Announcing the Great Character Clash

We all have favorite characters. It’s time to give them some public recognition and attention.

And what better way to do that than a contest?

*ahem* Announcing…

The Great Character Clash of 2017

Sci-fi and fantasy characters locked in a battle for ultimate supremacy.

A tournament to determine the best of the best.

Five weeks. Thirty-two contenders. One champion.


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Last year, I did a book championship tournament to coincide with the NCAA “March Madness” tournament. This year, the concept is back, but with sci-fi and fantasy characters stealing the spotlight.

The Character Clash will kick off next week, but in the meantime, I need your help. My empty bracket is begging for someone to fill it with competitors, and that’s where you come in. So basically, you, O readers, are part of my nomination committee.

Nomination Rules:

1. Characters must be from sci-fi or fantasy—an equal (ish) mix would be nice, but I’m not going to be picky.

2. Only nominate characters from books, movies, and TV shows (no comic books).

3. There’s no limit to the number of characters you suggest, but there are only 32 spots. I’m going to have to pick and choose, so don’t be offended if your character(s) doesn’t make the cut.

4. Try to nominate characters most people would at least be familiar with.

5. If you pick an obscure character or one from a story that’s not well known, I’d appreciate it if you could either add a short description about why that character’s awesome, or include a link so I can get a basic idea of who the person is, what they do, etc.

6. If you pick The Doctor, specify which incarnation.


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7. Leave your nominations in the comments section below.

8. If you’re not sure if a character qualifies as being from sci-fi or fantasy, suggest the character and name the story, and I’ll let you know. Movie example: Pirates of the Caribbean wouldn’t count.

9. I don’t care what skills/powers/qualities a character has. I’ll take strong characters, loyal characters, cunning characters, you name it.

10. Villains welcome and encouraged.


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11. Not limited to humans.

12. I’ll be taking suggestions through this Friday. Any characters nominated after that won’t make it into the bracket pool.

Why Not Have a Free-for-All?

I’m limiting the character choices because simplicity for me.

But also for your sake. Once the bracket is filled, it’s up to the audience (aka YOU AWESOME PEOPLE AND ALL YOUR FRIENDS) to vote and determine who moves on and who gets eliminated. I don’t want to have a bunch of obscure characters nobody knows about and therefore aren’t able to vote for/against.

The more people that participate the better, so feel free to spread the word on social media and your blogs, via owl post and Palantir and intergalactic transmission.

The official hashtag (if you do that sort of thing) is #CharacterClash2017.

Looking forward to seeing your suggestions and having a blast with this tournament.

79 thoughts on “Announcing the Great Character Clash

    1. Ohhh, Katniss and Barry. YES. I haven’t watched Voyager, so not sure who Seven of Nine is, though I’ve heard of Janeway.

  1. Here are my suggestions! I tried to pick characters that would be fun to contrast with other people, not just people I personally like. 😀

    The Doctor (11th)!
    Scarlet Witch
    Star-Lord
    Gandalf the Grey
    Jack Sparrow
    Doctor Strange
    Toph from Avatar: The Last Airbender – or Katara!
    Luna Lovegood
    River Tam

    ^_^

        1. Aha, thanks for that, Deborah. I at least know what Firefly is… 😉 Really want to watch it sometime.

          1. Yessss you should! 😀 Aside from occasional annoying “content” it’s an EXCELLENT show. The writing and characters and world are all brilliant. <3

            Also I love this Character Clash thing and I'll try to come up with some nominations sometime this week. 🙂

  2. Character: Puddleglum
    Book: The Silver Chair by C.S. Lewis
    Race: Marsh-wiggle
    Description: Tall, lanky, like a stretched-out frog wearing a pointy hat. Grave. Pessimistic. Probably invented Murphy’s law. Basically, like every other Marsh-wiggle – except they think he’s too optimistic.
    Why He’s Awesome: His extreme gravity provides most of the humor of the book (unintentionally, of course). Plus, in the darkest scene, he displays profound (but still semi-pessimistic) optimism with far-reaching heroic consequences.

