The Riv Analysis: An Introduction and it’s Presence in Warriors – PT.1 by Riverspirit

Riverspirit begins their series on their new method of analyzing characters by introducing the system.

Hey y’all! Riv here, and I’d thought I’d write an article on a new way of analyzing character through a process I call The Riv Analysis (or in it’s formal name that I’ve given, The Esse Resolvere Chart). As someone who studies psychology, I made my own ruling when it comes to classifying characters from books and movies. Because this is a Warriors website, I thought I’d bring out a few examples from the series to fill my chart.

In The Riv Analysis, there are three main categories that classify characters: Hero, Side, and Villain. All of which have their own subcategories. There are such things that I call in-betweeners which are characters that perfectly merge with other categories, but for this post at least, I’m going to focus on just these three.

(The deciding factor in how characters are placed depends on how they reach their climax)

Why is this form of analysis important?
This categorization that I have made is beneficial to writing your own FanFics, understanding book and media characters better, and making sure that your characters are strong, yet not cliche.

Let’s start diving in to the main categories.

HERO CHARACTERS CATEGORY

1. The Broken Hero
A heavily-used protagonist role that sits around the fact of a hero’s broken past, and how it shapes the future of them. Even in real life, past experiences involving trauma and loss can shape a person, so why not have it thrown in to help progress the main character’s story? A few examples of commonly-heard-of Broken Heroes include Harry Potter and Eleven Hopper. Now, what about in Warriors? I’d say the most prominent examples are Crookedstar and Ivypool. Both dealt with trauma that helped shape their character arcs and helped reach the peak of their climaxes. Although it is commonly used, I love this form of character as it usually leaves room for development and meaningful fan-works in which I’m a true fan of.

2. The Well-Earned Hero
The Well-Earned Hero reflects on a character who has been working up to a certain point to reach their climax: also could be defined as the Hard-Working Hero. Typically, since the usual comparison is to Broken Hero, sometimes these characters can be seen as flat (or Mary-Sue and Gary-Stu’s). This can be true- however, it depends mostly on how well a character is written. An example of an excellently-written Well-Earned Hero is Luke Skywalker from Star Wars. He slowly made his progression in training to rise up to the character he was meant to be: the peak of his arc, if you will. Examples like this in Warriors are most-likely Firestar and Hollyleaf. Both worked hard to get to the point of their prime, and both fulfilled what their goal was in mind. Well-Earned Heroes typically are determined and strong-spirited, so keep that in mind if you are interested in writing about them.

3. The Unexpected Hero
An Unexpected Hero is typically defined as a side character until an out-of-the-blue moment that makes them jump to their story’s pinnacle. Usually, these heroes do not have much development before-hand (give or take a few brief backstories), however, most times these characters will have special relationships with the main protagonist. Unfortunately, about 70% of Unexpected Heroes receive the hero title through a sacrifice and death, and this category can also be classified as The Sacrificial Hero. Due to spoilers, I will not reveal Unexpected Heroes who die in this post, but I will list the ones that do indeed live to tell their tales. This includes Neville Longbottom, and Constance Contraire, and pretty much any other character you can think of that has swooped in out of nowhere to save the day. I’d say a big Unexpected Hero in warriors is Feathertail. Not going to go much deeper into that if you haven’t read The New Prophecy, but if you know, you know.

4. The Twisted Hero
Now this is category that we don’t see very often, yet it’s one that I find very intriguing. You’ll find it very similar to the Right-Minded Villain, but I’ll do my best to distinguish between the two. The Twisted Hero is defined as a “hero” in terms, however, this hero is usually does the right things for the wrong reasons. I don’t have many examples from other pieces of work, but a slight example would be Tigerstar. He could easily pose as a hero for both ThunderClan and ShadowClan, however his hero-like actions easily covered up his ulterior motives. I highly encourage this when coming up with your own characters for FanFictions, as these characters are a little more unique. Make sure when writing about this that you make it clear that they are a hero, although you may decide that you’d like to do an in-betweener with this and the Right-Minded Villain.

I will be creating several more posts explaining the Side and Villain categories! Please ask me if you have any questions about the chart! I give you full permission to use The Riv Analysis (The Esse Resolvere Chart) in posts of your own, just please make sure to credit me:D

See you in parts 2 and 3!
– Riv out!