I absolutely love this video!! I find that this is a phenomenal challenge and for people with creativity and a mind for philosophy and human mind. I think what would be interesting to explore (pardon me if you said this but I listen to these as I clean my house and sometimes have to redirect my attention) would be the question of who this immortal is. Meaning, are they human to begin with and then gain immortality? Or are they born immortal? If so, do they even have the same thought processes as humans? Lots of opportunities to create non human qualities❤
Frieren is a good example of immortality. Shows how someone who will essentially live forever lacks general empathy and the understanding of feelings and others time, but after being hurt by another’s mortality, slowly tries to learn about others and grow close with them.
She's also a rather unusual example in that she started out as an emotionally distant hermit (either elves naturally don't form close bonds like humans do, or she had trauma from her community being wiped out by demons), rather than being numbed after an endless cycle of watching loved ones be born, grow and die.
Just because a character is immortal doesn't mean a battle scene is uninteresting. Sure, HE can't die, but he is just one person and presumably he has a goal. Does he care about others in the battle, and can he protect them? Does it matter if he defeats 100 enemies if the other 10 000 burn the city he was supposed to protect? Leaving him alone on the battlefied with everyone he loved dead might be a more cruel fate than if he just died. Then there is the issue of memory. How much would a 10 000 year old character really remember of his life? Small bits and fragments, at most. Bad memory might be a bleesing as it would allow him to experience "new" things simply because he forgot he did the same 1200 years ago.
RE:ZERO is the best example I can think that has an "immortal" character. I don't think there is a single person who thinks his immortality makes the story boring, in fact it's the main hook
I found some authors write immortality or rather just longevity really well. Especially with the negative side effects. R A Salvatore wrote the Drizz't Do"urden series where he's this drow ranger who lives a very long life and out lives his friends and loved ones. I thought how he handled that was well done, showing the tragedy of outliving everyone he loves and cares about. There's also a dwarf who was cursed to be immortal. (Of course, there's some plot points where several characters were reincarnated that kinda lessened the impact of the tragedy of long life compared to others, but that's besides the point, there's also a really great character redemption arc by one of the primary original antagonists who is also cursed to live a longer life than normal. Artemis Entrei). Another who does immortality really well is Brandon Sanderson with several characters like Hoid. I think when immortality is written well, it can be so satisfying, especially with the more negative effects of it. A lot of the immortal characters in Sanderson's books also mostly get corrupted over time by whatever powers they used to gain it. A great example is in Warbreaker with the "Gods" and how they have to live off the breath of other people to extend their lives. Harry Potter deals with immortality as well and show a cost of immortality like with Voldemort splitting his soul to extend his life and how that makes him this loveless villain. Vampires are always a great concept of the cost of immortality. In order to become immortal, you have to also become a monster. Or being a Lich. Another good example is Deadpool in Marvel who was cursed with immortality by Thanos because he was in love with the same woman (Death), so he cursed him with immortality to keep him from being with death. Or even in the movie when his loved one dies and he wants to die but can't. He tries to blow himself up but just regenerates to life while Celione Deion plays in the background. I love reading stories about immortality that deals with these themes of cost, morality, love and all the things that really make life meaningful and how immortality effects those things.
Flat arc characters like Sherlock Holmes and James Bond don't change and don't need to. Gandalf is an Istari, essentially angels or possibly archangels given mortal form to help direct matters in Middle Earth. Saruman demonstrates that even such characters can be corrupted and killed. That's not boring. It doesn't remove stakes. The dude got his throat slashed by a disgruntled henchman. To make matters worse, he didn't get to go back to Valinor because he had allowed himself to go off mission. I strongly disagree that immortality removes stakes. It simply changes them. Somebody like Connor "The Highlander" MacLeod fully expected to live a basic human life but had immortality thrust upon him. He had to watch his wife grow old and die while he stayed young waiting for the big fight between himself and The Kurgan. That's not stakes? All those fun&games sequences where he was drunkenly dueling people in the 18th Century. His nearly inhuman detachment from society in the modern period at the end of the movie. That's stakes, man. It depends on the story you want to tell. Need a mentor? How about a 900 year old space goblin who finally goes to sleep for the last time. Not technically immortal, but still effectively so compared to the rest of the cast. Need a deus ex machina to point you on your way? How about a weirdo in a big hat and yellow boots who sings and dances around the wild woods just beyond Buckland like a random weirdo? Tom is beyond immortal, he's almost like Middle Earth personified. The ring was less than nothing to him because he was that OP. Did he spoil the story? No, he literally didn't give a darn. He was busy singing and dancing. Helped the hobbits away from the Barrows, but not a stakes-removing story killer. I disagree with your conclusions. Makes it really hard to watch this video when your ideas and examples are so far off the mark.
But most of the time the main character functions as immortal. There's no danger for them anyways 🫣 they got that strong plot armor. I'll take an immortal character taking that into account to a mortal character who never gets hurt anyways
It depends on what you define immortality as the very subject of immortality is VERY broad. Wether a writer wants to incorporate immortality or not and what they would define immortality as. It’s up to the readers to determine wether they like it or not and believe me most descriptions of immortality I’ve found aren’t great. A character just lives forever, they don’t take damage, they can’t get sick and they don’t age. It’s very shallow and boring. It’s just drumming up scenarios and adding layers to it to give it meaning. It’s what I’m doing for the world I’m building.
That's why the Greek myth of immortality is better you cannot die but you still can get sick, ages and get injured. Then the marvel version of immortality where you can regenerate, still get Cancer, resurrect from the dead but still age in once reached a certain age the regeneration slowed down until it no longer work Then internal youth where you are susceptible to many diseases, answers and can be killed just can't aged.
