It’s more commonly a female character type, not sure why. Male shadow-driven types always end up too stylized to be interesting. Or in a safely socialized role like the town drunk. I’m racking my brain and failing to come up with good male shadow-driven characters.
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In real life the shadow-driven type seems equally common in teenaged boys and girls but in adulthood it is rarer in men. Possibly because it’s hard to survive in that mode too long outside of rare careers like music, and harder for men to go dependent.
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But women can more easily stay shadow-driven if financially dependent, which is more acceptable socially.
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I don’t quite get the logic of shadow-driven characters and how they behave. Like what would be a good hack for writing them?
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Realistic ones that is. Not serial killers or superheroes.
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The connection *is* the shadow. In horror, the dark, mythic-mysterious shadow of the serial killer or literal demon/ghost drives the plot with inexorable inevitability. In cringe, the unintegrated internal shadow of the protagonist does the same. Either way, inevitable doom.

