The Minor Character Adoption Society

[veronica_rich]

As a writer, have you ever adopted a minor character from someone else's canon for the express purpose of giving them a story? Or six?

I've done it three times, or should say, feel like I'm in the process of doing it a third time whether I want to or not: Reg Barclay from Star Trek: TNG, Prissy from POTC (she didn't even have a name - the fat woman from the first movie, who rubs up against Will in the tavern), and now it seems my brain wants to take home Hillary from the Tomb Raider movies and feed him little doughnuts (whoops - no, that's me who wants those, sorry) and transcribe his history and minor adventures. Just last night I came up with ideas for two more stories.

(I have other stories I need to finish! I have other characters in the brain already. *weeps*)

What is it about minor characters? Is it because they present such a blank canvas? Is it the mystery of trying to piece together a past or expand upon something glimpsed in canon but not much addressed? I know for a fact some of you have taken someone who had two lines in a movie and given them a better history than screenwriters gave the major characters.

I didn't invent these characters. I don't make money off of them, and I don't feel like I should. But I get excited about their histories in a way I don't always about my own original characters (or, I should say, I can come up with the history and ideas, but I find it easier to WRITE the history of someone else's minor character). It can't be laziness, or I wouldn't do any of it. What IS it?

Comments

[beckyblack]

I once included a character in a fic who was only ever mentioned in one episode and never even appeared. Now there's a blank canvas for ya. :D

All that was known of him in canon was he was a pilot, he was black and he used to work with someone who was now working for a drug smuggler, but we didn't even get told if he was involved knowingly in any drug smuggling himself. So he was a real open book.

[veronica-rich.livejournal.com]

And which episode was that? Maybe I'll remember it. *G*

[beckyblack]

In Plane Sight, in season 2. Murdock pretended to be a pilot named Dick Nash, who the bad guy was expecting to show up to fly some crates with drugs concealed in them. But then someone who knew Dick Nash showed up and blew his cover.

I used the real Dick Nash in a fic. Face and Murdock happened to run into him in Brazil. Murdock was pretty chuffed to meet him. :D

[veronica-rich.livejournal.com]

You know - I sort of remember that one, I think ...