұрын
@@theluminousone5883 the funny word he rants aboit including giving a diary excerpt. Something dull or so, i forgot honestly, its judt a very funny word
@danaa-
@danaa- 11 күн бұрын
Now he hasnt uploaded in four months.
@VidiaReePhoenix
@VidiaReePhoenix Жыл бұрын
*Pro-tip:* Never let your genius be wrong! Instead of trying to show their intelligence by how well they adapt to unexpected situations, write it so that they always knew every situation that comes up and how to solve it before hand. Not lazy at all!
@shadowofdimentio4618
@shadowofdimentio4618 Жыл бұрын
Ok but no mention to the fact smart characters are often just given knowledge that's impossible to gain, like modern sherlock being able to figure out things by looking at you for two seconds and Aizen planning years ahead in advance. Always love when the smart character is so smart they can literally guess and be 100% correct on anything
@Albino_Basilisk
@Albino_Basilisk Жыл бұрын
Donatello and billy the blue ranger are the smart ones, and also my favorite ones from their respected groups
@revui834
@revui834 Жыл бұрын
I'm currently writing a murder mystery where there's a team-up between two intelligent characters who have entirely different styles of deduction that cover for each other's weaknesses, with one of them being more concerned with observable reality and practical knowledge that lends itself well to picking up on smaller details, and the other being more or less out of touch with reality with a brain that generates endless theories for his investigative partner to pick through and determine which ones make the most sense. If not for this video, I never would've realized that these two should actually just both be omniscient geniuses who know everything immediately because they are just so smart. Like, dude, trust me. Just trust me. They're smart. You agree.
@icecreamhero2375
@icecreamhero2375 Жыл бұрын
What happens when one of them gets sick and can't show up to work?
@revui834
@revui834 Жыл бұрын
@@icecreamhero2375 Geniuses don't get sick. They outsmart the germs. Actual answer: There is one case toward the end where the endless theory generator is... unavailable. He's physically present but personal reasons leave him unwilling to assist. For the other investigator, this is the toughest case of her life as she tries to basically brute force her mind into doing the same thing his does. It's almost dramatic irony; she began the story resisting his attempts to help, but gradually got so used to it that investigating without him feels like investigating with half her brain. She's also at a general low point in the story due to recent losses and personal grievances; she nearly gives up the case entirely.
@broadside1713
@broadside1713 Жыл бұрын
You scared me at the beginning with all that GOOD advice about writing being a magic show, I was relieved when it turned out to just be a prank
@marocat4749
@marocat4749 Жыл бұрын
It i kinda, that you can keep the attention where it should be while playing tricks to get it moving, maybe even reveal later. It doent have to e, but its at least an entertainment show.
@Zift_Ylrhavic_Resfear
@Zift_Ylrhavic_Resfear Жыл бұрын
Thanks for the video :) The mad scientist trope is also unrealistic for another reason : modern science is a team effort. You just won't get far alone, because science is slow and It's very hard to not make mistakes when you don't have anyone to bring in a different perspective. To put it in more details, science is all about making sure there has not been any mistake, so checking everything multiple times is necessary, and in theory every study must be done several times by different teams (in practice it's not done as much as it should, because who is going to read your study and give you money if it just says "we got the same result as that previous study"?). And as you can expect, this makes it very slow to learn anything in science. The only reason scientific progress is relatively fast is because there are many scientists working on different things at the same time, and even then our understanding of the world doesn't change much from year to year, progress takes decades to be made. The reason we have so many scientists btw, is that that the scientific method is just that, a method. It's a way of doing things that you learn, and you don't need to be a genius to do that, so average people can become scientists. Anyway, the point is that a lone scientist won't have much results.
@julietfischer5056
@julietfischer5056 Жыл бұрын
That trope got started when it was still possible for lone geniuses to make their mark. Even then, they had colleagues, or the works of others, to consult. The better-written 'mad scientists' did have assistants, subordinate scientists, and contacts with various scientific organizations--in addition to funding and other resources.
@tsm688
@tsm688 Жыл бұрын
@@julietfischer5056 even then, the lone genius didn't just happen to make an advance, they spent a lifetime acquiring the necessary knowledge and tools. Even Einstein didn't come from nowhere. He had a math and physics background, he was a patent clerk just because he couldn't find a job.
@julietfischer5056
@julietfischer5056 Жыл бұрын
@@tsm688- Yep. But lone nuts are more fun.
@annasolovyeva1013
@annasolovyeva1013 Жыл бұрын
Uncareful learning of modern physics can actually drive you mad, but such a person gets flaws in logic and therefore becomes incompetent as a scientist. That also leads to suicide and depression, not making war robots. A country or a corporation that pays engineers and scientists money to make battle robots results in battle robots. The closest we can get to the actual 'mad scientist" trope is a group of scientists, who is: 1) paid by the actual villain to make the research or construct the stuff they need. It should not be something yet impossible, but rather an engineering project with vague goals. Humanity already makes robots or can synthesize chemicals, but what about making them act bad in a particular way? 2) are totally normal, but nerds and weirdos. Let's say they are awkward about particular human social experiences (e.g. sb hates soccer or nightclubs) and are into some nerd hobbies or sports to chill out. Into music out of mainstream. E.g. sb who plays the violin, enjoys jazz, hates discos and idk, figure skates? 3) come from a foreign country where the government used to fund science and education, but now after a crisis or coup it stopped or seised funding. Theoretical education is still decent, but lab financing sucks. And they want modern lab gear, funds for their projects and somewhat decent wages to live with comfort. It gives a reason for them to work for the villain and a different mentality gives another layer of weirdness. Let's assume you have people from former SU. No branching cranberries needed, but slavs don't small-talk, for instance, put up lab flasks on a tripod in a fir tree shape on New year, drink enormous amounts of tea (leaf black/red tea in a proper teapot) on any time and occasion - the biggest Russian industrially manufactured porcelain teapot is 4.5 l big. It's about what your team uses for brainstorms. Done - "mad" scientists.
@5daboz
@5daboz Жыл бұрын
THANK YOU! This is what I already wrote to Hello Future Me to talk about. How both smarter and limited characters are a fascinating challenge for any writer given that he is (probably) not them, so everything can go wrong (or lame) really fast. What clever tricks he/she/they will employ, given that someone smarter would presumably come up with a better solution to their problem.
@borjaslamic
@borjaslamic Жыл бұрын
Here's a maybe great way to deliver information on complicated scientific topics and the like. Read a kids book, that should explain it like you're five and then your character can explain it to the others in the same way.
@annasolovyeva1013
@annasolovyeva1013 Жыл бұрын
Lucy and Steven Hawking have written a great series like that on modern physics. I mean nuke, quantum, astro .
@josephmother6822
@josephmother6822 Жыл бұрын
1:44 *Sleight, meaning swiftness, not slight. I will now proceed to write several novels including only smart characters after such a major ego boost.
@eggy6815
@eggy6815 Жыл бұрын
This was perfectly timed as i was gonna write a smart character for my dnd campaign. On an unrelated note, do you think you can do a pirate episode in the next 24 hours?
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