Put Them Through Hell

As writers, we always hear it’s necessary to put our characters through hell, right? Hardship is what will make our characters grow and help them achieve their full potential. It’s also an excellent place to showcase to your readers what characters are made of, even if that kind of strength or endurance is something we’ve never seen from them before. I’m talking about that make-or-break moment that decides how things play out from now on.

I kind of found my way to this week’s topic coincidentally, as I hit several excellent illustrations of this point at the same time. But I’ve always been really intrigued by these scenes of endurance where you see a character have to choose to be their strongest self. These scenes, by definition, are almost always excruciating to experience as a reader or viewer (in the case of movies or TV) and the fact that a fictional person can channel that sort of emotional reaction from you is one of the amazing parts about writing. I’m going to walk through a couple of examples I can think of where you see characters fight through this kind of struggle and break down some common themes and elements. There will be spoilers ahead.

            As I’ve said, I’ve hit several good examples of this type of scene recently, and the first one I came across was in Philip Pullman’s second book in the His Dark Materials series, The Subtle Knife. These fantasy stories follow the journeys of several separated characters from the first book, one of which is the aeronaut, Lee Scoresby, who is looking for Lyra (the main girl in the series) and eventually teams up with mysterious arctic explorer, Stanislaus Grumman. If you’ve read this series, you can probably tell what scene I’m going to talk about: the ill-fated chapter “Alamo Gulch”. (In retrospect, just from that name alone, I shouldn’t have been surprised by how that chapter went down, but still.)

            So, in this chapter, Grumman and Scoresby are searching for Lyra and the bearer of the subtle knife, but they’re being rapidly pursued and are forced to move on foot. The men chasing them are after Grumman, and Scoresby chooses to stay behind to hold the men off long enough for him to escape and try to complete the mission. In the heart-rending scene that follows, you see Scoresby, low on ammunition and outnumbered, fight out a slow, inevitable battle that you as the reader hope he’ll miraculously find a way out of. As the battle wages, Scoresby and his daemon (think a spirit animal sort of deal), Hester, fight fiercely from their chosen spot, though it soon becomes clear this is a last stand as Scoresby is repeatedly wounded. At the last second, Hester remembers that an allied witch gave him a flower that would allow him to call her in a time of need. The reader, desperate for any sign of hope, is sure this is the miraculous way out we’ve been hoping for. But alas, the witch needs time to come to his aid, and the outcome might have been different if the flower had been remembered sooner. Scoresby and Hester both perish, though not before both are sure every foe chasing them was vanquished. Lyra and Grumman will be safe, even if it required their sacrifice.

            I’m not someone who’s typically super emotional when it comes to stories, but let me tell you, this scene almost made me cry. Two enjoyable characters sacrificing everything they have for the success of the overall mission is hard enough, but having help literally on the way and being that close to salvation? Dang, that gets you.

            On a slightly happier note, let’s shift gears to the second example of this type of scene I’ve come across in the last few weeks. My family and I have been watching the hilariously dark SYFY show, Resident Alien, which follows an alien who crashes on earth and takes human form after he fails to complete a mission to destroy the human race. Near the end of season one, Harry (our alien in disguise played by the incomparable Alan Tudyk) is up on the mountain searching for the final element of his doomsday device, and gets waylaid by Asta (Sara Tomko) and D’Arcy (Alice Wetterlund) who came to get him because the mountain is dangerous during the spring thaw and there’s a storm coming. In true writing form, the three fall victim to the very thing Asta and D’Arcy came to prevent and they all tumble into an icy crevasse. Asta and Harry fall farthest, but D’Arcy had a chance to hook in her climbing equipment and prevents herself as deep a fall even though she’s down quite a ways a well.

Though Harry and Asta are dealing with their own problems and revelations, I’m going to focus in on D’Arcy. One thing I really like about this show is that every character is messy and heroic at the same time- everyone has difficulties and vices and goodness in them in a pointedly human struggle, even if the characters are not always human. D’Arcy is maybe a character that’s focused on more-so in this respect, but this scene introduces a really interesting set-up. D’Arcy, a character that’s been haunted by a brutal physical injury in a winter sport before, is stuck alone, halfway up the crevasse with the climbing gear and eventually, unbeknownst to the other characters, a broken wrist. For one horrifying moment, you see D’Arcy call out for Asta in a panic as she realizes she may have been the only one of the three to survive the fall. Luckily, Asta gives verbal confirmation from the bottom of the crevasse, and D’Arcy, soothed, quickly realizes that the only way any of them survives is if she’s able to climb out to the radio and the last snowmobile to go get help. The ensuing scene has D’Arcy’s hard-fought struggle to climb out of the crevasse, which includes at least one good fall back down and a blackout. She even makes a video log in case she’s not able to make it, which tells the audience her confidence in being able to rescue them all is pretty low.

