16 Sometimes Silly Reasons For Characters' Iconic Traits

Fictional characters all have their nutty in-universe origin stories. The thing is, sometimes their actual origin stories are even more ridiculous. They exist, and have the characteristics they do, because of some bizarre glitch in the creative process.

The fact is, sometimes even brilliant directors and other creators can complete miss the mark and fail to predict which elements of a character will stick.  For example, did you know Spock (yes, Star Trek Spock) was originally supposed to be a sex symbol? Yes, the cold, calculating and robotically logical cold fish from Vulcan. The Stark Trek schemes don’t stop there either.  We couldn’t believe how the show tried to capitalize on the success of the Monkees to draw in a younger demographic. Also, yes, we’re being serious.

But it’s not all well intentioned sci-fi marketing ploys, we also cover the bizarre reason for Heather Ledger’s bizarre lip licking technique in his rendition of the Joker.

If we’ve piqued your interest, there’s plenty more where that came from. For example ...