Foil (literature)
From The Art and Popular Culture Encyclopedia
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A foil character is either one who is opposite to the main character or nearly the same as the main character. The purpose of the foil character is to emphasize the traits of the main character by contrast, and perhaps by setting up situations in which the protagonist can show his or her character traits. A foil is a secondary character who contrasts with a major character but, in so doing, highlights various facets of the main character's personality.
A foil's role, as a contrast to the hero, may be emphasized by adding physical contrasts. Don Quixote is dreamy, impractical, and thin, and Sancho Panza is realistic, practical, and fat. Sherlock Holmes is tall and lean; Doctor Watson, although at first described as lean (on his return from Afghanistan), is described "middle-sized, strongly built".
In some cases, a subplot can be used as a foil to the main plot. This is especially true in the case of metafiction. One example of plots being used as foils can be seen in the graphic novel Watchmen, in which a comic book within the Watchmen universe is presented as a story similar to that of one of the main characters.
The "straight man" in a comedy duo is sometimes known as the comic foil. The humor in these partnerships derives from the uneven relation between the characters, who usually share many traits but have drastically different personalities. While the straight man portrays a reasonable and serious character, the other portrays a funny, dumb, or simply unorthodox one.