  3. Ooh, this looks like a ton of fun!! I nominate…
    Kit Livingstone from The Bright Empire series – https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/9769032-the-skin-map
    Prince Lionheart from The Tales of Goldstone Wood – https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/11756117-moonblood
    Dustfinger from the Ink trilogy – https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/71366.Inkheart
    and Westley from The Princess Bride – https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/21787.The_Princess_Bride?ac=1&from_search=true
    Can’t wait to vote! 😀

  4. Can I suggest characters from picture books? 😉

    My Willoughby (a friendly dragon) and Nickerbacher (a dragon who does stand up comedy). He “slays” you with laughter. Imagine the fun!

    heh, heh, heh …

    1. Haha, I guess you can. The only thing is, I don’t know if they’d get many votes since not many people know about them. But yes, I’m picturing the fun I could have with Nickerbacher and…just yes.

  5. Edmund – The Narnia series, fantasy
    Spock – Star Trek TOS, Scifi
    Cat Noir – Miraculous: Tales of Ladybug & Cat Noir, fantasy
    Samwise Gamgee – LOTR, fantasy
    Teyla Emmagan – Star Gate Atlantis, Scifi
    River Tam – Firefly, Scifi

    1. Okay, so I only know half the characters listed here… 😮

      *wonders if he should be ashamed*

  6. How can you say Pirates of the Caribbean doesn’t count???

    I nominate
    Nym from Storm Siren by Mary Weber
    Sairu from Golden Daughter by Anne Elisabeth Stengl
    Merlin from Merlin’s Blade
    Artemis Fowl from Artemis Fowl by Eoin Colfer
    Harry Potter
    Hermoine Granger
    Hagrid (really, any character from the Harry Potter books!)
    Samwise

    Just to name a few… there are so many good ones! After looking at such a wide variety of characters, you could almost have made multiple championships according to category, such as best villain, best hero, best side-kick, etc. Voting on this will be so hard!

    1. Haha, well, PotC seems more “realistic.”

      Great nominations, Jennette. Thanks for commenting! Hmmmm, great point with multiple categories. I’m gonna have to think on that…

  7. Great idea (and I don’t know half of the ones mentioned either)!

    Time to represent for a little Star Wars:

    Darth Vader
    Hans Solo
    Luke Skywalker

    I could name many more, but I know space is limited. 🙂

    For fantasy, how about:

    Willow (from the George Lucas movie)
    Falkor, the Luck Dragon (from Never-ending Story)

    Happy fighting!

  8. Ahsoka Tano, R2D2, Darth Vader/Anakin
    Skywalker – Star Wars
    The Tenth Doctor
    Brom – Inheritance Cycle
    Legolas Greenleaf – LOTR
    Harry Dresden- Dresden Files

  9. I’m just goin with the first ones that come to mind, however smart or not that may be….. Lucy Pevensie. Peter Pevensie. Samwise Gamgee. and Aslan. Yes, you can obviously see where my loyalties lie…. 😉

  10. Aslan – Chronicles of Narnia
    Gandalf – Lord of the Rings, etc.
    Samwise Gamgee – Lord of the Rings
    The Doctor 11th – Doctor Who
    The Daleks – Doctor Who (I know it’s an entire race but they’re basically all the same and were very worthy oponents for the Doctor)
    The Weeping Angels – Doctor Who (Same reasoning as the Daleks)
    The Borg – Star Trek: The Next Generation (Same reasoning as Daleks and Weeping Angels)

  11. Captain Picard from Star Trek the Next Generation.
    Aragorn from Lord of the Rings.
    Khan from Star Trek.
    Arthur Dent from Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy.
    Daniel from Stargate: SG-1.
    Saruman from Lord of the Rings.
    Wormtongue from Lord of the Rings.
    Eowyn from Lord of the Rings.
    (We’re doing a Lord of the Rings marathon at the moment, so I can’t help myself.)
    I can’t wait to see who gets picked for the final 32!

  12. Worthy Star Trek characters not nominated so far:
    Dr. Leonard McCoy (original series)
    Data (Next Generation)
    Benjamin Sisko, Odo, Garak, and Kira Nerys (Deep Space Nine)

    Other worthy sci fi figures:
    Louis Wu (Ringworld–and other novels by Larry Niven)
    Ender (Andrew) Wiggin (Ender’s Game)
    The Mule (psychic villain in Isaac Asimov’s Foundation series)
    Paul Atreides (Dune)
    Neo, Morpheus, Agent Smith, the Oracle (The Matrix)
    Mark Watney (The Martian)
    Adrmiral Adama, Gaius Baltar (Battlestar Galactica)

