Hetalia: The Fifty Stars

Side Chapter 7: How to Create an OC

Hello, Readers ~

This side chapter is dedicated to the creation of Hetalia OCs, most notably those personifying the States of America. It'll contain my personal advice on the matter as well as show my creative process in the making of my OCs. If not interested, feel free to skip this chapter. But to future Hetalia fans who are interested on making their own OCs, or are in need of advice regarding the subject, this side chapter may be entertaining. Anyway, thank you to everyone for reading so far, and hopefully this side chapter proves to be entertaining to the ones who chose to read it.

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Writing a Hetalia fanfiction based on the States of America can be challenging.

For starters, to those who plan on doing all fifty states, there's the problem of making fifty original characters. Add personifications of an American capital, some territories, and other entities to the list, keeping track of all those OCs can be challenging and overwhelming for the audience and even the creator as well. 

Which is where character templates come in handy.

Many Hetalians have created their own character templates of their OCs. With at least fifty OCs to create for the States of America, some tend to either do the minimal or give up midway which is quite a shame. Then again, it's not too difficult to understand why. The idea of creating at least fifty character templates, one per state, is a hefty amount of work to do. Even if such creators were to finish creating all fifty character sheets, some start to grow disinterested in the subject for various reasons. Such issues result in many Hetalia fics, notably those on the States of America, getting abandoned or discontinued after a while.

It's possible I may one day fall into these two possible fates with my own fanfiction. Even so, I hope to continue writing this fanfiction series. I still like Hetalia after all these years, and my interest in history and culture remains strong. So once again, thank you to those for reading and taking an interest in this fanfiction.

Anyway, I'm getting off-topic, so let's get back to the creation of character sheets.

To anyone who has look over various character sheets on Hetalia OCs, you may have notice the diversity and variety of character sheets. Take two character sheets of, say, a Tennessee OC made by two different creators. Even if they were to convey a similar stereotype of Tennessee, the amount of information detailing the OC based on the state is different.

For example, the amount of information on such character sheets are along a spectrum between two extremes I like to call "minimal" versus "detailed".

When referring minimal character sheets, they are character profiles containing small amounts of detail for an OC. Such templates usually contain the basics, simply listing out the name the OC personifies, its human name, its age appearance, and possibly a short description of its physical appearance and personality. Minimal character sheets can be advantageous to both the creator and audience in various ways. The amount of work (research, writing, etc.) is minimal, thus wouldn't consume a lot of the creator's time. In a way, the reader/viewer may have an easier time remembering the OC(s).

On the other hand, there are some disadvantages with this type of template. Such sheets, having contained little information, can come off as lazy or vague, making the OC look flat, not well-defined, or memorable, especially when comparing multiple OCs side by side. Not only does it make it difficult for readers to distinguish OCs apart, but it may also alienate the creator from touching upon the character due to its blandness, therefore neglecting it, especially in favor of other OCs.

At the other end of the spectrum, there are character sheets that do the opposite, containing a large amount of "detailed" information on an OC. Such character sheets are praised for being well-developed, showing off the creator's hard work and knowledge about the place they personified. Rather than simply list off a name and age, they do more than that. For example, they may add their birthday, their hobbies, factual information, or even more detail about their appearance, their personality, and their relationship with the rest of the world. Detailed character sheets solve the issue of blandness in minimal sheets. Both the creator and the audience are well-informed about the OC as well as possibly getting them to relate to or like the character. Normally, adding such details are a good thing. However, I do have some personal issues with this mindset.