Avaitor's Top 10 Fictional Characters (And Yours, Too?)

[Avaitor]

Because I talked about doing this before, but never got the motivation to write up on my choices until now.

10-

Scrooge McDuck

I always find it interesting to discover which one of Disney's fab five (or six, if you count Daisy) suits the fancy of a certain person. Now, while I can't think of too many males that fancy Minnie or Daisy, it's otherwise hard to determine which particular character might be favored by someone. Be it Mickey's charm, Donald's irritation, Goofy's likable stupidity, or Pluto's agreeable canine traits, there's a lot to go with these characters.

Despite my love of dogs, my favorite of these characters has always been Donald. Goofy's shorts were more varied and had higher highs, but I just tended to really like a good Donald short if one was on. The guy may have a massive temper issue, but that's hilarious, and he has enough of a heart to balance out his less likable traits.

But one reason I side with Donald is thanks to one man- Carl Barks. While Barks had his own strong history with Disney's theatrical shorts, it's pretty clear that he will forever be remembered for his work on their comics, where he worked almost exclusively with the duck and his nephews. We never really got to meet Huey, Dewey and Louie's parents, but Barks put it upon himself to extend Donald's family, as to help add shades to the character that despite not being present in the cartoons, have soon made their way into his and the studio's vast history.

You know where this is going. While Barks created a handful of memorable characters that happened to be a part of Donald's family, by far his most famous creation has to be Donald's extraordinarily rich yet shockingly frugal uncle, appropriately named Scrooge McDuck. While Scrooge initially appeared in one of Donald's stories in 1947, the character proved popular enough to star in his own stories, even gaining his own title. Donald and the nephews would join him in many stories, but Scrooge's character was enough to make them stand out.

Barks was a gifted artist and writer, one who was able to elevate these stories, which were supposedly made "for children", and add in rich enough textures to make them feel fresher than your usual kids comic would. Be it a decisively painted stroke, a neat little twist or two added to a tropical location for the characters to traverse, or sometimes even a corny line that works in its own way to ease tension, there was always something extra added in most of his stories to make an Uncle Scrooge comic work. Many comic fans from all over the world seem to have agreed with me, as numerous others have been taking the character and putting him into tight adventures ever since, sometimes emulating Barks, sometimes not.

And of course there's DuckTales, the beloved cartoon which took considerable inspiration from his stories. In hopes of not outshining the character of Scrooge, Donald, who was usually a big part of Barks' tales, was written out, the odd appearance aside, while adding in a few new colorful characters to pace things up. Needless to say, the show did not need Donald to be a smash.

But hey, I'm not here to teach a history lesson. What about the character stands out for me?

I personally just love how greedy Scrooge is. He almost literally has all the money of the world, but still isn't content with his wealth. This explains why Scrooge is so unlikely to donate any considerable chunk of his fortune, and also makes for some GREAT gags, which tend to be made either with or at him.

Despite that, the reason Scrooge goes on his epic voyages isn't entirely due to his lust for cash. As old as he is, Scrooge McDuck has a serious lust for life, and loves traveling all over the world to discover great wealth and even greater adventure.

Of course Scrooge has a heart and loves his family, so I won't touch too much on that aspect of his character. If he didn't, then he would be a villain. Or basically, Glomgold. That said, one scene I do love which highlights Scrooge's softer side comes from the very last episode of DuckTales, in which he needs someone to watch over gold-imprinted versions of his nephews. To get little Webby to stay by while he takes other matters, Scrooge calmly talks to Webby and goads her into taking on such a big duty. It helps greatly, and gives a little girl some much-needed confidence, in a way that only a loving uncle can do.

But besides that, Scrooge is a funny, sometimes inspiring, sometimes painful, almost always entertaining character. One that I'm greatly fascinated by, and love to see get his day whenever he can. Easily worthy to be a part of my top 10 characters.

Also, when the remastered game comes out, please do check it out. It's going to kick-ass.

More to come!

[Foggle]

Great post and thread idea! I would post my favorite characters, but I don't want to get in the way of your list, so I'll sit on that for awhile.

Scrooge is probably my favorite Disney-related character.

[Pharass]

This topic is of to a very good start: Scrooge is indeed a great character and I'm looking forward to see the rest of your list. Like Foggle I'm going to wait awhile before posting my own favorite characters.

[Dr. Insomniac]

Too broad a topic for me, so I'll start with subsections.