    And some favorite fantasy baddies:
    Evil (Time Bandits)
    Malificent (Sleeping Beauty et al.)
    Sauron (LOTR)
    Bavmorda (Willow)

  13. The 10th Doctor and the 12th Doctor, River Song and Donna Noble, Captain Picard and Captain Janeway, Spock and Q, Iron Man and Thor, Professor Xavier, Doctor Strange…
    Okay, okay, that’s enough…

  14. How can I pick?

    Legolas Greenleaf – LOTR
    Samwise – LOTR
    Gandalf the grey – LOTR
    Lucy Pevensie – Narnia
    Arya Dröttning – Inheritance Cycle
    The Doctor (9th)
    Clara Oswald – DW
    Nehemia Ytger – Throne of Glass
    Lysandra – Throne of glass
    Padmé Amidala – Star Wars
    Aelin Ashryver Galathynius – Throne of Glass
    Leonard McCoy (Bones) – Star trek

    Is Harry Potter considered fantasy?
    If so: Regulus Black

    Theres just too many amazing characters out there, it’s so hard to chose!

  15. I second Artemis Fowl. I also second spock and Tenth Doctor.

    I also nominate Janner Wingfeather from the Wingfeather saga by Andrew Peterson. And Marty McFly from Back to the Future.

  16. I love this tournament!

    Tom Bombadil
    Vin (Mistborn)
    Naomi Sunrider (most powerful Jedi ever – knocked a sun out of place!)
    Tavi (Codex Alera)

  17. Bean from the Ender’s Game series. One of the best and most well-developed characters I’ve ever read.

    Bard Eanrin from the Tales of Goldstone Wood – he’s a fey creature, can be a man or a cat as he desires, with a witty tongue and a cat’s reluctance to be a hero… though he often ends up being one anyway.

    I’ll second Han Solo from Star Wars

    The Tenth Doctor – because he’s such an amazing iteration of that character, so torn between guilt and the thirst for adventure, so serious yet so light hearted… I could go on.

    Eugenides from the Queen’s Thief series – story about a thief who is extremely good at his trade, enough so that he is actually sanctioned by the queen herself and works/reports directly to her. Gen is brilliant and cocky and every bit as good at what he does as he thinks he is. Also, he uses his brain to protect his country and prevent wars… which is admirable.

    1. Liking the suggestions here, even if I’m not familiar with them all. LOL

      Bard and Gen sound fascinating, and you can’t go wrong with the 10th Doctor. 😀

  18. Oh, and Michael Carpenter from the Dresden Files – because he’s such a heroic and steadfast and loyal character and I love how he brings out the best qualities of Dresden himself.

  19. And Malcolm Reynolds from Firefly/Serenity. One of my all-time favorite characters ever… swashbuckling rebel smuggler with a heart of gold.

    Okay, I’m done now, I promise.

  20. Vin from the Mistborn series
    Jack Sparrow (a must! 😀 )
    Legolas (LOTR)
    Edmund (Narnia)
    Lucy (Narnia)
    Sam from LOTR
    Loki (because his humor!)
    The Doctor (of course 😉 )

    Okay, I think I’m mostly seconding characters that others nominated already. 🙂

  21. (Uncle) Iroh – Avatar: The Last Airbender
    Remus Lupin
    Merlin – BBC’s Merlin
    Kyo – Fruits Basket
    Shasta – Chronicles of Narnia, Horse and His Boy
    Fai D. Flourite – Tsubasa Reservoir Chronicles — He’s kind-hearted and loyal, even as he regrets the choices he’s made for survival and after the many trials he faces that threaten to change his entire character.
    Inuyasha – InuYasha

  22. Hey Zac, hope this isn’t to much trouble but my fiance and I both picked 32 entrants: 16 fantasy, 16 Sci-fi. I’ll post them separately to make things a little easier and they are ranked in no particular order. These are mine.

