What All Heroes Need

In the past, I’ve talked in depth about what villains need to bring your story to life. Today we’re gonna talk about the heroes, or protagonists, of your story. The people your reader should identify the most with. The people the story is really about.

(Now before we begin, let me say I am not talking about antiheroes. Antiheroes have an entirely different dynamic that parallels the lives of your run-of-the-mill heroes, and they have needs all their own.

Now, let’s begin.

Heroes need friends.

Who is Luke Skywalker without Han Solo? Who is Sherlock Holmes without Dr. Watson? A hero’s friends are the people who not only show up for the big fight or bail them out of jail, but who help the plot move along. One of them will just happen to have the skill your hero needs to figure out the final clue, or will be able to pull a few strings and get the charter bus to the school in time for the football team to make it to the game. Your hero’s friends will also remind them of their moral center.

One of my favorite scenes comes in George R.R. Martin’s A Clash of Kings when Jon Snow finds out that his father is dead. He is overcome with a desire to be at Robb’s side. He goes so far as to sneak out of Castle Black and is on his way south. Who stops him? Samwell Tarly, who reminds him of his vows. That’s what friends do. They support the protagonist. They help the protagonist and remind them of who they are.

Heroes need to save the cat.

If you’ve read my posts before, you know I love Blake Snyder’s Save the Cat. The book’s title comes from an old Hollywood term for making the protagonist lovable. He or she must save the cat: do something selfless early on in the story to establish to the reader that they should like this character. It can be anything. They can give food or money to the poor, act kind to an animal, help a friend out, something. In the beginning of a story, you have to pull out all of your tricks to keep the reader interested. In the beginning is where your hero should do something selfless.

When the original animated film Aladdin was in post-production, test audiences didn’t like the hero, Aladdin. The correction? In the beginning of the film, after our hero steals the apple from the fruit vendor and is about to bite into it, he sees a poor street urchin girl. She is clearly very hungry. Aladdin gives her the apple and walks away hungry. Now we know he’s a good guy.

Heroes need mentors.

This should be obvious. We see it all over our movies, television shows, and books. Even video games use this trope. Star Wars isn’t Star Wars without Obi-Wan Kenobi. King Arthur isn’t King Arthur without Merlin. Whether the mentor is a kindly parental figure, like Mickey in the Rocky movies, or a reluctant holder of knowledge, like Shamus in the Mockingbird books, a mentor is key to a protagonist’s arc. A mentor is necessary to help shape the character of your protagonist, whether they are onstage or not.

Of course, a protagonist never fully becomes a hero unless the mentor goes away. Either the hero must reject the mentor’s advice and do things on their own, or the mentor must leave—either by going away or dying—allowing the hero of your story the room to grow into themselves.

Heroes need flaws and weaknesses.

Flaws and weaknesses are the cornerstone of a good story. A hero’s flaws and weaknesses should drive the story forward. They should get the character into more and more trouble. Overcoming these flaws should be the way they overcome the plot problem and win the day.

Many new writers fall into the trap of writing a perfect protagonist. Or, the protagonist is the idealized version of themselves, which means they can’t see their flaws. A character without flaws is a boring character. Very few people want to read about the perfect person.

The great thing is that a flaw can be based on anything! Maybe they’ve got a temper and say the wrong thing when they should be silent. Or maybe they were burned as a child and the facial scars prevent them from being in the career they want. How about someone whose pride won’t allow them to try anything new for fear they’ll fail and be ridiculed? Maybe their drive for revenge is consuming them, crowding out everything else in their life. Flaws can be internal, external, or the way society treats a person.

And since we’re on the topic, let me say that having a disability is not a flaw or weakness. However, depending on the story, it can be framed as a flaw or a weakness as your character overcomes society’s expectations based around that disability. (The same can apply for sexual orientation, gender, ethnicity, or any minority status.)

Both Jon Snow and Cersei Lannister face the condemnation in their society because of their perceived flaws: Jon is illegitimate, while Cersei is a woman. They have other flaws, too. But the labels their society has given them make life harder.

Heroes can be challenging characters to write. The more you work on them, however, the richer and more complex they will become, rewarding the story while making you a better storyteller.