I am a bit puzzled here, as I think about it then many famous stories do have immortal characters. J.J. Tolkien has immortal characters, and I can think of many other stories with immortal characters. In fact, for almost all long-running series the core characters are immortal. An interesting exception is Sherlock Holmes, who dies drowning in a waterfall.
As you pointed out, the issue isn't immortality itself, but how it's managed. My biggest issue is fighting prowess. How do you creat a competent fighter for example that doesn't defeat everyone he meets. Granted with technological advancement from sword to gun, diffrent things can play a factor in their success. But, at the same time, if they can't die, does it really matter. Though, I could argue, you could simply allow them to experience pain, temporary death, and be imprisoned. Immortality doesn't equal invulnerability. The other issue I have with it, key example Twighlight, is how the plus 100 year old person, is dating a teenager, but it's okay, they have the body of a seventeen year old.🙄 Ya, that's not creepy. Because the love intrest is physically young, wealthy, and hot.😬 At least in Lord of the Rings, Aragorn is an adult.
@Dragonmoon8526 This point kinda reminds me of a manwha I read called Epic of Gilgamesh, which strangely enough has very little to do with the Babylonian epic 😅 One of the main characters, whose name I can't really remember right now, has literally existed since the dawn of humanity. He's seen all kinds of things, such as the growth and collapse of different civilisations. To that end, he's also picked up various skills. But in the end, his main talents lie in a form of formulaic magic created centuries ago. Though he initially tried to learn how to fight like the Knights (who are basically ultra powerful superhumans with immense talent that only one in a hundred thousand people can possess in this setting), he ultimately fails because he simply isn't talented enough. So when he faces a Knight in battle, he has to outwit them somehow or flee the battle entirely. And even with his immortality, he's not invulnerable. He can regrow lost limbs and such just fine, but he feels the pain of each wound. And while he can recover from decapitation, his head takes a long time to grow back, which his enemies once used to their advantage to kill his loved ones and capture him for study.
Two of my favorite examples of immortality being handled well: * The story of Numenor in Tolkien's legendarium. The good immortals tragically fail to understand how envious humans can become of immortality if they are constantly reminded that it exists seemingly just out of reach, while one evil immortal understands this very well and uses it to turn humans against the good immortals. * _The Hunger_ by Whitley Strieber. Flashbacks do an amazing job of helping us to understand the immortal not-quite-human Miriam, while the gradually revealed fate of the humans she makes immortal for companionship remains one of the most truly horrifying things I have ever read.
I know it's not a book, but I thought the game Sekiro: Shadows Die Twice had an interesting story about immortality, power, responsibility, and corruption. Genichiro wants the power of immortality as a weapon to defend his homeland from the Internal Ministry, Owl wants immortality as a weapon in order to conquer the country of Japan, Kuro wants to sever his immortality and end the Dragon Heritage to stop people from continuing to kill each other to gain this power, Hanbei once used his immortality in service of his lord but now it dishonors him because he cannot follow his lord into death like a warrior, and to Sekiro his immortality is a tool to pursue Kuro's goals no matter what. It was a good narrative that put immortality completely at the center of the story.
I have an ageless character in my book. He can still be killed, just not die of old age. He stays around his 40's in youthfulness. He's really interesting to write for this reason. His story is that he is the first man, and it gives him some interesting characteristics. I need to work on him more, as I haven't put enough thought into everything it implies, but he's my favorite character right now
@@larsdahl5528 No. I am inspired by Adam, however. My book is a loose allegory of Christianity, and with the magic system I have it allowed Adam to become ageless
That is how immortality works in most cases. Which is why this video doesn't make much sense. Also, that is likely our future as humans .. but I doubt we will choose to stay at 40 if we can stay 20/25 our for "ever" .. (ever being untill the laws of enthrophy fails us, the world or universe ends and or we get wounded, in an accident etc etc which can all still take us out) But yeah, scientists from Harvard have already extended the life's of mice by tremendous amounts and now they claim to have found a switch that can reverse age cells and that they can turn it on and off at will. A scientist took rats that were near the end of their time, who had alzeimers, their fur was falling out, their kidneys were failing.. he returned them to their strongest.. not only that, they became healthier and stronger than they used to be when they were young. Their fur now shined and was strong, their kidneys worked perfectly fine and their alzheimers was gone
If you want a reference (or to avoid accidentally threading a beaten path), I'll recommend Belgarath the Sorcerer by David & Leigh Eddings. It's an autobiography of sorts about the titular character with pretty much the same premise.
I find unconditional invulnerability being the most difficult kind to implement without destroying the story. I've seen it can even bring ridiculous results. Well, in "Death suits her" it is of course used for comedy effect - and it should act as a warning sign for anyone not wanting to make it a comedy.
I was going to argue along the lines that western immortality is negative. But i realise is not immortality thats the problem, its the suffering and change that we believe should come along with it. Comparing it to immortality found in Chinese fantasy, the view is different. Immortality is something for the most part everyone can achieve. But you can't stay stagnant as you have to keep striving for it, lest you be killed or have you lifespan run out before you reach it. In that way the Immortal sees the lifespan of mortals as we see the lifespan of flies.
I read a monkey’s paw sort of tale way back. There is an island where you can become immortal but continue to age. Eventually you become so senile and hard to care for that they bury you in a hole. Eventually geologic processes turn you into a living diamond, in permanent pain, unable to interact with the outside world, and hopelessly insane.
why, it is a fine source of conflict?... it is fun, as one can explore how far the time restriction modifies the human mortal mind and attitudes, all of that is lost if you do not have beings who are baffled at and stunned by those specifically human adaptations to mortality...