    Fantasy:
    1. Gandalf, LOTR
    2. Samwise Gamgee, LOTR
    3. Reepicheep, Chronicles of Narnia
    4. Faramir, LOTR
    5. Prince Zuko, Avatar the Last Airbender
    6. Puddleglum, Chronicles of Narnia
    7. Gollum/Smeagol, LOTR
    8. Wicked Witch of the West, Wizard of Oz
    9. Willy Wonka, Charlie and the Chocolate Factory
    10. Iroh (Uncle), Avatar the Last Airbender
    11. Draco, Dragonheart
    12. Po, Kung-Fu Panda
    13. Lu Yan/The Drunken Master, The Forbidden Kingdom
    14. Xanth Filatine, The Edge Chronicles
    15. Shrek
    16. Tyrion Lannister, Song of Fire and Ice

    Sci-Fi
    1. Darth Vader, Star Wars
    2. Doc Brown, Back to the Future
    3. Harold Finch, Person of Interest
    4. Obi-Wan Kenobi, Star Wars
    5. Morpheus, The Matrix
    6. E.T.
    7. T-800, The Terminator Movies
    8. Frankenstein’s Monster
    9. Marcus Wright, Terminator Salvation
    10. Scotty, Star Trek
    11. Emperor Palpatine, Star Wars
    12. Yoda, Star Wars
    13. Elias, Person of Interest
    14. Ahsoka Tano, Star Wars
    15. HAL 9000, 2001: Space Odyssey
    16. Robbie the Robot, Lost in Space/Various

  23. Here is Mary’s

    Fantasy:
    1. Aragorn, LOTR
    2. Gandalf, LOTR
    3. Samwise Gamgee, LOTR
    4. Edmund Pevensie Chronicles of Narnia
    5. Reepicheep, Chronicles of Narnia
    6. Boromir, LOTR
    7. Errol Stone, Staff and Sword Trilogy
    8. Puddleglum, Chronicles of Narnia
    9. Merlin, BBC’s Merlin
    10. Martin the Warrior, Redwall
    11. Newt Scamander, Fantastic Beasts
    12. Captain Navarre, LadyHawke
    13. Philippe the Mouse, LadyHawke
    14. Golden Sparrow, The Forbidden Kingdom
    15. Morganna, BBC’s Merlin
    16. Gaius, BBC’s Merlin

    Sci-Fi:
    1. Spock, Star Trek
    2. Captain Picard, Star Trek Next Gen
    3. Captain Nemo, 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea
    4. Harold Finch, Person of Interest
    5. Quorra, Tron: Legacy
    6: Daniel Jackson, Stargate SG:1
    7. Brennan Caldwell, Firebird Trilogy
    8. Megamind
    9. Data, Star Trek Next Gen
    10. Lt. Uhura, Star Trek
    11. Elizabeth Bennet, Pride, Prejudice, and Zombies
    12. Mr. Darcy, Pride, Prejudice, and Zombies
    13. Captain Kirk, Star Trek
    14. Solora, Book of Eli
    15. Jack Harper, Oblivion
    16. Pavel Checkov, Star Trek

  24. Captain Navarre of Ladyhawke!!!!! And Mouse! And Isabeau!

    And the Bishop is by far one of the most despicable villains of all time… so you know… if you decide to make two brackets, one for heroes and one for villains… 😉

  25. Rand al’Thor from The Wheel of Time. Why has no one picked him yet? 🙂

    Dark Vader
    R2D2
    Darth Sidious
    Yoda
    Luke Skywalker (I’ll refrain from naming 10 other star wars characters…)

    Merlin (from the BBC show)
    Ang ( Last Airbender)

    Wolverine
    Spiderman
    Superman
    Batman
    Apocalypse
    The Joker
    The Phoenix
    Professor X

    I second the mention of Data (Star Trek next Gen)

    Gandolf (LOTR
    Saruman (LOTR)
    Sauron (LOTR)

    Cloud Strife (Final fantasy) sorry does that count? lol

    Aslan (Narnia)

    Lord Voldemort (Harry Potter)

    Queen Cersei Lannister, (Game of Thrones)

    Jack Sparrow (how is POTC not fantasy?)

    This is a great idea, and I am excited to see what all is picked. Thanks for putting this together!

    1. Wow, excellent list. Love the variety. And as for PotC…I guess as a fandom it just doesn’t leap to mind when you think of fantasy.

  26. Gasp. I love POTC….however my husband concurs. Although I totally debunked all his reasons. After which he did admit the third movie would be considered fantasy lol. Also superheroes not fantasy. (More sci fi) This btw is a man who read way more fantasy than I. Including the entire wheel of tome and song of the and ice series. My conclusion. Classic fantasy is it’s a own sub genre 🙂

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