Is this a Gen-Z vs millennial difference thing? Is that why I don’t get it? I’ve been seeing this phrasing around recently. Main character vibes.
HOW…as a writer, I’m super confused XD How can someone act like a main character? Aren’t we all main characters of our own stories?
Or…are these like, the term “snowflake”? Haven’t seen that used in ages. Some kind of entitlement act? A negative sentiment? Or does it mean main character people control the room and are loud and boisterous? Spoiled?
Also guessing the phrase came from TikTok, right? Yeah? Those POV videos, right? I don’t do TikTok, but I keep up in my own ways
Help me with this mystery. I don’t get it. Main character vibes. What is it? And how can you tell? And is this a bad thing or a good thing? Is it a praise or a mean comment?
I could see it being an insult depending on the genre that’s inferred, if any. A YA romance main character probably makes a lot of bad relationship decisions, for example.A sci-fi or fantasy main character might have a bunch of weird stuff happening to them all the time. And I guess you wouldn’t want to be a suspense or horror main character.
From my understanding, “main character vibes” is definitely not a compliment and is often referring to “main character syndrome,” a phenomenon coined by people on TikTok / other social media.
Basically, main character syndrome is the idea that someone essentially views their life as a fictional story with them being the main character starring in this story. This version of main character syndrome is often associated with a person’s lack of agency in their lives, as if their life story has already been fully written and there’s nothing that they can do to change it.
But most often, this isn’t what these people are referring to with “main character vibes / syndrome.” What they’re describing is when a person not only believes that they are the main character of their own story but that the other people in their lives are merely supporting characters that exist solely to assist the them instead of viewing other people as the main characters of their own lives. In other words, it refers to people who are narcissistic and self-centered to the degree that they stop treating the people around them as people but as mere props.
I saw this news clip about this girl who found out from a stranger that her friends were talking bad about her behind her back. The girl was said to have main character vibes. I think they got the meaning wrong then.
They fit the stereotypes of a MC. I suspect it fits genre that is very campy like Manga more than anything else. These are guys that have swarms of girls chasing after them, and are fairly attractive. It can come across as them using people like objects, but honestly those doing the labels tend to come across as more proactively using in that situation
It goes along with ShE’s NoT lIkE oThEr GiRlS. As someone who tends to write eccentric characters, I can’t stand dealing with the bland vanilla “different” being hyped up.
Is that why I don’t get it? I’ve been seeing this phrasing around recently. Main character vibes.
Like Llamas in Hats or Charlie the Unicorn.