Help With Travis

[WarpGirl]

OK so I'm pouring myself a drink planning on starting Ch 5 in my fic and suddenly it hits me... I have to do something with Travis. Now frankly the idea doesn't thrill me. Why? He's boring! I mean I get who the guy is supposed to be and all, basically you're clean cut guy from the space "sticks" who went in search of adventure, with his family's support and opposition. Basically he's like the farm kid who goes to college and becomes a big city doctor. OK fine, he's still boring. And I have no clue what to do with him. So any thoughts.

[Distracted]

Okay. So let's get into Travis' head for a minute. What do we know about him? He grew up with an older brother and both parents all living cramped in a small spaceship together 24 hours a day 365 days a year for YEARS. Either they must really love each other or he left because it was driving him crazy to always have family underfoot. His father was dead when he went back "home" to visit, right? And his older brother was captain. Did he leave when his father died because his brother patronized him and treated him like a baby? Or was his father still alive when he left, and did his father treat his brother like the crown prince and ignore his younger son? Did Travis just feel smothered by parental over-involvement and just want out? Maybe his older brother wanted to leave and couldn't because Travis was the spoiled baby and they let Travis go off to Starfleet, forcing the older brother to stay. You could do a prodigal son storyline where Travis left with his inheritance and wasted it all, then decided to enlist in Starfleet because he was too ashamed to go back home. And then after his father died his mother forgave him so he went back to visit.

If I were going to write about Travis, I'd watch the only episode that really gets into depth with Travis' back story, the one with Horizon in it (I forget the name), and then let my imagination run wild.

[WarpGirl]

I've watched that episode three times and it bored me to literal tears. <sigh> I'm going to have to just suck it up I guess. But I will take everything under strict advisement I swear. Thank you.

[Distracted]

You're welcome.

Another thing you might try is to keep him a "boring", sweet, quiet, beautiful boy with a wonderful home life and then put him in an interesting situation and see how he reacts. That's what I did in my Virtual Season Six. I left him sweet and innocent (albeit a little too fun-loving ) and presented him with an illegitimate child whose mother wanted nothing to do with him. Then I just let him react. So he doesn't have to be interesting in and of himself, he just needs to react believeably and sympathetically to an interesting situation. If you can get the reader to care about him then he'll come alive as a character.

[WarpGirl]

The only problem I had with your Travis is that I don't buy him as a boy-toy sex god. Although I will say he is a bonafied Hottie. Honestly even when he was in bed with Gannet in Demons, I had trouble seeing him as someone who just got lucky. IDK I still can't understand how they had a hot young thing like that tied for the sexiest job on the ship (because I honestly can't decide if a engineer or a pilot is sexier) and he's got absolutely no fire in him. No attitude, (good or bad) no defining characteristic other than a nice, polite, and utterly bland Ensign. My God Harry Kim had more spice than he did, and his job was boring. I'll think of something, I know I will.

[Aquarius]

Here's my question:

Does all this Travis stuff further the plot? Does it enhance the point of the story you're trying to tell? Is the stuff you reveal about him going to add any real value?

Or are you fleshing him out "just because"?

I only ask these questions because so often, I see otherwise good fics get bogged down in superfluous detail. I don't really know what you have in mind for your story at this point, but when dealing with my own writing as well as that of others, in a situation like this if the answer was "yes, this is going to move the story along or add value to the development of the characters that the story is centered on," then you'd already know what you need to do with him, what you need him to be in the situation. Why? Because the situation you've created would demand that a character do this/say that/have had that particular experience previously.

I guess I'm suggesting that you don't get too bogged down with backstory that you don't already have a direction in mind for.

[WarpGirl]

I kind of expected these questions if you replied Aquarius, and yeah they are valued and valid. So to answer, I would hope that anything I added to the story enhanced the plot and theme. And I admit that part of the reason I do fanfic is to "flesh out" characters for the heck of it. It's fun, some people like sports, I like picking apart characters. And yeah I like complicated too, I'm sort of in the go big or go home school of thought. But mostly when you're dealing with a whole cast of characters in a fandom, I actually like to use all of them in some way. And I never pan details ahead only major events. I like flexability.

[Aquarius]

I'm not saying to not use the other characters. I'm just saying that what you do with them needs to matter in terms of getting the story from Point A to Point B. For example (and this is just kind of simplistic and silly for the sake of making a point) we don't need to know that Travis's favorite food is pasta salad, unless later on we find out that it's the magic cure for the Crazy Space Disease/Affliciton of the Week that the crew is doing battle with in the story. (Yes, I know that's not what YOUR story is about; as I said, I am simply making a point.)