            D’Arcy, with a broken wrist, has to free climb out of the crevasse and go get help before the snow storm fully sets in or Harry’s injuries get worse. Talk about no pressure. D’Arcy is kind of an interesting character because she’s one of those people who’s extremely confident in one sense, but not in others. She’s had a life-altering failure before due to an injury, but this time, it’s her best friend who’ll lose her life if she fails- her best friend who’s always kept her going. This is a character that has to put all her self-doubt out of mind and channel her strength because she must succeed. Eventually, D’Arcy is able to get out of the crevasse and get lines down to the others to pull them out as well.

            Two very different scenarios but still the same vibe. I still find it kind of funny that I ran across these two scenes within a short time of each other. Thinking back on scenes I had a similar reaction to, I can also think of two examples that immediately come to mind, both of which center on two of my favorite fictional characters.

            I know I talk about the Riordan-verse enough to probably have a jingle for that segment of the blog, but The Heroes of Olympus series puts Annabeth through the ringer in the same form I’m talking about. Beyond dealing with the disappearance of her boyfriend in the early books, by The Mark of Athena (B3), Annabeth has drawn the ire of her mother, Athena, and discovered there’s a portion of the quest she’ll have to complete entirely on her own. Annabeth is assaulted by monsters, forced to the limits of mental and physical endurance, and- on top of everything- breaks her ankle and is forced to walk it off to see her quest through. And all that’s before she reaches the end of the line and finds herself face-to-face with the mortal enemy of all children of Athena, Arachne. This scene, of course, leads to one of Riordan’s most infamous cliffhangers, which sees the other lead characters find their way to Annabeth and the object of her quest, the Athena Parthenos, both of whom are in desperate need of backup. A last ditch effort saves the statue, but Annabeth’s ankle gets snagged by Arachne who is determined to take Athena’s chosen child out with her. Percy tries to save Annabeth, though both quickly realize that there’s no use and accept the fall into Tartarus, which triggers the two’s journey all throughout the next book, The House of Hades.

            (Side Note: I just realized I titled this blog “Put Them Through Hell” and then discussed a scene where Rick Riordan literally threw his characters into hell. That’s kind of funny.)

            So, not only has Annabeth finally been reunited with her boyfriend and undergone a solo quest crucial to saving the world where she sustained an intense injury and had to keep going, she now has been thrown into the literal pits of the Underworld and has to continue moving forward. The last time I read The Mark of Athena, I feel like I just spent the whole last stretch of Annabeth’s scenes in awe of that level of toughness and determination. She’s injured in an extremely painful way, splints herself up, gets battered by her worst fears at every turn, and fights on not just to the end of one book, but keeps going through a whole other book. That’s insane.

            Secondly, when I think about scenes that completely challenge a character to the utmost core of their being, there is one person we cannot overlook. I’m talking about Katara from Avatar: The Last Airbender, in specific reference to the bloodbending episode, “The Puppetmaster” (Season 3, Episode 8). I genuinely cannot think of a better example of a storyline that completely strips a character down and reshapes them to where they’ll never be the same again. All throughout this episode, you have Katara thinking she’s learning about a new form of waterbending that might be a key to defeating the Fire Nation, and then slowly becoming aware that the very use of such a terrible power over people is not worth the corruption of her character. Katara spurns her newfound teacher and ends up fighting for her life, ending in the tragic ultimatum that the only way Katara can win the battle and save herself is to bloodbend and cross her own moral lines. This episode is so dark and you can see the toll it takes on the usually hopeful Katara. The writers literally take away a piece of her soul with the events of this episode and it is writing that is excruciatingly executed. This episode scared me to death when I was younger, and it still is one of the most painful episodes to watch in my opinion just because of how one of your favorite characters gets broken. Plus, the impact of this scene is expressed throughout Katara’s life, as the spin-off show The Legend of Korra, emphasizes that later in her life, Katara rallied for bloodbending to become illegal.

            So, let’s think about what all these excruciating scenes have in common and compare.

1.     High Stakes

In each scenario, the stakes are very high for all our characters. If Scoresby and Grumman are captured, no one gets to Lyra to help her journey or finds the bearer of the subtle knife to aid in the larger war at hand. If D’Arcy isn’t able to climb out of the crevasse for help, all three of them will die. If Annabeth doesn’t find the Athena Parthenos, the greater quest to save the world will fail. If Katara found a secret weapon against the Fire Nation, the tide in the war might turn.

Each character is operating under an extreme amount of pressure to fulfill a smaller goal key to the success of the larger mission. Holding the gulch, climbing the wall, finding the statue, harnessing the power- all of it directly correlates to the desired outcome: completing the journey, saving her friends, saving the world, winning the war. This is the make-or-break, do-or-die moment for a character, and everything that happens later depends on the completion of this single task.

