Katawa Shoujo Forums

I've followed Hanako's route to the end after some trial and error, and I must say she captured my heart. However, there is something about her character that somehow irks me: it falls all-too-readily into place as a "Sympathy Sue"- a character whose dark and troubled past, shyness, and natural disabilities cause her some grief in her present situation, thus inspiring your sympathy and giving the trope its name. See here also: "http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/M ... atheticSue.
What is your opinion on this? Do you think that Hanako is developed enough to escape the event horizon of this particular trope? Given how abrupt the ending was, with no epilogue chronicling her improvement, I think that there isn't much to go on in this theory. However, one thing I thought initially was that given her apparent PTSD following the fire and her subsequent experiences, she has more of a right to act in this way than other Sympathy Sue-type characters.
What are your thoughts?

Burgundy wrote:I've followed Hanako's route to the end after some trial and error, and I must say she captured my heart. However, there is something about her character that somehow irks me: it falls all-too-readily into place as a "Sympathy Sue"- a character whose dark and troubled past, shyness, and natural disabilities cause her some grief in her present situation, thus inspiring your sympathy and giving the trope its name. See here also: "http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/M ... atheticSue.
What is your opinion on this? Do you think that Hanako is developed enough to escape the event horizon of this particular trope? Given how abrupt the ending was, with no epilogue chronicling her improvement, I think that there isn't much to go on in this theory. However, one thing I thought initially was that given her apparent PTSD following the fire and her subsequent experiences, she has more of a right to act in this way than other Sympathy Sue-type characters.
What are your thoughts?

The whole point of the Hanako route is that showering someone with too much sympathy is BAD!! Just look at her bad end if you baby her.

So no. She is not a sympathy sue.

I could go through that article and pick out all the words and sentences that state why Hanako is not a sympathy sue, but I would then end up spending a lot more time than I'd like, because not only are there many arguments to why she's not one, but also because tvtropes.

It's pretty much agreed that she is a Woobie, however.

encrypted12345 wrote:

Burgundy wrote:I've followed Hanako's route to the end after some trial and error, and I must say she captured my heart. However, there is something
-Snip-

The whole point of the Hanako route is that showering someone with too much sympathy is BAD!! Just look at her bad end if you baby her.

So no. She is not a sympathy sue.

That doesn't immediately exempt the characteristics. What I'm asking is whether her actual character can be taken as the aforementioned trope and whether or not you think she's developed enough to get away with it

I would say no:

First off, she doesn't unload her troubles onto everybody within earshot- It's not until partway into act two that she even tells Hisao the beginnings of what happened to her, and not even Lilly knows the full extent of what happened.

Second, her character isn't about people feeling sorry for her- being coddled is more or less the opposite of what she wants. She also doesn't ignore the fact that people care about her, or whatever positive things that happen in her life- in fact, her H-scene occurs because she was 1.) Afraid of being seen as an emotional burden to others and 2.) Didn't want to lose one of her few friends.

Thirdly, her character has more facets than being the trauma llama- while shy, she's also quietly competitive, as games force other people to treat her as an equal rather than a fragile doll. She's probably at her happiest before the end scenes during the times she's playing chess or pool with Hisao (who she totally poolsharks, anyway).

I don't think she can be considered a Sympathetic Sue as the trope is explained here. Hanako does not seem to want sympathy. Her character might elicit it from the reader, but at the beginning of the story she's happy being left alone by everyone. If you think she wants sympathy you probably missed the whole point of her bad ending. She does not make a big deal out of her pain, trying to force everyone around her to shower her with sympathy. She has to force herself the first time she tells Hisao about her history (to the point it seems to be physically painful for her) and even Lilly doesn't know much about what happened. She does not ignore the positives in her life. In fact, she seems content with the small exchanges of joy she shares with Lilly and eventually Hisao. She even says that she's not jealous of Lilly for having a lot of friends.

"She has a sad backstory and you feel bad" does not make her a Sympathy Sue. The TVTropes article even mentions this several times, which makes me wonder why you seem to think this applies to Hanako.

I merely wondered because she showed several of the defining characteristics, and her elusiveness somehow made it seem like she was more wallowing in her own self-pity. However, I see your point now.

I honestly never saw her as that type of Mary Sue giving the fact in the good end she wnats to have sex with Hisao to show she don't wanna be view as a person who needs to be babied because of her tragic past and if you get the bad end she snaps on you and basically goes off on you for treating her like she was a lonely child.

The thing is, Hanako is a Loner. She spends most of her time alone, has few friends and likes to read alone in a beanbag in the corner of the library.
i didnt see her as a Mary Sue, she does not try to make everybody sorry for her .

The problem is, Loners are aliens, they are outside, they don't need nor want hundreds of friends, but the worst thing for a loner are that non loners tend to think they are broken or unhappy or worst, they tend to thing that loners need help to socialize or need to be showered with attention.As a loner myself i noticed that needy people tend to react badly to loners, trying constantly to help them "reach out" to others. And lots of forum dwellers round here are needy...

The sad thing is, most players missed Hanako's route lesson...

Note: The needy part seems a bit heavy or insulting, the thing is, i don't know a lighter word for needy.
note 2: Party of one: the loners manifesto by Anelli Rufus, A hell of a book.

The Mary Sue archetype is one-dimensionally perfect, which Hanako isn't. She's deliberately set up to look like a Sympathy Sue (which I mean metaphorically, but the more literal sense also works), but this is so that they can throw the sympathy back in your face later. I thought it was a very interesting take on the whole thing.

Mary Sue is more Lilly than Hanako.

Every single fictional character is called a Sue nowadays. It seems like the term is meaningless.

Notguest wrote:Every single fictional character is called a Sue nowadays. It seems like the term is meaningless.

Especially when it is a Fan Character.

Notguest wrote:Every single fictional character is called a Sue nowadays. It seems like the term is meaningless.

It's far from meaningless. For a character to avoid the stigma, he/she/it must show signs of progression away from the original (bad) characteristics: if this progression is not evident, then the term is applied to a greater or lesser degree of truth.

Tomate wrote:
As a loner myself i noticed that needy people tend to react badly to loners, trying constantly to help them "reach out" to others. And lots of forum dwellers round here are needy...

The sad thing is, most players missed Hanako's route lesson...

Note: The needy part seems a bit heavy or insulting, the thing is, i don't know a lighter word for needy.
note 2: Party of one: the loners manifesto by Anelli Rufus, A hell of a book.

I can't help but note that classifying yourself as a loner won't help your situation. It's somehow like you enjoy being such, when all it would take to stop would be a basic set of social skills, but I digress.

She's not a Mary Sue.

Mary Sue is a sexist term to begin with (and if you disagree, kindly point yourself here), but none of the main girls in KS are what I would consider one-dimensional wish-fulfillment characters (or, if wish-fulfillment is part of their character, it is not their only defining trait). Some are more multi-faceted than others but as far as I'm concerned, they're all pretty good, and if I did have to pick out the character with the most stereotypical characteristics, it would be Lilly, not Hanako.