Jun 24 2009
Key traits of interesting jobs
Many, perhaps most, real life jobs have a fairly narrow and specialized focus. For example, most people of a company’s employees work for a particular department and newspaper reports usually focus on stories related to their section of the paper. In general, I’d recommend giving your heroes jobs that are more flexible because it gives more opportunity to entangle the character in the plot and add new developments.
Here are some aspects that can make a job more flexible and plot-friendly.
1. Get the character out of his office. Offices are mostly bland, forgettable, comfortable and safe. As far as readers and interesting stories are concerned, they are Kryptonite. I’d recommend giving your character a lot of work outside the office because the real world is harder to predict and gives you more opportunities to work in new scenes, danger, seedy characters, etc.
2. Please avoid making the character the boss. Usually, the boss has the least interesting job in the building. Privates and flunkies usually have more at stake than a general or a business magnate does. In addition, low-level work is generally more interesting. I’d much rather read about a platoon patrolling hostile streets or a corporate flack trying to steal corporate secrets than about the men that decided to send the patrols or steal the secrets.
3. As much as possible, please have the hero spend his time working with people outside of his company. The relationships within a company are usually tidy and well-controlled, especially if the characters share the same goals. When a boss lays down the law, that’s usually the end of it. It’s usually more interesting when a character can’t just order other people to give him what he wants. For example, a police officer has to convince a reluctant witness to testify, which will give you an opportunity to show you how impressive he is. In contrast, if the cop could just order the man to testify, that wouldn’t be very interesting or impressive. (Well, technically, cops can order witnesses to testify, but persuasion is often necessary in dangerous cases).
4. I’d recommend making the hero accountable to a tough boss. Characters like JJ Jameson tend to add a lot more dramatic potential than friendly bosses like Perry White. They create more of an obstacle for the heroes and usually make the heroes seem more likable.
One of the things this doesn’t take into account is the sheer number of jobs that don’t take place in a cubicle. Rarely do superheroes seem to get cubicle jobs like this article suggests… Writers seem to think they’re above that kind of thing, unless it’s for humor purposes.
B.Mac, number 4 reminds me of the TV series 24 where Jack Bauer faces some obstacles such as CTU Directors who are opposed to his tactics – such as Ryan Chapelle.
The Wire is another show that I thought did a good job with cop vs. boss conflict. Another option would be that the character has a lot of conflict with someone on the job that isn’t a boss. For example, on Dexter, the main character is a serial killer that works as a lab tech for the police department. His main conflict on the police force is with an observant and paranoid detective that picks up too many creepy vibes from a guy whose instincts were too good.
Yeah, Dexter is another good example.
Is being a detective a suitable job for a superhero that is an alien? And how would I go about it ?
@Nick, the Martian Manhunter is a PI, so it works for at least for one character (well, depending on your opinion of MM)
“Is being a detective a suitable job for a superhero that is an alien? And how would I go about it?” I’m not sure how to answer that. Could you be a bit more specific? (IE: What are some of your concerns about an alien-as-detective?)
One thing that I considered once (not sure if it’s any good) is to give the superhero a job as a photojournalist… where the boss secretly knows that it’s the hero.
“But, how did she get these photos?”
“Simple. That’s Sonix.”
“WHAT?”
“How else could she get them?”
“Then, why’d you hire her?”
“SImple. I get the best shots of Sonix in the city, and if anyone tries something in the building, I have the ultimate security guard. All I need to do is keep her secret. An excellent trade-off.
That sounds like a very believable take on J. J. Jameson. (Maybe he’s just PRETENDING to hate Spiderman. In a New York City where pretty much everybody is neck-deep in shadiness, but especially the Punisher and Wolverine and the hundreds of murderous villains, it feels very strange that anyone would argue that Spiderman is the linchpin of evil).
Mind you, I love JJJ, too.
Yeah, that’s where I came up with the idea of it. Not sure whether I should, or even can, use this idea though.