Saturday, December 30, 2006

Favorite Fictional Characters

Over on his site, Christopher Mills has a list of his top ten fictional characters. It seemed like a blogworthy sort of thing to do, so I thought I’d join in. First up below are my top ten, from written fiction only. Below that are ten from TV/Movies. These are as of right now, of course, and subject to change.

From Prose:
1. Karl Edward Wagner’s “Kane”
2. Robert E. Howard’s “Bran Mak Morn”
3. ERB’s “John Carter”
4. Ken Bulmer’s “Dray Prescot”
5. John D. MacDonald’s “Travis McGee”
6. Louis L’Amour’s “Rye Tyler” (From To Tame a Land)
7. Howard’s “Conan”
8. David Gemmell’s “Druss”
9. Poul Anderson’s “Flandry of Terra.”
10. Jim Kjelgaard’s “Desert Dog.” (Gotta get one animal in there.)

From TV/Movies
1. James T. Kirk
2. Spock
3. Kolchack (From the original series)
4. Kelly (From Charlie’s Angels)
5. Sean and Christopher (from Nip/Tuck)
6. Little Joe (From Bonanza)
7. Matt Dillon
8. Ripley
9. Pinhead
10. Cartman

10 comments:

  1. That is a cool idea for a blog. I'm in agrement with you on a lot of those.

    Here are a few different ones I'd put on my own:

    Raymond Chandler's Philip Marlowe Ross MacDonald's Lew Archer
    Sherlock Holmes

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  2. Great list Charles...although I have to question some of the ones on your tv and film list..like Little Joe???

    And Sidney, those three were up for consideration on mine..actually Holmes was at the top. I will offer here my top five and show you how shallow I am

    Sherlock Holmes
    Matt Helm
    Robert B. Parker's Spencer
    James Bond
    Dirk Pitt

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  3. Shows the weird gaps in my own education. I never read Sherlock Holmes or Ross MacDonald or Chandler as a young adult and so they never had quite the strong impact that other writers did.

    Stewart, the TV/Movie list is pretty much tossed up there because I just never watch much TV. But I used to play Bonanza sometimes as a kid and would always be Little Joe. I think it was mostly his cool horse.

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  4. Where are the ladies among your favorites?

    I do so love the ladies.

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  5. Wow...the lack of ladies is amazing, isn't it, in all our lists. Wonder why that is. Now I sit here, trying to think of one I would put up there in my fiction, and I can't come up with any. Does it mean I'm a sexist? Yes.

    On a TV list there would be Emma Peel and Xena. Maybe Honey West.

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  6. Interesting lists...I'll have to think about it, but my number one is easy: Eleanor Dammert from Michael McDonald's Blackwater series. I even named my first tablet PC Eleanor...

    That's pretty sad, huh?

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  7. Hey, I had Kelly from Charlie's Angels on mine. She was a woman. Oh la la.

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  8. And Ripley on my list. Two women. So there, Basil

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  9. Man, that's a good one Cliff lists and I wouldn't have thought of her without prompting.

    I read almost the entire Blackwater saga one Christmas season in the mid-'80s. Probably Christmas of '83. We had an ice storm and got housebound. The story is one long novel originally published as several slim paperbacks. Each installment had been published by then, but I didn't own them all.

    I read all of the ones I had then waited for roads to get driveable so I could go and buy the rest.

    It was agony.

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  10. Sidney,

    I read them as they were published, month-by-month. I read each book in about 2 days, then had 28-29 days to wait for the next one! It was six months of pure hell, as the first few ended on cliff hangars that were so, so cruel!

    The saga ranks among my all-time favorites, and Eleanor Dammert, well, you just gotta meet her!

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