The Importance of a Good Sidekick

One of the most overlooked characters in writing is the sidekick. Far too often, the character is limited to comedy relief and that's a shame; the sidekick can be used for so much more. Properly used, the sidekick can be one of your best tools and make your job that much easier.

The Basics

The first use of the actual term comes from 1896 pickpocket slang: The "kick" was the front pocket, the safest from a pickpocket, and so the "sidekick" was seen as one's closest companion. Prior to Golden Age comics, the sidekick was thrown into stories to help with exposition: Since most authors were writing for the stage, they needed some way to get the hero to discuss his inner thoughts with the audience, so the sidekick was invented. The sidekick was seen as the foil to the hero, and so helped to expand the characterization of the hero.

[In the Golden Age of comics, the role of sidekick was to act as the insert character for the audience, giving boys (and later girls) someone to identify within a story. Suffice it to say that this did not go as planned, and the sidekick was usually the least-liked character in the story. It was only when the kids became an adults that they liked the sidekick.]

The sidekick is most often the support character; the hero is mostly self-sufficient while the sidekick needs the hero. The hero is the active part of the relationship or is a generalist while the sidekick is a specialist or tends to act only when pushed; thus the sidekick adds to the capabilities of the hero but is still dependent on the hero. While the assumption for most is that the sidekick is the junior member of the team, the reality is that he's usually an equal member of the partnership, and can even be the superior of the character. It's worth noting that Merlin is Arthur's sidekick (Merlin provides the support not Arthur), even though Merlin is far more powerful than Arthur; Merlin's abilities can only be used in specific situations and Merlin has no problem seeing what happens while Arthur can act in most situations and takes the initiative.

Let's Get It Over With

The sidekick is usually used for comedy relief. This can be either because the sidekick is always getting into mischief and needs to be rescued, his naivete creates some sort of misunderstanding, or even because he provides just the right witticism at just the right moment. In some situations, the sidekick is the more sensible of the two with the comedy coming from the hero ignoring the sidekick until he has no choice (such as how Daffy Duck tends to ignore Porky Pig, or how Sancho Panza often tells Don Quixote to just leave the windmills alone).

This works best when there is a definite difference between the experience between the two characters, and it works even better when it fits the theme of the piece. This is why Kiff and Zap Branigan work so well together: Futurama loves taking potshots at authority and the two give them that shot. Branigan is used to show the problems of an arrogant, unthinking leadership while Kiff shows the suffering it causes, and what the common soldier has to do sometimes to get the leadership to slow down and think about its actions, even if the advice is often ignored.

[The "fits the theme" issue is why most comic book sidekicks don't work: They're just added on without any real thought as to why they should be there. Too many are just thrown in there as "audience perspective" or to help sell merchandise without worrying about how they fit into the overall story. While Dick Grayson (the original Robin) would have been great to show how Bruce Wayne dealt with his issues as an orphan or with crime, he was just treated as an apprentice. This is also why Tim Drake and Damian Wayne (future Robins) are so popular: Drake explored how Batman needed the grounding Robin gave him while Damian forces him to think about the consequences of his actions.]

Let's Throw in Some Emotion

The stoic hero is always a literary favorite: We just like the idea of someone who can deal with what Life throws at them and shrug it off. However, this doesn't make for dynamic or even relatable characters: Sherlock Holmes is so stoic that he's considered autistic because of his apparent inability to relate to others. This is why Dr. James Watson is so important: He acts as the emotional one so that we can see some sort of reaction to the situations the two find themselves in, as well as pointing out the occasional crack in Holmes' armor.

There are sometimes when the inversion of this works wonderfully, such as the emotional Captain Kirk and the logical Mr. Spock. Either way, you get an emotional response that worries about the personal ramifications versus a logical one that worries about the big picture. The key is that for the pair to work you need varying degrees of emotion, and the greater that gulf the better. This allows you to create some interesting situations between the two, such as the conflict between logic and emotion or when the positions get flipped.

There are some interesting permutations to this, of course. Kirk is often the telling vote between the logical Spock and the emotional Dr. McCoy, for example. The hero's stoicism comes in handy when his sidekicks are all very emotional, albeit based on different emotions, or his emotion is a nice counterpoint in a system that looks down on emotion. Try to avoid the emotional hero/emotional sidekick or the logical hero/logical sidekick pairings; there should always be some gulf between the two, even if they take turns taking on the extremes.

You Need a Mirror

Taking it to an extreme, the hero and sidekick(s) should represent as many different perspectives as possible. This doesn't necessarily mean they should be at extremes of any given spectrum, only that you need some sort of conflict between them and the easiest way to enforce that is for them to have vastly different perspectives on pretty much any particular ideal. By acting as foils to one another, you can explore a greater number of perspectives on a given theme, giving you access to much deeper writing, especially if the different sides are fully respected in the piece.

You Should Always Have Someone To Talk To

One of the problems with "show don't tell" is how you handle exposition and inner thoughts. With a sidekick, you have someone to discuss things with, allowing you to make those inner thoughts into outer conversation. Exposition can also be dropped into dialogue; provided you don't do walls of text, it should fit naturally. The sidekick can also dispense exposition as needed, usually with a "you didn't know?" glare at the hero. This also eliminates the echo chamber problem: Since things can be discussed, you can present different sides to the same problem. Provided you don't overuse it, the sidekick's ability to converse is arguably one of the best things about having one around.

The Human Tool

Lastly, the sidekick can give the hero access to tools and skills he doesn't normally have access to. This means that while your hero can be a generalist, or a jack of all trades but master of none, your sidekick can be a specialist. The sidekick can also be a walking encyclopedia or know every language that would be useful but isn't well known, such as ancient Sumerian, Latin, or even hieroglyphics. They can also carry more esoteric gear; while the hero has his Swiss army knife, the sidekick can have a portable lab kit or a fingerprinting kit.

In superhero terms, the hero can have the cool but more mainstream abilities while the sidekick has the rarer powers, the ones that are good in clinch but require more specific situations to be useful.

In short, the sidekick can be a very useful tool when used right. Don't over-use them, or they lose what makes them interesting and they start veering into "self-insert" status, or where it looks like you've decided to put yourself into the story and take the limelight away from the hero. It can take some practice to fine-tune them, but that time is well spent.