Excellent video with well-exposed ideas. I’ve pondered the impact of immortality in characters, and your lecture on this issue was spot on. Thank you for sharing.
Thanks for the tips when it comes to immortality, I think I may be good since some of my characters are immortals but they can still die if the wounds are serious or they end it themselves. They can use magic to heal themselves too but again if the wound is beyond their magic uses they need need to get out of battle to treat the wound as fast as they can before it's too late. It also a curse to them as well since they see horrible things and saw people they knew died in front of them and they have to live with it but they keep going because it's their jobs to protect the innocents.
I made character who is vampire who is 1000 years old, and survived WWII and apocalypse, and he has some PTSD both from war and apocalypse,and he had problem to Remember some people, but he isnt only immortal characterbut other immortals aren't vampires so they don't Remember their own past ,but our vampire Remember them but see that they aren't as they were centuries ago
I wrote a character who is nearly immortal. He is pretty damn convincing. He drives his immense vehicle by night and prefers to lure his victims so he can consume their blood. Despite he is a vampire he knows he can die if he is exposed to too much sunlight. Then there is this thing about him which you have probably not heard before - the car he drives is also a vampire, and works like an exoskeleton. If you write a near immortal character instead of writing an immortal one, your story becomes more interesting. Dido in JoJo´s Bizarre adventure is like this. Did not hear about him until this year, after completing the other guy who is from South America. Dido uses a mask which makes him near immortal.
I enjoyed your discussion. I like to check my own reasoning on such things. In the universe of my books, immortality is seen as a curse by all who have it. Among many things, they fear that grief is something that may accumulate and eventually drive them insane. This causes them to distance themselves emotionally from mortals. The potential for resentment causes them to physically distance themselves.
So, you’ve mentioned Voldemort and Liches as if they were different things? 😁 Rather than “Horcrux” just being Rowling’s fancy term for “phylactery”? (I lampshaded that in my D&D fan fiction, where an aspiring lich asks an experienced one whether he could use his old diary as a phylactery - and the other lich advocates against this, stating he read about someone who had a VERY bad experience with that…)
Been wanting to make my main protagonist Immortal, and I've been a bit worried that I haven't made it exactly right. the overall themes of the story is basically the importance of good ( not just in terms of morality, but also just practicality, as much like the real world, evil can get you killed easily). the main character originally died as a young child, but was later revived and gained immortality by a phoenix, which he originally presumed meant he had to eventually repay his immortality back by doing good. eventually he does encounter the main party where he uses his immortality to do several things, such as stall enemies so someone stronger can recover, or take attacks that would normally kill one of the characters. He's essentially made to embody themes like the human spirit and what people should do with incredible power (along with the theme of how good is essential for humanity, as he later learns the reason he's revived was because people wanted him to come back, not just so he could serve them). as well, his immortality has a few costs as well that I'm still thinking of adding, mainly that, because of how he obtained his immortality, he gained what I could only summarize as fire and death magic (with the death magic being used to keep him alive, with fire just being a cool side effect). because of this, he's actually affected by things such as magic that affects the dead (such as spells meant to repel them), high concentrations of Nature Magic, and even holy attacks, which almost hurt twice as much compared to other life. it also causes a few other small benefits (I.e being able to go to the afterlife while alive, being immune to stuff that steals souls, etc.) that don't happen much, but are still nice to have.
Another problem is how the brain processes memories. Elders become more mentally rigid over time; if your body didn't age, would your brain stay young and continue to gain information? This could potentially lead to psychosis. A good treatment of the topic is found in : "The Boat of a Million Years," By Poul Anderson
When i write immortality its never eternal unless its creator gods. I have Three gods that created all and they are eternal but any other being including other gods are able to die in some way. Certain characters CAN live forever but all of them can still be killed.
There is immortality in my series, but that's only agelessness. They can still die of sickness or wounds. There are also few enough immortals that it wouldn't change society a great deal.
I’ve been mulling over putting living gods in my narrative due to my love for Greek myth, but they would be antagonists at best and background characters at worst. I wanted to showcase the intense depression, apathy and even insanity that would come from living for even as little as a few centuries. What do you think? (They would be killable, just not easily)
I like the idea of gods as antagonists personally. Power level is always something tricky though as it bears the risk of ruining the entire story if not done well. It does seem though as you've got some very specific/deep topics you want to cover by adding them, and as such, it already seems likely that you're putting conscious effort into balancing them properly :)
@@TheAlphaLegionnaire that’s exactly what I’ve been thinking alongside mine. Here I can show a brief set of rules I’m writing for my work concerning gods. Gods * Every action a god takes uses power. * Gods cannot channel, move through or interact with solid objects. Only exceptions are purified shards. * Gods can channel/project their power into followers and purified shards. They can also “touch” or link their souls to willing bound souls. * Gods cannot talk, see, hear, smell, or taste. They can only “feel” the presence of other bound and unbound souls, this touch allows them to communicate with their followers and other gods through complicated interactions of souls brushing against each other. * Each Gods powers are finite and there are limits. The only way a god can grow their power is for them to form a link with a bound life form (aka followers). those who have opened their souls to a gods touch. This connection is very volatile and prone to be cut by emotions.
