Lesson 4

[David]

David Chai's Intriguing Character Layers

What I learned doing this is the more things going on beneath the surface, the more intriguing the character is.

Succession.

• Character Name: Logan Roy
• Role: Head of the Roy corporation.
• Hidden agendas: Wants to make sure his wife has more voting rights.
• Competition: his own children. Other companies that want to take them down.
• Conspiracies: Conspires with his wife, who is not the children's mother to give her more power over the company.
• Secrets: Has borrowed $3.5 Bn against the company trust.
• Deception: hid financial problems from his children. Also hid cover ups.
• Wound: Believes his son wants to take over his empire and will run it into the ground.
Secret Identity: Losing his mental and physical capacity.

[Marlon Jones]

Lesson #4 – Assignment 2

What I learned: Digging deep to create layers of intrigue for my main characters allows me to be more creative with their journey. The more intriguing they are the more the audience will connect with them, love them, and root for them.

Normal Is Relative

Intriguing Character Layers

Character Name: Stevie Jackson
• Role: Newlywed Father in 2nd marriage with Dominique trying to get his kids and family to accept his new life.
• Hidden agendas: To be the best husband, father, son, brother, and friend to atone for his failed first marriage.
• Competition: Dominique (for how to run their household), his friends and family who have not been divorced, and himself (comparing his old life vs his new life).
• Conspiracies: none yet
• Secrets: Harboring unresolved resentment toward his family for past wrongs.
• Deception: Everything in his new life is “all good” when it is far from.
• Wound: Abandoned by biological father leads to fear of abandonment by those closest to him.
• Secret Identity: Professional Song Writer

Character Name: Dominique Jackson
• Role: Protective Mother of 4 in a new marriage with Stevie.
• Hidden agendas: To maintain the control in her new marriage that she had in her last marriage.
• Competition: Stevie (for the “alpha” role in the marriage), Stevie’s judgmental sisters and mother.
• Conspiracies: Thinks Stevie’s family is out to destroy her marriage.
• Secrets: Hiding the real reasons her second marriage failed.
• Deception: She’s got it all together when in fact she is crumbling.
• Wound: The dysfunction of her parent’s marriage and subsequent split has negatively impacted her far beyond what she realizes or can even admit.
• Secret Identity: She loves animals more than people.

• This reply was modified 7 months, 2 weeks ago by  Marlon Jones.

[Bryan Koss]

Bryan Ko's Intriguing Character Layers
　
The Queen's Gambit
　
Character Name: Beth
Role: A young orphaned girl who lost her mother early in life, and is a chess prodigy.
　
Hidden Agendas:
Beth's hidden agenda is, strictly speaking, her search for a true sense of belonging. She doesn't open up much to her mother and is secretive about her interactions with boys.
　
Competition:
Beth faces competition in every episode as she participates in different tournaments, going up against increasingly stronger opponents. In this fourth episode, Beth experiences her first major loss.
　
Conspiracies:
There aren’t any significant secretive schemes for Beth.
　
Secrets:
The fact that she haven't found her real father remains a secret.
　
Deception:
Beth doesn’t seem to lie much.
　
Wound:
This episode reopens Beth’s deepest emotional void—without chess, what’s left in her life? It also brings up her being an orphan again. Then, her adoptive mother passes away, meaning she has now experienced the loss of a mother twice, deepening her original wounds.
　
Secret Identity:
This episode serves as a reminder or revelation to the audience that Beth has always harbored a lot of anger since childhood. Despite her current image of a relatively well-behaved girl, the angry “beast” inside her has not yet come to the surface.

• This reply was modified 7 months, 1 week ago by  Bryan Koss.
• This reply was modified 7 months, 1 week ago by  Bryan Koss.
• This reply was modified 7 months, 1 week ago by  Bryan Koss.