Plot-Driven Stories or Character-Driven Stories?

Long-running stories work much better when they're character-driven. Other than that? Well, my favorite movies and books are not so much character-driven as using characters and plot developments to transmit some ideas or views. Not sure in what category that falls.

@quinlan58: Agreed on the first part.

It's supposed to be a difficult question, so it will be great to read your thoughts if you want to come back to the topic.

All i can say is

Dont dumb down the character(s) for the plot

And

Dont dumb the plot down for the character(s)

Both! Plot driven is awesome, but favorite wold be CHaracter-driven!

They don't have to be mutually exclusive

Character-driven is always better.

Definitely plot driven. By far.

Character-driven stories and plot-driven can both intertwin or convolute each other on certain occasions. Certainly, plot-driven can produce the best storylines and character-driven are consistently good therefore it can, it can go either way.

The stories which really bring you along for the whole ride, make you excited and you end up loving them are the ones that combine the two aspects. Stories which are building up for a longer period of time and do everything along the way to unravel the plot, build-up on it and etc. are the ones that need and should get more character driven work.

However, if the writer has decided to focus on just one of the two I'd pick the character driven work.

If I had to choose an exclusive type, it'd be character driven, no contest for me.

Why do you think so?

Plot driven stories have a better storyline and build up to them. But character driven stories are consistently good or atleast decent. I'm gonna go with character driven stories.

Plot driven usually works better for TV show and movies.

Character driven usually works better for video games.

Character driven 9/10, unless its a grand plot with great world building.

I can deal with ambiguous, unresolved, weak plots if the characters are strong. However, it's hard for me to invest my time in well constructed plots if the characters are "meh". For example, the plot of the Leftovers is extremely open-ended, ambiguous and secondary, but it's characters are so strong and well crafted that I hardly cared. It's one of my favorite series of all time. On the other hand, Dark (from Netflix) has a very tight, well constructed plot but I honestly didn't give a damn for any of the characters so I didn't really give a damn about the show even though it was really good.

Game of Thrones is an example of a show that had the best of both worlds until the writers flushed it down the toilet lol

Thanks for the answers, everyone.

Asking a binary question with an hypothetical ultimatum can be helpful in choosing someone's preference.

Kind of like how a "If you could only bring 5 movies on island" question might help people choose their actual favorite movies instead of what we think are the best movies.

@infantfinite128: Fair, but it's hard for me to say just Character Driven or just Plot Driven when there's basically no stories that are just one or the other. Any great story I can think of is a blend of the two, and I really can't pick out a story I like for being just one or the other. I suppose I would say character driven as that's basically a mediocre sitcom.

Perfectly said. The only exception is when one is more important than the other. So the first leg of the plot has to be dumbed down to introduce the character(s) or the character(s) have to be dumbed down to establish the greater plot.

But even then, you can't do that for more than like...half a book/season or a few chapters/issues of a manga/comic before it gets obnoxious.

Thanks for reading,

Floopay

Character-driven definitely.

Makes everything feel more realistic, and allows for events to unfold naturally and place characters in moments and locations that don’t feel out of place

I can go with either to be honest. It's all about execution.

IMO, plot should generally function in service of theme and characterisation.