Now, here, you have a Trip and T'Pol story. So say one of those characters is at a crossroads, and you need a catalyst that makes sense to get them from point A to point B...and Travis starts spinning a yarn about something that happened when he was a kid, and it's kind of a metaphor for what's going on and it gives Trip or T'Pol the answer/inspiration they need in order to do what the story demands they do next, THEN you've "used" him in a way that serves the plot and/or the development of the main characters, while developing his character in the process.

So I guess I'm just cautioning you to make sure that what you "use" him for is timely and appropriate, versus Pasta Salad being the cure for nothing but a growling stomach.

[WarpGirl]

Don't worry I'm not considering any type of "pasta salad" things. Frankly I'm just trying to convince myself that he's interesting for anything at this point. The thing is when I write I just know the events in advance, I literally have no clue who is going to say what, or how anyone will react until I actually physically write it. I really don't know what I want Travis to do. I may hate Archer, but at least I don't find him boring.

[Aquarius]

Well the cool thing about Travis is that he's mostly a blank slate. We know that he grew up on the Horizon, etc., but beyond that, he's a good go-to character in terms of when you need someone to be something in particular to get those main characters going in one direction or the other.

Let the plot dictate what you need from Travis, then create something really cool around him for that.

[WarpGirl]

Great a blank slate, with no personality. Perfect.

[Escriba]

Things we know about Travis (by Escriba):

- He has spent all his life in space. A point the scripwriters always forget. He's more experienced than the entire crew (with the exception of T'Pol.)
- Although he's usually serious, he likes to perform pranks on his friends. He tells good scary stories, and I bet he's good with jokes too.
- He doesn't indulge himself in casual sex. He's one of the few that notices and fights the Orion women attraction (even if he fails at the end.)
- He obviously left Horizon and enlisted in Starfleet without the approbation of his father. A thing he really regretted when his father died.
- He is quite ashamed/regretful of leaving Horizon and the Boomer way of life, because he feels he betrayed his family, but he needed to expand his horizons (non pun intended.) He's like the son that went to College instead of staying and working for the family farm.
- He feels privileged for his work and for seeing the universe (don't forget that as a Boomer he only saw a specific part of the galaxy again, again and again.)
- He knows how to talk to women. I know, it sounds stupid, but he can be a very good friend of a woman without having sex with her. He was obviously a friend of... Nora? His childhood friend in the Horizon? He's friend with Gunner and he raised Hoshi's morale in "Damage" (by the way, they work really well together. And I don't imply anything romantic, just that they're great teammates.)
- He's very humble. He always says he didn't land well even when he lands in a place where no other could do.
- Probably he's the only one that didn't automatically dislike T'Pol from the beginning. I don't have real proofs about this, it's mostly a sensation, but I think I'm right. ( In Strange New World he accuses T'Pol of being the one to find the caves and to have the idea of staying overnight, but only after Trip accuses her and he doesn't say anything more against her in the entire episode, even when he was stoned.)

These are Travis' facts. Now try to do something with them

[Kotik]

Things we know about Travis (by Escriba):
- He doesn't indulge himself in casual sex. He's one of the few that notices and fights the Orion women attraction (even if he fails at the end.)

That is somewhat contradicted by tis piece of conversation during Broken Bow, when Travis shows Trip the "sweet spot" :

TUCKER: The Captain tells me you've been to Trillius Prime.
TRAVIS: It took the fourth, fifth and sixth grades to get there. I've also been to Draylax and both the Denebian moons.
TUCKER: I've only been to one inhabited planet besides Earth. Nothing there but dust-dwelling ticks. I've heard the women on Draylax have.
TRAVIS: Three. It's true.
TUCKER: You know that first-hand?
TRAVIS: First-hand, second-hand, third-hand.
TUCKER: I guess growing up a boomer has its advantages.

[Escriba]

Yeah, could be (what? Nobody is perfect ) but it doesn't say it was casual. And compared to Trip, Travis is a monk. Poor boy, he almost get less than Archer. But not less than poor, poor Malcolm (the thing is Malcolm tries to get something more times than Travis, but apparently he's not so good with women )

[WarpGirl]

Thanks Escriba you're wonderful as always. The problem is Travis' personality. He has no real engery to his personality. Has he ever even gotten angry to the point of shouting. Harry Kim has been known to lose it on occasion. Travis is a 'one note' guy. I mean look at all you laid out and I still couldn't give you an effective personality profile. Something I like to do with all of the characters I write. He doesn't stand out as anything special with his personality, his life is amazing, he isn't.