How I wanna use immortality; people who once thought were taking a noble sacrifice for the good of their empire become immortal invulnerable killing machines. The pitfalls? They have mortal souls and minds. What happens when your brain can only store so much info? And how exactly does your body react to being frozen in time? My immortals aren't the protagonists, but plot devices to explore humanity; after so much time experiencing the same things and feeling nothing, what lengths will they go to feel alive again? How do they cope with a world that moves faster than them? But because they're war veterans put in places of power, they all evolved god complexes. Even their invulnerability is a curse, because the bodies do age, if only so they can heal from wounds, and there were no special powers put in them beyond not ageing and not dying. This makes so they heal much slower than mortals and still feel the pain. The main one acts as a goofball because he likes messing around with mortals. And has no self-preservation instinct as he got desinthetized from centuries of not dying.
Imagine this: an immortal completely allergic to committed relationships who nonetheless has decades-long marriages under their belt because they feel like flings to them due to their altered perspective.
@@TheTaleTinkerer I guess I can't blame you, it is a fairly recent work, but "Frieren - Beyond Journe's End" is quite possibly the most thoughtful and moving commentary on the brevity of human life as seen by a long-lived elf. Unfortunately it is a manga rather than a book, but hopefully this will be rectified eventually.
Thanks Sascha, this made me rethink my views on perceived immortality. I will now change some characters from NEAR immortal to temporal immortality. Gave me some bloody good ideas 😂
Glad to hear that it gave some inspiration. As always, just trying to share some insights and spark ideas. Immortality is not a no-go per se (as presented in the video), but just like going for a purely evil villain, I think it is something that needs to be done consciously and with purpose to avoid certain issues :)
Completely agree with all of this. I'm not a novelist but play TTRPGs and immortal races bug me to no end. The mental atrophy and subsequent insanity alone would be off the charts. And it breaks "history" having walking librarians that know all things that have ever happened. Never mind population explosion could/would be an issue. Everything about it makes no sense to me. Even a race that lives to 200-300 years old would be a major issue. Practically speaking. It's fine if there is a hunter/prey setup or some deliberate weaknesses that come into play. But that is few and far between most of the time. Old D&D used to pawn off the fact that elves were "lazy" and hence why a "young" elf of 80 joining a party wouldn't already be max level. I never bought into that. On another note, there was a game in the late 2000s called Lost Odyssey (JRPG) that had a mix of immortal and mortal characters in an interesting way (the immortals learned from the mortals). Throughout the game, the main immortal character would relive memories through short stories told in words alone scrolling up the screen (that would take 5-10 minutes to read). The stories were amazing, heart wrenching, and perspective shifting for his long, long life with mortals. They released it as a book and you can find all 33 stories on youtube I think. The book is called: He Who Journeys Eternity: Lost Odyssey: A Thousand Years of Dreams. That was when I first really considered what living that long would be like. And how it would change someone.
There's ways to nerf long-living races/species. For instance, my setting has elves age slower and are overall significantly less fertile. An elf woman that has 3 children over her 300 year life is considered accomplished, even celebrated if they're all daughters. A child is significantly larger of an investment if they take ~50 years to reach the human equivalent of their late teens. In that same time humans can have two entire generations be born and sire heirs, easily doubling their numbers in times of plenty, or rebound from war casualties and such. Elves lack that kind of leeway, and would never willingly let their child take up a dangerous job like adventurer, or really even any kind of martial occupation outside of a knightly class of paper generals who tend to view war as a sport. Actual fighting and other dangerous or menial tasks are relegated to the human lower class/caste conditioned over generations to be subservient to their "betters". The only elves to break the mold would be criminals forced into service, desperate orphans or third sons of lower classes, or the very, very few highborn raised into elites in lifelong employ to either the state or a wealthy benefactor. As for the "lazy" part, funnily I've recently workshopped something that might make sense of it: metabolism. Put simply, slower metabolism means less energy to burn on physical or mental tasks, making elves seem languid to humans and especially dwarves (high metabolism, industrious and natural engineers). Elves can make up for that difference through experience, but still take time getting there. The benefit is that their diet can have more fruit and cereals as the blood sugar spikes aren't as severe, so they can support their population better by farming. Contrast the dwarves, who need high-calorie foods like meat, eggs and dairy to function near peak efficiency, foods whose production and storage is more demanding, meaning harsher population caps. Most cereal crops simply aren't reliable since carbs burn too fast for them, causing severe blood sugar spikes, addiction and diabetes. In fact, they might rely on their (evolved?) poison resistance to consume significantly more salted and fermented food, even their stereotypical love of alcohol might simply be to fulfill a need for more calories.
Not just a Fantasy issue, it is a big Sci Fi issue. For me ir ruins Sci Fi murder mysteries. Oh no my body is dead I just move my brain to a new clone or even a super-clone. And all my posessions are still mine.
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I absolutely love this video!! I find that this is a phenomenal challenge and for people with creativity and a mind for philosophy and human mind. I think what would be interesting to explore (pardon me if you said this but I listen to these as I clean my house and sometimes have to redirect my attention) would be the question of who this immortal is. Meaning, are they human to begin with and then gain immortality? Or are they born immortal? If so, do they even have the same thought processes as humans? Lots of opportunities to create non human qualities❤
Frieren is a good example of immortality. Shows how someone who will essentially live forever lacks general empathy and the understanding of feelings and others time, but after being hurt by another’s mortality, slowly tries to learn about others and grow close with them.
She's also a rather unusual example in that she started out as an emotionally distant hermit (either elves naturally don't form close bonds like humans do, or she had trauma from her community being wiped out by demons), rather than being numbed after an endless cycle of watching loved ones be born, grow and die.
Just because a character is immortal doesn't mean a battle scene is uninteresting. Sure, HE can't die, but he is just one person and presumably he has a goal. Does he care about others in the battle, and can he protect them? Does it matter if he defeats 100 enemies if the other 10 000 burn the city he was supposed to protect? Leaving him alone on the battlefied with everyone he loved dead might be a more cruel fate than if he just died.