2.      Obstacle and Injury

            In three of the four scenarios, the characters have to deal with an injury that directly inhibits their ability to succeed. Lee Scoresby receives multiple wounds that prevent him from moving and effects his ability to fire on the approaching enemies, D’Arcy’s fall breaks her wrist which will make the climb up the crevasse where she has to use her hands extremely difficult, and Annabeth breaks her ankle, which makes walking on difficult but also hinders the speed at which her quest can be completed.

            Katara, on the other hand, may receive some injuries in the fight, but the obstacle preventing her moving forward falls much more into a mental or ideological battle than a physical one. Katara is fighting on moral principle while everything about the way the fight goes provides temptation or need to utilize a power that will allow her to win, at the expense of the soul she’s fighting for. If Katara uses the power, in her mind, she is no better than anyone she’s fighting against.

3.     Change in Character

As I said before, these are all make-or-break scenes for these characters where the end results will drastically depend on how their actions play out. In the case of Lee Scoresby, he doesn’t really know what side he’s aiding in the murky war beginning to play out and he only promises to let Grumman go once he’s sure that him choosing to stay and hold their pursuers at bay will be of greater use to protecting Lyra. This act proves his devotion to her and whatever cause she stands for.

            D’Arcy and Annabeth are characters both fighting against their own self-doubt and fear of failure. D’Arcy is a character that’s been to the top and had a huge setback in her life due to an injury, leaving her currently in a place of stagnated self-sabotage. Does she ever truly think she’s going to make it out of the crevasse? Since she makes a video in case she dies, maybe not, but the thing that propels D’Arcy onward and upward is perhaps not her own need to survive, but her need to save her best friend. It’s clear that Asta has always been the person who’s forced her to keep going, and this time the roles are reversed. I think D’Arcy refuses to be the reason Asta dies and that is what gets her out of the hole. Annabeth, on the other hand, is a character we’ve never really seen working outside of a team forced into a quest alone. I think this is also one of the really interesting things about Annabeth’s writing technique in particular because, up until The Mark of Athena, she’s been in seven other Percy Jackson books and never narrated before. Prior to this book, the audience only knows Annabeth through the words of other characters, the most frequent of which is Percy (who is obviously a little biased being as she’s his best friend and later girlfriend), and so up until this point, we’ve most often associated Annabeth with being cool, confident, and always having a plan. Inside her own head though, Annabeth is an anxious, traumatized teenager who doesn’t view herself that way at all- she’s always worried about the next step forward or making the wrong move. With her off on her own, we get Annabeth completely unfiltered by any other character and Riordan instantly walks her through her own worst nightmares. Both Annabeth and D’Arcy are on a journey of self that may be aimed more at subtle, yet massive changes like confidence, overcoming fear, and conquering the ghosts of your past.

            Katara, in this scenario, might be a mix of both. She’s clear on who she is, what her principals are, and what she’s fighting for. Still, she finds herself forced into an impossible situation where the only chance of survival is to compromise her own values. This is the one time Katara, a character who has always been the moral compass of the group, steps over the line and, though it saves her life, it is clearly something that haunts her for the rest of her life. Avatar is a show that likes to force its characters to change and grow, and especially in the final season, you see the main kids suddenly become much more grown up. They’ve journeyed around the world and are leading the efforts in a larger war. Yet it’s Katara’s need to help the greater good that almost sends her into utter corruption. As the saying goes, “The path to hell is paved with good intentions” and Katara trades a piece of her soul for this costly lesson.

4.     Hope

For a final factor in all these dire scenarios, I think I’d be remiss to ignore the element of hope, which clearly plays a crucial role.

Keeping with Katara, hope of a new ability to use against the bad guys is what tempts her into the grey area of war in the first place. For D’Arcy, hope that at the very least she can save her friends fuels her forward. Annabeth keeps walking forward alone because if she completes her mission, she’ll be reunited with Percy, her friends, and their larger quest will have a much better chance of succeeding. All three of these characters survive, with their newfound lessons, but let’s talk about the character that doesn’t.

For Lee Scoresby, there probably is a faint hope that he can hold off the oncoming attackers and then follow after Grumman when it’s safe. As the scene continues though, that hope (along with the reader’s) starts to drain away as he’s repeatedly injured and running out of ammo. As I mentioned before, at the last second, Scoresby remembers the witch’s flower that can be used to call for help, and I think hope is actually the part of this scene that makes it so devastating. This last hope makes the reader think he can be saved. The witch, who is another prominent character, will come, heal him, and everything will be fine. Still, it quickly becomes apparent that this hope has come too late. Scoresby is wounded too badly, the witch is too far away to come quickly, and things might have turned out differently if only he’d thought to use his call for help sooner. The fact that there is help coming and that everything could be fine is a false hope that makes this scene truly devastating.

            Well, that blog felt like an emotional rollercoaster, but it was an interesting topic to write about. Do you have any make-or-break moments for characters that you think are good examples of character development? Let us know!

Thanks for reading. Write on.

-Kamryn