Top 10 Detectives:
10. Sam Vimes - Doesn't let werewolves get in the way of investigation.
9. L - Would've solved the case if it weren't for almost serendipitous planning on Light's part.
8. Harry Dresden - If Peter Parker took up magic instead of webs.
7. Henry Gordon Jago - Wish Moffat would at least give him a nod.
6. Rorschach - Hurm.
5. Hercule Poirot - Though I suppose this rank has been spoiled by how much I've enjoyed David Suchet's incarnation.
4. Sherlock (Cumberbatch incarnation) - He's got the style of Jeremy Brett combined with the bravado of Basil Rathbone, all on top of the calculations of Arthur Conan Doyle's classic.
3. Renee Montoya - Why not Batman? Good question.
2. Lester Freamon - Draft dodging peace freaks, huh?
1. John Constantine - Jackass with a heart of pure gold who drinks enough whiskey to kill a village of Irishmen while being able to make almighty demons stumble by his path. A class act through and through.

[Avaitor]

Aww, no love for Marlowe?

[Pharass]

Aww, no love for Marlowe?

Or the Continental Op, the original man with no name.
Speaking of great detectives, Gordanius the finder from Stephen Saylor's books is a great character as well.
Perhaps I should go with the doctor's idea and do a top ten for each category I can think of instead. Have to think about that.

Avaitor, looking forward to number nine.

[gunswordfist]

I wanted to do a favorite animated characters list but I guess this takes that over. I haven't read your list yet due to me not wanting to possibly consider changing some of my choices just yet. I'll read it right afterwards. OK:

Favorite anime character:

1. Yusuke Urameshi (Possibly my favorite fictional character period.)

Cartoon:

1. Daffy Duck
2. Batman
And Hawkgirl (also my favorite suerperheroine), Dale Gribel (sp?) and Peggy Hill in an undecided order but I do know I like Dale more than Peggy due to Gribel being my favorite KOTH character.

Comic book hero:

1. Deadpool. I feel like I need to get to know any other candidate for this part of the list better. Spider-Man was my favorite for a long time due to watching the cartoon as a kid but I've barely read any of his comics. Green Arrow, Hal Jordan and Daredevil are somewhat favorites but I don't know where to place them. And for The Hulk...ah fuck it..
2. Planet Hulk...or whatever you call him from that comic. My first time reading a full Hulk arc and I haven't read much else on him. I'm sure this counts as a different version of him so I didn't just say Hulk.

Comic book villains

1. Deathstroke (Deathstroke Full Cycle. Nuff said.)
2. The Joker
3. Lincoln Red Crow (also my favorite crime boss character of any type of medium.)

And my list shows that I need to read more books and watch more movies.

[Avaitor]

Dale Gribel (sp?)

It's Gribble. And I love JL's take on Shayera too.

[Avaitor]

9-


Count Dracula

Yes, I went with Bela Lugosi's take on Dracula for the picture, but this is more of an all-encompassing choice, arguably with Stoker's writings being the most important.

Few books have sinked into my skull like Dracula did. Going with an epistolary writing format is tough to pull off, but it works quite well in this particular novel. The way we're able to read into the minds of the cavalcade of cooky characters is quite killer (try saying that 5 times fast). Of course, while we learn plenty about Jonathan, Mina, Lucy and Van Helsing, we're not meant to go inside the mind of the titular count, but only see how these characters experience his peril. Granted, by today's standards, the novel is quite tame, but it still chills as well as the best of them. There are relatively few literary periods and styles as appealing as Victorian-era Gothic, with this being one of the obvious highlights.

Now what do we learn about Dracula through the numerous letters and journal entries collected in this book? The man is charming, highly charismatic, and quite civilized, being able to hold conversations and impress the majority of his castle's inhabitants. This doesn't exactly make up for his vampiric lifestyle, but hey, that's what makes him so fascinating.

blah blah blah, he's one of the first villains of his kind in this form of literature, blah blah blah, very influential villain, blah blah blah. Obviously Dracula's impact on storytelling is present and a big part about his character's appeal, but hey, importance not why I like these characters. I like Dracula because of his combination of class and barbarism. That's pretty much it.

Then again, one reason for the character's eternal popularity is how easy he and his story is to adapt, which is a big part of my personal love for Dracula. Be it Lugosi, Christopher Lee, or even Gary Oldman, there have been plenty of great turns on the character over the years. To the point that I'm even intrigued about, if not fully excited for, NBC's upcoming show for the character.

[Dr. Ensatsu-ken]

1. Yusuke Urameshi (Possibly my favorite fictional character period.)

Call it Justin Cook's version of Yusuke Urameshi, and I agree with you. That's not to say that Nozomu Sasaki doesn't do a great job in the role among the Japanese voice cast, but as far as I'm concerned, Justin Cook just brings SO much more personality to the character. I don't care if its added dialogue and changes some of the original Japanese meanings of some of the lines. It just sounds so damn natural that in many cases you would swear that this show was originally written for an English audience, even if its just FUNi's old bad-habit of heavily Americanizing the script dialogue. Either way, we still got a very intelligent and entertaining script, all the same, and Justin Cook did a (mostly) great job with his delivery, with maybe just a few stumbles and hiccups here or there.

