How to Write a Foil Character

Foil characters make the characteristics and personality of the protagonist stand out. The foil character’s characteristics and personality serve as a contrast to the main character. They are named after the medieval practice of placing a metal foil around a gemstone to make it shine brighter. Foils are a great way to develop the protagonist’s characterization without dropping an anvil of a message upside your reader’s head. Some examples of foils are Batman and Superman (foils of each other), James Doakes (Dexter Morgan’s foil on “Dexter”) and Han Solo (Luke Skywalker’s foil in the original “Star Wars” trilogy).

Difficulty: Moderate

Instructions

1. Think about your protagonist’s physical and personality traits. Write down her strengths and weaknesses. Foils often have opposite personalities and physical features.

2. Write down your protagonist’s background, upbringing and current position in society. The foil can share similarities in these areas or have completely different circumstances in life.

3. Decide if your foil character will be an enemy or a friend. Foils can be sidekicks like Dr. Watson is for Sherlock Holmes. Think about friends and how they make up for each other’s weaknesses. On the other hand, a good foil enemy can also bring out the best and worst in your protagonist.

4. Give your foil physical and personality traits and write them down. Decide how different in look and disposition the foil will be to the protagonist. Think about what traits you want to highlight in the protagonist and how the foil can bring these out.

5. Give your foil a background, upbringing and current position in society. Write these down.

6. Decide where the foil will enter the story. The foil can appear from the beginning or arrive at a momentous place in the plot.

Tips & Warnings

• Always keep your protagonist in mind if you’re intentionally writing a foil character. You want your audience to get information about the main character even when they’re reading about the foil.
• You may already have potential foil characters in stories you’ve already written. You might consider going back over these stories to add character development for the foil or details to make the foil character more integral to the character development of your protagonist.
• Make sure your foil is an interesting character. While your foil highlights the protagonist’s characteristics, he should be able to stand on his own. He’s not just a prop for the main character.

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