Then there is the issue of memory. How much would a 10 000 year old character really remember of his life? Small bits and fragments, at most. Bad memory might be a bleesing as it would allow him to experience "new" things simply because he forgot he did the same 1200 years ago.
RE:ZERO is the best example I can think that has an "immortal" character. I don't think there is a single person who thinks his immortality makes the story boring, in fact it's the main hook
I found some authors write immortality or rather just longevity really well. Especially with the negative side effects. R A Salvatore wrote the Drizz't Do"urden series where he's this drow ranger who lives a very long life and out lives his friends and loved ones. I thought how he handled that was well done, showing the tragedy of outliving everyone he loves and cares about. There's also a dwarf who was cursed to be immortal. (Of course, there's some plot points where several characters were reincarnated that kinda lessened the impact of the tragedy of long life compared to others, but that's besides the point, there's also a really great character redemption arc by one of the primary original antagonists who is also cursed to live a longer life than normal. Artemis Entrei). Another who does immortality really well is Brandon Sanderson with several characters like Hoid. I think when immortality is written well, it can be so satisfying, especially with the more negative effects of it. A lot of the immortal characters in Sanderson's books also mostly get corrupted over time by whatever powers they used to gain it. A great example is in Warbreaker with the "Gods" and how they have to live off the breath of other people to extend their lives.
Harry Potter deals with immortality as well and show a cost of immortality like with Voldemort splitting his soul to extend his life and how that makes him this loveless villain.
Vampires are always a great concept of the cost of immortality. In order to become immortal, you have to also become a monster. Or being a Lich.
Another good example is Deadpool in Marvel who was cursed with immortality by Thanos because he was in love with the same woman (Death), so he cursed him with immortality to keep him from being with death. Or even in the movie when his loved one dies and he wants to die but can't. He tries to blow himself up but just regenerates to life while Celione Deion plays in the background.
I love reading stories about immortality that deals with these themes of cost, morality, love and all the things that really make life meaningful and how immortality effects those things.
Flat arc characters like Sherlock Holmes and James Bond don't change and don't need to.
Gandalf is an Istari, essentially angels or possibly archangels given mortal form to help direct matters in Middle Earth. Saruman demonstrates that even such characters can be corrupted and killed. That's not boring. It doesn't remove stakes. The dude got his throat slashed by a disgruntled henchman. To make matters worse, he didn't get to go back to Valinor because he had allowed himself to go off mission.
I strongly disagree that immortality removes stakes. It simply changes them. Somebody like Connor "The Highlander" MacLeod fully expected to live a basic human life but had immortality thrust upon him. He had to watch his wife grow old and die while he stayed young waiting for the big fight between himself and The Kurgan. That's not stakes? All those fun&games sequences where he was drunkenly dueling people in the 18th Century. His nearly inhuman detachment from society in the modern period at the end of the movie. That's stakes, man.
It depends on the story you want to tell.
Need a mentor? How about a 900 year old space goblin who finally goes to sleep for the last time. Not technically immortal, but still effectively so compared to the rest of the cast.
Need a deus ex machina to point you on your way? How about a weirdo in a big hat and yellow boots who sings and dances around the wild woods just beyond Buckland like a random weirdo? Tom is beyond immortal, he's almost like Middle Earth personified. The ring was less than nothing to him because he was that OP. Did he spoil the story? No, he literally didn't give a darn. He was busy singing and dancing. Helped the hobbits away from the Barrows, but not a stakes-removing story killer.
I disagree with your conclusions. Makes it really hard to watch this video when your ideas and examples are so far off the mark.
But most of the time the main character functions as immortal. There's no danger for them anyways 🫣 they got that strong plot armor. I'll take an immortal character taking that into account to a mortal character who never gets hurt anyways
That is actually an interesting viewpoint - plot armor as immortality. I'll let that one sink in a bit, somehow their is a video stirring here :)
My favourite type of immortality is lobster immortality
I have the image of a gigantic elf, 30 feet tall, acting as an advisor to a human emperor and telling tales from 10000 years ago.
Good points. In my own fantasy world, I want to examine the pitfalls and horrors involved with mortals seeking immortality.
Look for a book titled "Kyoshi's Ascention" from Avatar The Last Airbender franchise.
Even immortals seeking mortality might be a great additional study
It depends on what you define immortality as the very subject of immortality is VERY broad. Wether a writer wants to incorporate immortality or not and what they would define immortality as. It’s up to the readers to determine wether they like it or not and believe me most descriptions of immortality I’ve found aren’t great. A character just lives forever, they don’t take damage, they can’t get sick and they don’t age. It’s very shallow and boring. It’s just drumming up scenarios and adding layers to it to give it meaning. It’s what I’m doing for the world I’m building.
That's why the Greek myth of immortality is better you cannot die but you still can get sick, ages and get injured.
Then the marvel version of immortality where you can regenerate, still get Cancer, resurrect from the dead but still age in once reached a certain age the regeneration slowed down until it no longer work
Then internal youth where you are susceptible to many diseases, answers and can be killed just can't aged.
@@majesticgothitelle1802 Your grammar is repugnant and frustrating.
@@majesticgothitelle1802 exactly
I am a bit puzzled here, as I think about it then many famous stories do have immortal characters.
J.J. Tolkien has immortal characters, and I can think of many other stories with immortal characters.
In fact, for almost all long-running series the core characters are immortal.
An interesting exception is Sherlock Holmes, who dies drowning in a waterfall.
