Mary Sue
From The Art and Popular Culture Encyclopedia
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Mary Sue, sometimes shortened simply to Sue, is a pejorative term used to describe a fictional character who plays a major role in the plot on such a scale that suspension of disbelief fails due to the character's traits, skills and abilities being tenuously or inadequately justified. Such a character is particularly characterized by overly idealized and clichéd mannerisms, lacking noteworthy flaws, and primarily functioning as wish-fulfillment fantasies for their authors. Perhaps the single underlying feature of all characters described as "Mary Sues" is that they are too ostentatious for the audience's taste, or that the author seems to favor the character too highly. The author may seem to push how exceptional and wonderful the "Mary Sue" character is on his or her audience, sometimes leading the audience to dislike or even resent the character fairly quickly—kind of an "author's pet" effect.
"Mary Sues" can be either male or female, but male characters are often dubbed "Gary Stu", "Marty Stu", or similar names. While the label "Mary Sue" itself originates from a parody of this type of character, most characters labeled "Mary Sues" by readers are not intended by authors as such.
While the term is generally limited to fan-created characters, and its most common usage today occurs within the fan fiction community or in reference to fan fiction, canon and original fiction characters are also sometimes criticized as being canon "Mary Sues" or "canon Sues". Wesley Crusher from Star Trek: The Next Generation is probably the best-known example. In role-playing games, original characters may also be criticized as "Mary Sues" if they dominate the spotlight or are too unrealistic or unlikely in other ways.
