Hey, writers.

Last time, we talked about something I call the Krystal Test.  Essentially, how do we differentiate characters in such a way that the average person wouldn’t be confused by everything on the page?

Before we discussed characters that already existed, but what if we applied the Krystal test to an “upcoming” movie?

Hit the jump, and let’s discuss. 

So how do we use the Krystal Test?

When you think of all the characters in your story, it is important to differentiate those characters.  Let’s start with an easy one first.  The first Avengers movie had multiple characters.  Imagine if you were casting/creating these characters.  What do we have?  One woman and five men.  Hm.  Well, the men can’t all look alike.

Woman
Man
Man

Man
Man
Man

The one woman automatically sticks out, assuming that she looks like a woman, so that’s an easy one.  (To clarify, we don’t always know the gender of a character if…say…they’re wearing a battle suit or if they’re covered in hair like the Addam’s Family character It.)  By the way, I often refer to this setup as the Chun Li Effect or Evanescence or No Doubt.  One woman mixed in with multiple dudes always stands out.  Careful with that though.  Chun Li became the leading lady of fighting games…while the attention Gwen Stefani got caused strife in the band.  It’s a double-edged sword, but it’s a tool to keep in our pockets, writers.

Anyway, back to the task at hand.

Black Widow
Man
Man

Man
Man
Man

So can we differentiate them?  One long hair, one short hair?  Done.  Thor will have long hair and…wait, there’s more than one male character with short hair.  Actually, more than two.  And two of them have dark hair.

Hm…okay, one will have a goatee.  Done.

So there’s a woman (Black Widow), a man with long hair (Thor), a dark-haired man (Hawkeye), and a dark-haired man with a goatee (Iron Man).

There’s more ways to dig into this, but I’ll stop here, I think we’re all on the same page, writers.

Woman || Black Widow.  Done.
Man || Thor.  Long blonde hair.  Done.
Man || Captain America. Short blond hair.  Done.
Man || Iron Man. Short dark hair, goatee.  Done.
Man || Hawkeye.*
Man || Hulk.  Green.  Done.

Note that Bruce Banner/Mark Ruffalo doesn’t really stand up straight for a lot of the movie.  This would be a differentiation based on body language (if everyone stood up with their chest out like Superman then they’d blend together), but let’s save that for another day.

*A note about Hawkeye:  He doesn’t have any outrageous, screaming quality that passes the Krystal Test for me. I wonder if anyone in the general public ever confused him for a different character.  My only theory is that this was done on purpose.  He’s supposed to be the layman that the average person forms a connection.  Also, he was often in scenes with Scarlett Johansson.  I will never, ever confuse Jeremy Renner for Scarlett Johansson.  Ever.

Alright, writers.  I have a question for you, regarding the Krystal Test:

How would you design the Avengers’ appearances?

Perhaps a Mohawk for Jeremy Renner or maybe a crewcut for Scarlett Johansson?  Haha.

Aloha,
Alvin

P.S.  Here’s your quote of the day, writers.  “I write for the same reason I breathe: Because if I didn’t, I would die.” — Isaac Asimov