How come I feel like two dimensional drawn characters have more "character" than real life actors?

Question

Who else feels that way?

Answer 1

I do on occasion. But I really think your average cartoon or anime character has a bit of an unfair advantage. Consider:

--With a real live actor or actress, what you see is what you get. One person, in charge of all of it, appearance, voice, facial expression, everything. And people are human, nobody's perfect, not even in their best roles. Consider that when Gillian Anderson played Dana Scully on _The X-Files_ TV show, that she basically went through the entire role with *one* standard facial expression. You know, wide-eyed, lips slightly parted, etc. I'm not saying it didn't work for that character, but it *was a flaw*.

And it gets worse from there, because real live actors also have to be *celebrities* these days too. Meaning they have the burden of being *in the media* and hyping up their own work, and some people....well, they are better at the hype than they are at the acting. Surely this would explain why Jennifer Lopez can still get "acting roles" long after she decided to make money by shaking her rump and "singing". o_O

--Compare this now to a cartoon or anime character. You have a writer literally putting *every* word in the character's mouth *and head* directly. And another person hand-picked to voice-act the character. And a *small army* of people drawing and re-drawing the character over and over again. And *another* small army of editors making sure that everything looks and sounds perfect and synchs up right.

Does this happen to some degree with live actors too? Sure, but only on the set of a movie or TV show. Animated characters are, by comparison *always on the set*. They are always tweaked and *always* at their best, and there is no "human factor" in terms of the character his/herself getting in the way, needing rehab, marrying white-trash losers, and so on.

Not to mention (with the exception possibly of _Gorillaz_) animated characters never have to *sweat* being "celebrities". They simply don't exist independently of the show or movie. You won't see Snow White or Sailor Moon on the _Tonight Show_ flubbing her lines as she tries to promote the next straight-to-DVD enterprise. ^_^ Thank goodness.

So yeah, cartoon and anime characters can and do surpass their real-life counterparts (where there are any), but they do have more than a few *unfair* advantages I would think.

I hope this helps. ^_^ Thanks for your time....good Question too!

Answer 2

I do. made up characters can have so much character and personality than real actors because they are made from scratch. Its not some famous person reading from a script. With actors, they go through so many different roles in different productions its weird to see them change personalities.

i dont know if this helped or not but I feel the same way.

Answer 3

Your brain is filling in details where detail is lacking... I get the same effect when watching foreign movies with subtitles - I assume that I am missing out on subtleties and nuance that make the movie a true work of art, and thus I experience a true work of art. When the actual actor is right there in front of you, you can't ignore the flaws and frailties and the cognitive dissonance. It's the classic scenario.