Most of our members have “Original Characters” (OCs) we LOVE playing because we decide when we will kill them versus the writers of the shows. But OC’s have to prove themselves and not look like Mary Sues/Gary Stus with godmodding and tropes. That’s what makes them hard to maintain. Moreover, there are NO images and they’d have to be collected and the behavior has to be believable.
The fact that ALL roleplayers (RPs) who have OCs work very hard to do this sort of performances, which means that there are standards they follow and really work at that makes roleplay (RP) part of the fun. Most OCs are done very well.
However, Lucasfilm told SWAG 77 that we cannot have OCs, that we must follow the canon, continuity and timeline, i.e. Darth Vader does not have a wife during the “Dark Times” and ANH era, which means SWAG 77 does not RP him with a “wife”.
Moreover, that means new characters seen on TV have to be predicted as to what the writers have in store for us. For instance: “Fives“.
Why build blogs, Facebook pages, Twitter accounts, etc. to respect the fandom when LFL does a “Game of Thrones” style death of their character? All the stories must be dismantled and the social media changed. For SWAG 77, it’s normal, par for the course. For us, we’re use to it. For the fans, it messes with their minds.
All this to say, SWAG 77’s predictions were wrong about the character “Fives” and we’re fine with that. Sometimes our hypotheses are incorrect, we’ll move on.
Here’s the thing: This is why we ask ALL our RP members to do a THEMATIC character representations versus method character representation. A THEMATIC acting vs. METHOD acting. Thematic acting is related to the overall story and where the characters fit into the story. Method acting is what actors do to put themselves into the role of the character to get at their thoughts. Technically, it is more of a percentage issue.
The problem with using the method acting is social media binds people’s psyches through the code and they delve too much personal energy for characters. Social media actors get too attached to our characters, especially when we build all these social media portals and platforms for them for interaction. Iconic characters are not an issue. Actors are hurt when the perform as the small secondary cast and their favorite character dies. Writers are trained to disconnect and have dispassionate control of their character’s interactions. Changes and edits are made collectively made for logical flow to story and worldbuild which is tied in with marketing and advertising. And the story writing group gets the approvals to move forward to storyboarding. Last minute script changes are made so that flow is logical. That is how it done IRL.
As for “FIVES” character: In story group meeting they probably wrangled with this issue. But they came to a resolution and this is the direction they chose. Our group doesn’t know why, but it probably has something to do with Star Wars Rebels and future episodes. It is the editing on the film floor kind of thing. It would have not made sense to keep moving forward in a “wind down” and build up to a new series. This is the COST OF STAR WARS FANDOM.
But oh well… Let’s keep moving forward. Will this incident affect your fandom and stop you from roleplaying online? Probably not. You love Star Wars, don’t you? Then show it, grieve if you have to, and keep it moving.