As you pointed out, the issue isn't immortality itself, but how it's managed. My biggest issue is fighting prowess. How do you creat a competent fighter for example that doesn't defeat everyone he meets. Granted with technological advancement from sword to gun, diffrent things can play a factor in their success. But, at the same time, if they can't die, does it really matter.
Though, I could argue, you could simply allow them to experience pain, temporary death, and be imprisoned. Immortality doesn't equal invulnerability.
The other issue I have with it, key example Twighlight, is how the plus 100 year old person, is dating a teenager, but it's okay, they have the body of a seventeen year old.🙄 Ya, that's not creepy. Because the love intrest is physically young, wealthy, and hot.😬
At least in Lord of the Rings, Aragorn is an adult.
And Aragorn isn't even young anymore. Off the hat I think I recall him being over 80yo at the time of the the LOTR.
@@MiljaHahto How?! Isn't he human? I thought he was over 30 at most!
@Dragonmoon8526 This point kinda reminds me of a manwha I read called Epic of Gilgamesh, which strangely enough has very little to do with the Babylonian epic 😅
One of the main characters, whose name I can't really remember right now, has literally existed since the dawn of humanity. He's seen all kinds of things, such as the growth and collapse of different civilisations. To that end, he's also picked up various skills. But in the end, his main talents lie in a form of formulaic magic created centuries ago. Though he initially tried to learn how to fight like the Knights (who are basically ultra powerful superhumans with immense talent that only one in a hundred thousand people can possess in this setting), he ultimately fails because he simply isn't talented enough. So when he faces a Knight in battle, he has to outwit them somehow or flee the battle entirely.
And even with his immortality, he's not invulnerable. He can regrow lost limbs and such just fine, but he feels the pain of each wound. And while he can recover from decapitation, his head takes a long time to grow back, which his enemies once used to their advantage to kill his loved ones and capture him for study.
@@vandemark1760 I think he's half-elf. Not 100%.
Two of my favorite examples of immortality being handled well:
* The story of Numenor in Tolkien's legendarium. The good immortals tragically fail to understand how envious humans can become of immortality if they are constantly reminded that it exists seemingly just out of reach, while one evil immortal understands this very well and uses it to turn humans against the good immortals.
* _The Hunger_ by Whitley Strieber. Flashbacks do an amazing job of helping us to understand the immortal not-quite-human Miriam, while the gradually revealed fate of the humans she makes immortal for companionship remains one of the most truly horrifying things I have ever read.
I know it's not a book, but I thought the game Sekiro: Shadows Die Twice had an interesting story about immortality, power, responsibility, and corruption.
Genichiro wants the power of immortality as a weapon to defend his homeland from the Internal Ministry, Owl wants immortality as a weapon in order to conquer the country of Japan, Kuro wants to sever his immortality and end the Dragon Heritage to stop people from continuing to kill each other to gain this power, Hanbei once used his immortality in service of his lord but now it dishonors him because he cannot follow his lord into death like a warrior, and to Sekiro his immortality is a tool to pursue Kuro's goals no matter what.
It was a good narrative that put immortality completely at the center of the story.
I have an ageless character in my book. He can still be killed, just not die of old age. He stays around his 40's in youthfulness. He's really interesting to write for this reason. His story is that he is the first man, and it gives him some interesting characteristics. I need to work on him more, as I haven't put enough thought into everything it implies, but he's my favorite character right now
Are you inspired by the Lilith myth?
Lilith was the first wife of Adam, but (unlike Adam and Eve) stayed immortal!
@@larsdahl5528 No. I am inspired by Adam, however. My book is a loose allegory of Christianity, and with the magic system I have it allowed Adam to become ageless
That is how immortality works in most cases. Which is why this video doesn't make much sense. Also, that is likely our future as humans .. but I doubt we will choose to stay at 40 if we can stay 20/25 our for "ever" .. (ever being untill the laws of enthrophy fails us, the world or universe ends and or we get wounded, in an accident etc etc which can all still take us out)
But yeah, scientists from Harvard have already extended the life's of mice by tremendous amounts and now they claim to have found a switch that can reverse age cells and that they can turn it on and off at will. A scientist took rats that were near the end of their time, who had alzeimers, their fur was falling out, their kidneys were failing.. he returned them to their strongest.. not only that, they became healthier and stronger than they used to be when they were young. Their fur now shined and was strong, their kidneys worked perfectly fine and their alzheimers was gone
If you want a reference (or to avoid accidentally threading a beaten path), I'll recommend Belgarath the Sorcerer by David & Leigh Eddings. It's an autobiography of sorts about the titular character with pretty much the same premise.
I find unconditional invulnerability being the most difficult kind to implement without destroying the story.
I've seen it can even bring ridiculous results. Well, in "Death suits her" it is of course used for comedy effect - and it should act as a warning sign for anyone not wanting to make it a comedy.
I was going to argue along the lines that western immortality is negative. But i realise is not immortality thats the problem, its the suffering and change that we believe should come along with it.
Comparing it to immortality found in Chinese fantasy, the view is different. Immortality is something for the most part everyone can achieve.
But you can't stay stagnant as you have to keep striving for it, lest you be killed or have you lifespan run out before you reach it.
In that way the Immortal sees the lifespan of mortals as we see the lifespan of flies.
I read a monkey’s paw sort of tale way back. There is an island where you can become immortal but continue to age. Eventually you become so senile and hard to care for that they bury you in a hole. Eventually geologic processes turn you into a living diamond, in permanent pain, unable to interact with the outside world, and hopelessly insane.
That sounds like "The Island of the Immortals" by Ursula K. Le Guin
why, it is a fine source of conflict?... it is fun, as one can explore how far the time restriction modifies the human mortal mind and attitudes, all of that is lost if you do not have beings who are baffled at and stunned by those specifically human adaptations to mortality...
