What is a Mary Sue? It’s a term for a fictional character (usually female, but there are male variations too) that is too perfect and too easily competent. In film and in literature, critics use the term in a derogatory way when they believe a character to be uninteresting, underdeveloped, lacking realism and relatability, even within the fictional world where the character dwells.
The term “Mary Sue” apparently came about because of some Star Trek fan fiction, very poor fan fiction, I might add based on a sample I read.
If someone wants to call Rey from Star Wars a Mary Sue, I won’t object. She is super powerful, even before any formal training. She easily masters any task. She intuitively knows what to do and how to do it. She is tempted, but doesn’t ever fall. Though her mission of self-discovery gives her some character development, we all knew she was good through and through. We knew she was ultimately on a mission to save everyone. And we never had any fear that she would fail, even when we learned of her dark heritage. (In fact, I think the dark heritage was invented to try to make Rey less of a Mary Sue, hoping she’d be more relatable. Disney thinks that every single person these days is having an identity crisis, crying out to the universe: Who am I!?)
Rey became widely popular. But I think there’s something more going on than people hungering for a strong female hero. We’ve had strong female heroes for a long time. I believe she is loved because she is a Mary Sue, not in spite of it.
A Mary Sue is created because of an author’s wishful thinking. The character is a projection of the author’s hopes and dreams. A film character, who has a team of creators, could therefore be described as a collective wish, a communal hope.
Rey was created because a group of people (and also the world that spent billions on the new trilogy, despite its flaws) have a communal hope that a savior will rise up, will face the darkness, will be tempted but not fall, and overcome evil with good, darkness with light--even if they don't realize it!
Why do you think that is?—this story and the thousands of others stories like it? If you believe that this entire universe and existence is random and accidental, I don’t think you can explain it; you can only marvel in the wonder of the human spirit.
But if you believe that God is good, that He created all things good, but then humans fell into sin and death, now you can see why. We were created to dwell with our good God. We long for that joy and peace. I believe Paul had that internal longing in mind when he spoke in Athens: “And He made from one man every nation of mankind to live on all the face of the earth… that they should seek God, and perhaps feel their way toward Him and find Him. Yet He is actually not far from each one of us…” (Acts 17:26-27).
How far away? Well, because God is present everywhere, not very far, though He was still inaccessible to us. But we were not inaccessible to God.
God became man, and dwelt among us. If Jesus were fictional (and he certainly is not), critics might be tempted to call him a Mary Sue.
- He was easily competent. At twelve years old, he astounded the teachers with His knowledge of Scripture. He won every argument with opponents. No one could stump Him.
- He was easily powerful. Water to wine. Bread and fish multiplied. The blind see, the lame walk, the deaf hear, and the mute speak. Then, even the dead rise up.
- He was thoroughly good. Tempted, but without falling. Human, yet without sin.
A Savior rose up. And He won the war and triumphed over evil by not fighting (kind of like Luke in ROTJ, except better of course). He is One we long for, as even our fictional messiah stories demonstrate.
I really can’t stand movies or shows where every single person is a terrible person, when there’s no good guy, when you don’t know who to cheer for because everyone is super dysfunctional. I know many people in our world find that interesting, and they can certainly find a lot of material to read and watch. I also can’t stand it when a character who is supposed to be good is made corrupt by Hollywood because they think it will be more interesting or relatable, like when Peter Jackson made Faramir weak and prone to evil in his “Lord of the Rings” movies, though Faramir, according to the book, was supposed to be good and not give into temptation, very different from his brother Boromir.
That kind of corruption bothers me. So, I like a good Mary Sue character. Someone good and, yes, even too perfect. Someone powerful and, yes, even too easily competent. Someone I don’t relate to, but someone I look up to, or would if the character were real.
Actually, you have someone like that. And it wasn’t a boy from Tatooine. It wasn’t the other boy from Tatooine. It wasn’t a girl from Jakku.
It was Jesus of Nazareth. Your real-life hero.
truth + love
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