How to Create a Comic Book Character

For this post I will talk about what you need to do to create a comic book character.
There is no golden rule for creating a comic book character, they can be anything you want them to be. They can range from a talking dog with a space snail for a companion or a superhuman with the power to change traffic lights with his eyes.

There is no restriction

There are some basic things you will need to know about your character that you can't do without:

- Name
- Background/History
- Appearance

Those 3 things are essential for creating a character after all you will need to call them something, you will need to know something about their history even if you don't expose it to readers and you will need to know what they look like.

The aspect that is potentially the largest is the history. What kind of events lie in our characters past? What is their reason for doing what they do? How did they become who they are? There are many life factors that affect who and what we are. Even if your readers never know all the history or any of it it helps if you know a little something about it.

Knowing something as simple as where they are from or if they had a good or bad childhood helps you define your character and their personality. After all aren't we all affected by the customs of the place we were raised and doesn't the type of childhood we have affect the decisions we make and they way we behave?

You could not know anything about your characters history and make them a mystery to yourself and all of their actions can be based solely on their mood that day. This all depends on the type of character you want to make. Like I said- there are no restrictions.


Let's look at appearance, does your character wear a costume? Wear a specific item of clothing that represents something significant to them? What style of clothing do they wear?

How your character looks will affect whether or not people will like them and whether they want to read about them or not.
A well designed character can really draw people in because they will find them interesting.

Superhero costumes need to based upon their powers- fire wielders are unlikely to wear light blue for example. However, if their flames are blue then you could incorporate blue into the costume.

Style choices will be based upon where that character is from and what time period. A gentleman from the 1940s will have different style options compared to an 1980s punk.


Finally, you need to name your character. Sometimes you already have a name and can build your character around the name but if you don't have a name you will need to think of one.

Names can powerful and can really define your character and make them who they are. Certain names are more common in certain areas and can be a representation of class. They can make someone sound evil and malevolent or they can make them sound like a hero.

Code names can change over time and people can even use an alias for a time but their real name is set in stone so take care when deciding on this.

Names can be a simple first name, a code name, alias or a full name. It is up to you and you must decide on one that 'fits' your character.


By taking these 3 points into consideration you can begin to develop your character. There are many other factors that influence and affect a person but this is a good starting point.

If you already have a character and general idea of what you want them to do and the story etc. take a bit of time to consider some of these points often it is good to question your initial idea to ensure that it is the right one.

The most important thing I can say now about creating a character though is to create one that you like. Make it for yourself how you like it, accept the criticism of others and use it if you find it helpful but don't be dismissive of someone saying something about a character that you don't agree with.

That's it for now, maybe I will continue this discussion another time but I will leave it there for today. Maybe in the next couple of days I will post up an comic book idea, I'll try and think of a new one just for you :).