Excellent video with well-exposed ideas. I’ve pondered the impact of immortality in characters, and your lecture on this issue was spot on. Thank you for sharing.
Thank you for the kind words, glad to hear the video was helpful for you :)
Thanks for the tips when it comes to immortality, I think I may be good since some of my characters are immortals but they can still die if the wounds are serious or they end it themselves. They can use magic to heal themselves too but again if the wound is beyond their magic uses they need need to get out of battle to treat the wound as fast as they can before it's too late. It also a curse to them as well since they see horrible things and saw people they knew died in front of them and they have to live with it but they keep going because it's their jobs to protect the innocents.
I made character who is vampire who is 1000 years old, and survived WWII and apocalypse, and he has some PTSD both from war and apocalypse,and he had problem to Remember some people, but he isnt only immortal characterbut other immortals aren't vampires so they don't Remember their own past ,but our vampire Remember them but see that they aren't as they were centuries ago
I wrote a character who is nearly immortal. He is pretty damn convincing. He drives his immense vehicle by night and prefers to lure his victims so he can consume their blood. Despite he is a vampire he knows he can die if he is exposed to too much sunlight. Then there is this thing about him which you have probably not heard before - the car he drives is also a vampire, and works like an exoskeleton. If you write a near immortal character instead of writing an immortal one, your story becomes more interesting. Dido in JoJo´s Bizarre adventure is like this. Did not hear about him until this year, after completing the other guy who is from South America. Dido uses a mask which makes him near immortal.
I enjoyed your discussion. I like to check my own reasoning on such things. In the universe of my books, immortality is seen as a curse by all who have it. Among many things, they fear that grief is something that may accumulate and eventually drive them insane. This causes them to distance themselves emotionally from mortals. The potential for resentment causes them to physically distance themselves.
So, you’ve mentioned Voldemort and Liches as if they were different things? 😁 Rather than “Horcrux” just being Rowling’s fancy term for “phylactery”?
(I lampshaded that in my D&D fan fiction, where an aspiring lich asks an experienced one whether he could use his old diary as a phylactery - and the other lich advocates against this, stating he read about someone who had a VERY bad experience with that…)
Been wanting to make my main protagonist Immortal, and I've been a bit worried that I haven't made it exactly right. the overall themes of the story is basically the importance of good ( not just in terms of morality, but also just practicality, as much like the real world, evil can get you killed easily). the main character originally died as a young child, but was later revived and gained immortality by a phoenix, which he originally presumed meant he had to eventually repay his immortality back by doing good. eventually he does encounter the main party where he uses his immortality to do several things, such as stall enemies so someone stronger can recover, or take attacks that would normally kill one of the characters. He's essentially made to embody themes like the human spirit and what people should do with incredible power (along with the theme of how good is essential for humanity, as he later learns the reason he's revived was because people wanted him to come back, not just so he could serve them).
as well, his immortality has a few costs as well that I'm still thinking of adding, mainly that, because of how he obtained his immortality, he gained what I could only summarize as fire and death magic (with the death magic being used to keep him alive, with fire just being a cool side effect). because of this, he's actually affected by things such as magic that affects the dead (such as spells meant to repel them), high concentrations of Nature Magic, and even holy attacks, which almost hurt twice as much compared to other life. it also causes a few other small benefits (I.e being able to go to the afterlife while alive, being immune to stuff that steals souls, etc.) that don't happen much, but are still nice to have.
Another problem is how the brain processes memories. Elders become more mentally rigid over time; if your body didn't age, would your brain stay young and continue to gain information? This could potentially lead to psychosis. A good treatment of the topic is found in : "The Boat of a Million Years," By Poul Anderson
After the Alchemist revealed the secrets of imortality, the retirement fund had to send the assassin's guild on a quest to find a solution.
When i write immortality its never eternal unless its creator gods. I have Three gods that created all and they are eternal but any other being including other gods are able to die in some way. Certain characters CAN live forever but all of them can still be killed.
There is immortality in my series, but that's only agelessness. They can still die of sickness or wounds. There are also few enough immortals that it wouldn't change society a great deal.
I’ve been mulling over putting living gods in my narrative due to my love for Greek myth, but they would be antagonists at best and background characters at worst.
I wanted to showcase the intense depression, apathy and even insanity that would come from living for even as little as a few centuries.
What do you think? (They would be killable, just not easily)
I like the idea of gods as antagonists personally. Power level is always something tricky though as it bears the risk of ruining the entire story if not done well. It does seem though as you've got some very specific/deep topics you want to cover by adding them, and as such, it already seems likely that you're putting conscious effort into balancing them properly :)
@@TheTaleTinkerer Thank you for taking the time to reply.
As always, you and your videos are a great help to my work 🙏
@@TheAlphaLegionnaire that’s exactly what I’ve been thinking alongside mine. Here I can show a brief set of rules I’m writing for my work concerning gods.
Gods
* Every action a god takes uses power.
* Gods cannot channel, move through or interact with solid objects. Only exceptions are purified shards.
* Gods can channel/project their power into followers and purified shards. They can also “touch” or link their souls to willing bound souls.
* Gods cannot talk, see, hear, smell, or taste. They can only “feel” the presence of other bound and unbound souls, this touch allows them to communicate with their followers and other gods through complicated interactions of souls brushing against each other.
* Each Gods powers are finite and there are limits. The only way a god can grow their power is for them to form a link with a bound life form (aka followers). those who have opened their souls to a gods touch. This connection is very volatile and prone to be cut by emotions.
