What is ‘in character’?

[branchandroot]

This is a bit like asking the “correct” way to spell a Japanese character’s name using the Roman alphabet. There are so many possible answers it boggles the mind.

But let me simplify it a little and specify more: should one stick with information presented in the anime/manga, which is frequently contradictory; or information presented in guide/info books, which often provides more background detail but may, again, be contradictory; or information pertaining to real life?

For example: if Tezuka acts like a serious-minded, reserved and careful thirty-year-old in the anime while the info books tell us he’s a rugged out-doorsman and we know that, in real life, fifteen-year-old boys act like, well, boys… then how do we write him?

Do we write anime/manga characters the way they’re written, or the way real people might act in their circumstances? Do we go ahead and use the fluid and exaggerated physical proportions, which are generally there to make characterization points, or do we take the numbers in the guide books and stick to them?

I don’t actually think there’s a single answer to this, of course, but it’s something worth thinking about as we write.