#check out the Grey Painter by William Loman

[erintoknow]

what other media, if any (literally anything; interactive fiction, Bioware- or Bethesda-esque RPGs, etc) do you think Ari would be a good fit for?

what other media? hmmm

well i guess in a way i've already decided the answer to this because i picked out ari and a few other character concepts and are reworking them to fit into an original fiction narrative.

it's been incredibly invigorating to get back into a writing project again after spending the last two years tossing around different ideas and concepts - this one seems to be the one that's sticking so far.

oh dear, i've ended up writing quite a bit more then i originally intended for this, but here we go:

i can't really imagine ari as a character being that good a fit for a video game or even like a tv show or something like (despite having spent a non-small amount of time imagining different such scenarios haha) at the same time though, fiction is fiction - what you consider a good fit is going to depend on what specifically you consider essential to the character, so let's see...

fiction, or i suppose potentially interactive fiction as well, is kind of the one medium that allows the closeness to a character's interior narrative that feels core to making ari stand out in my mind.

i don't think she could support being a lead character without that close lens. dropped into a video game or movie or some other medium, i think you'd get wildly different impressions of her depending on if she was part of the central cast and afforded space (at least in a narrative sense) to drop her guard, or if she was limited to specific section or like 'side quest.' It'd be the difference between seeing a stoic 'action hero' esque figure, a fragile emotional mess underneath that, or a character desperate for love yet utterly afraid of it underneath that.

of course, this is true for all characters in fiction isn't it? the amount of space the narrative affords them determines how well they can be examined or well, characterized, within the core text. different character concepts are better suited for different roles, and which roles those may be can also be dependent on the medium at hand

so then, i'd say - if you want to lean into ariadne's interior psyche drama you want the close perspective only really possible in written fiction imo; if you want more emphasis on action, on ari's outside world relationship, a more visual-based medium like a tv show might be suitable.

hmm actually, a graphic novel in particular would be very hit or miss i think, a traditional approach i think would be pretty boring, but if you had someone willing to get really experimental with page layout and visuals to convey experience through nonverbal means... that could be interesting?

jumping back to video games for a second because now i'm in full on 8am ramble mode and i am going to make 0 effort to edit or clean this up – video games are pretty unique in our forms of media in their ability to use audience interaction to further draw them into the fantasy of the story being told - i mean, really this the whole appeal that otherwise extremely weak narrative series like bioware rpgs right? they manage to have such a profound emotional effect on us as player/audience because we allow ourselves to be drawn into the fantasy that we aren't just watching or reading events unfold but are actively participating in them ourselves. there's absolutely ways you could work with that for ariadne's character concept, i think? i still think she'd be better utilized as not a main character in such a conceit, but a character you have to choose to work to get to know, maybe? probably in some way that ideally comes back later in the game to have repercussions either in revealed information or character actions to represent / respect the work that was or wasn't put into befriending the character.

so uh, to summarize, i think you could take this character and jam her into just about anything with a bit of work and she'd still be mostly recognizable - but it's really only with the close pov of written narrative that she stands out (with the visual element of graphic fiction making it a potential runner up here if you got someone willing to go nuts with it)

an interactive fiction story feels a little too close to her origin as a FHR fanfic character for me to feel comfortable going that route - but objectively i suppose that could work pretty well too? it's just not an angle i'm interested in exploring with the character - if i were to write an interactive fiction story, i already know which concept i'd want to roll with for that. the Grey Painter by William Loman (which is a fantastic piece of horror fiction imo and deserves more love) is a great example of the kind of direction i was already thinking of going with: a character with several preset characteristics in a preexisting relationship with another character, navigating a situation --- i'm digressing now though

considering i am a writer and prefer written narrative (books are so good!!! please check out Hell Followed with Us by Andrew Joseph White or The Girls I've Been by Tessa Sharpe), am actively writing one rn, and developed the original version of the character as part of a written narrative fan fiction, i can't say i'm surprised at my own conclusion haha