How I wanna use immortality; people who once thought were taking a noble sacrifice for the good of their empire become immortal invulnerable killing machines.
The pitfalls? They have mortal souls and minds. What happens when your brain can only store so much info? And how exactly does your body react to being frozen in time? My immortals aren't the protagonists, but plot devices to explore humanity; after so much time experiencing the same things and feeling nothing, what lengths will they go to feel alive again? How do they cope with a world that moves faster than them?
But because they're war veterans put in places of power, they all evolved god complexes.
Even their invulnerability is a curse, because the bodies do age, if only so they can heal from wounds, and there were no special powers put in them beyond not ageing and not dying. This makes so they heal much slower than mortals and still feel the pain.
The main one acts as a goofball because he likes messing around with mortals. And has no self-preservation instinct as he got desinthetized from centuries of not dying.
I have a character planned who is essentially immortal. sort of an 'other' trope, not exactly the antagonist not a friend either. I was
I think it depends on it look at Ras Al Ghul and Vandal Savage heck even the Endless pretty well written immortals
You should read Blade of the Immortal.
Thank you for the suggestion. I'll put it on my long research list :)
Imagine this: an immortal completely allergic to committed relationships who nonetheless has decades-long marriages under their belt because they feel like flings to them due to their altered perspective.
I watched it to the end, waiting for the part about Frieren. But in vain.
Sorry you felt there was something missing, but I don't even know who "Frieren" is, so I certainly didn't mean to imply an inclusion in the video :)
@@TheTaleTinkerer I guess I can't blame you, it is a fairly recent work, but "Frieren - Beyond Journe's End" is quite possibly the most thoughtful and moving commentary on the brevity of human life as seen by a long-lived elf. Unfortunately it is a manga rather than a book, but hopefully this will be rectified eventually.
@@MagnusItland it currently has an anime adaptation as well. I don't know if it covers the whole manga though.
Thanks Sascha, this made me rethink my views on perceived immortality. I will now change some characters from NEAR immortal to temporal immortality. Gave me some bloody good ideas 😂
Glad to hear that it gave some inspiration. As always, just trying to share some insights and spark ideas. Immortality is not a no-go per se (as presented in the video), but just like going for a purely evil villain, I think it is something that needs to be done consciously and with purpose to avoid certain issues :)
Just remember, if everyone Immortal, thats going to be a lot of war
Completely agree with all of this. I'm not a novelist but play TTRPGs and immortal races bug me to no end. The mental atrophy and subsequent insanity alone would be off the charts. And it breaks "history" having walking librarians that know all things that have ever happened. Never mind population explosion could/would be an issue. Everything about it makes no sense to me. Even a race that lives to 200-300 years old would be a major issue. Practically speaking. It's fine if there is a hunter/prey setup or some deliberate weaknesses that come into play. But that is few and far between most of the time. Old D&D used to pawn off the fact that elves were "lazy" and hence why a "young" elf of 80 joining a party wouldn't already be max level. I never bought into that.
On another note, there was a game in the late 2000s called Lost Odyssey (JRPG) that had a mix of immortal and mortal characters in an interesting way (the immortals learned from the mortals). Throughout the game, the main immortal character would relive memories through short stories told in words alone scrolling up the screen (that would take 5-10 minutes to read). The stories were amazing, heart wrenching, and perspective shifting for his long, long life with mortals. They released it as a book and you can find all 33 stories on youtube I think. The book is called: He Who Journeys Eternity: Lost Odyssey: A Thousand Years of Dreams. That was when I first really considered what living that long would be like. And how it would change someone.
There's ways to nerf long-living races/species. For instance, my setting has elves age slower and are overall significantly less fertile. An elf woman that has 3 children over her 300 year life is considered accomplished, even celebrated if they're all daughters. A child is significantly larger of an investment if they take ~50 years to reach the human equivalent of their late teens. In that same time humans can have two entire generations be born and sire heirs, easily doubling their numbers in times of plenty, or rebound from war casualties and such.
Elves lack that kind of leeway, and would never willingly let their child take up a dangerous job like adventurer, or really even any kind of martial occupation outside of a knightly class of paper generals who tend to view war as a sport. Actual fighting and other dangerous or menial tasks are relegated to the human lower class/caste conditioned over generations to be subservient to their "betters". The only elves to break the mold would be criminals forced into service, desperate orphans or third sons of lower classes, or the very, very few highborn raised into elites in lifelong employ to either the state or a wealthy benefactor.
As for the "lazy" part, funnily I've recently workshopped something that might make sense of it: metabolism. Put simply, slower metabolism means less energy to burn on physical or mental tasks, making elves seem languid to humans and especially dwarves (high metabolism, industrious and natural engineers). Elves can make up for that difference through experience, but still take time getting there. The benefit is that their diet can have more fruit and cereals as the blood sugar spikes aren't as severe, so they can support their population better by farming. Contrast the dwarves, who need high-calorie foods like meat, eggs and dairy to function near peak efficiency, foods whose production and storage is more demanding, meaning harsher population caps. Most cereal crops simply aren't reliable since carbs burn too fast for them, causing severe blood sugar spikes, addiction and diabetes. In fact, they might rely on their (evolved?) poison resistance to consume significantly more salted and fermented food, even their stereotypical love of alcohol might simply be to fulfill a need for more calories.
Me, a realistic fiction writer: *nodding along*
Not just a Fantasy issue, it is a big Sci Fi issue. For me ir ruins Sci Fi murder mysteries. Oh no my body is dead I just move my brain to a new clone or even a super-clone. And all my posessions are still mine.
This why elves in my setting are not immortal. I find immortality stupid.