Also, I always loved that Yusuke, unlike most other shonen protagonists, generally never came off as some moral goodie-two-shoes who had to have everything add up to some impossibly perfect ideals. The dude was actually more stone-hearted than Sensui when it came down to it. I mean, when he fought Doctor he had some hesitation at taking a human life, but showed that he was clearly willing to go through with it if he had to, and then after fighting Sensui he downright admitted that he didn't care if some evil people had to die. There are good people in the world and then their are scum-bags, so as far as Yusuke was concerned, just let the evil fuckers die.

Now, I have to admit, he isn't exactly a deep or complex character, but I admire his personality and attitude towards life. He's the type of character, though, that you could only really appreciate to his fullest if you both have a liking for shonen, but also hate the typical generic protagonist who are treated like complete saints when it comes to their morals. Togashi is good at making his characters more morally grey than pure light-hearted. That said, Yusuke at the end of the day was unquestionably a good guy. Gon from HXH, on the other hand, once you get to know more about him is actually far more morally grey than any other shonen protagonist that I have ever seen.

[Dr. Ensatsu-ken]

Count Dracula

Good choice. Honestly, while I never found Dracula scary, myself, I still remember the character just for how fascinating he is. I love how deep and rich his back-story is in regard to his mythology, and also how unlike the typical horror movie monster or villain, Dracula has a very eloquent and pseudo-civilized ambiance to him that makes him so unique compared to any other iconic horror figure out there.

[talonmalon333]

9-


Count Dracula

Yes, I went with Bela Lugosi's take on Dracula for the picture, but this is more of an all-encompassing choice, arguably with Stoker's writings being the most important.

Few books have sinked into my skull like Dracula did. Going with an epistolary writing format is tough to pull off, but it works quite well in this particular novel. The way we're able to read into the minds of the cavalcade of cooky characters is quite killer (try saying that 5 times fast). Of course, while we learn plenty about Jonathan, Mina, Lucy and Van Helsing, we're not meant to go inside the mind of the titular count, but only see how these characters experience his peril. Granted, by today's standards, the novel is quite tame, but it still chills as well as the best of them. There are relatively few literary periods and styles as appealing as Victorian-era Gothic, with this being one of the obvious highlights.

Now what do we learn about Dracula through the numerous letters and journal entries collected in this book? The man is charming, highly charismatic, and quite civilized, being able to hold conversations and impress the majority of his castle's inhabitants. This doesn't exactly make up for his vampiric lifestyle, but hey, that's what makes him so fascinating.

blah blah blah, he's one of the first villains of his kind in this form of literature, blah blah blah, very influential villain, blah blah blah. Obviously Dracula's impact on storytelling is present and a big part about his character's appeal, but hey, importance not why I like these characters. I like Dracula because of his combination of class and barbarism. That's pretty much it.

Then again, one reason for the character's eternal popularity is how easy he and his story is to adapt, which is a big part of my personal love for Dracula. Be it Lugosi, Christopher Lee, or even Gary Oldman, there have been plenty of great turns on the character over the years. To the point that I'm even intrigued about, if not fully excited for, NBC's upcoming show for the character.

Great choice. I would probably consider Dracula the greatest villain in all of fiction. As for what my favorite Dracula is, Lugosi is great and iconic. But I actually would likely pick Klaus Kinski from Nosferatu the Vampyre (the remake of the Nosferatu silent film). His portrayal of the character is so ugly and creepy, but you actually kind of feel sorry for him... That's also one of my all time favorite movies, by the way.

And I have to give an honorable mention to Max Schreck from the original Nosferatu. Only difference is that, as we all know, he was given a different name in that (the remake essentially corrected this issue and renamed him Dracula).

[Goldstar]

I typed my Top 9 list of favorite fictional characters on mine and Silverstar's blog (Silver's list is on there also). It's top 9 because I couldn't think of an even 10. I'm just going to link to it since I'm too lazy to re-type it here.

[Avaitor]

Pretty cool lists! I'm not too surprised to see you both have Daffy top your lists.

And you remind me that I need to watch more Night Court, Goldstar.

[Spark Of Spirit]

Night Court is great.

Good picks, guys.

You can tell how great of a character Dracula is when they based an entire genre of fantasy around his origin story. I've never been much of a fan of vampires because little is usually done with them where their weaknesses are kept (their weaknesses being the whole point of vampires in the first place) which leads to poor writing. But Dracula is still the best of them all and at his best he is one creepy villain.