Post by Deleted on Jan 14, 2020 6:47:25 GMT -5
Who am I? Just a conscience!
Introduce yourself
Hey, howdy, hey! The name's Fate Amenable To Change, and I wished upon a star from an advert on another site!. My other imaginary friends include none... yet. Dawn Bellwether and I are so very eager to join the Worlds of Disney circle of life!
Character basics
Character name: Dawn Bellwether
Age: Mid-thirties.
Species: Sheep.
Birthplace: Meadowlands District, Zootopia
Movie: Zootopia
Custom title: Wolf In Sheep's Clothing
Why'd you pick this character?I don't normally write villainous characters, because I'm a sucker for characters that are cute fuzzy balls of loveliness who are just super-helpful. So I like writing Bellwether, because it gives me an opportunity to dip my toes into writing a villainous character, but her demeanour also lets me write a happy, helpful, innocent sheep. It also gave me an excuse to watch Zootropolis Zootopia again in the name of "research".
Character appearance (try to get at least 2 or 3 sentences for each section)
Hair description: Like the rest of her pale cream wool, it's kept neat and tidy with rarely a strand out of place. It's been cut into almost a pom-pom at the top, which makes her look a little taller than she really is.
Facial description/mood/expressions: Bright, wide green eyes smile out at the world from behind a pair of large glasses. Her soft, round face is framed with wool and a pair of awkwardly floppy ears. While the ears don't really move much to express her mood, her eyebrows and eyes do most of the metaphorical talking, even though she spends most of her time looking either very earnest with attentive, alert eyes or stunned, with her eyes wide open and eyebrows raised. Those same green, kind eyes also do just fine for scowling too, it turns out.
Clothing style: Bellwether tends to (and prefers to) wear formal office attire, mixing and matching shirts, blazers and skirts to make herself look presentable and unassuming. There's the occasional flash of fancy jewellery for special occasions, but her only usual nod to the concept of accessorising is a plain bracelet and necklace with a bell on it. As of her arrival at the the park, she's dressed in a most unflattering shade of "prison orange".
Body build: Diminutive. As a sheep, most of her bulk is made up of wool, and she keeps that short, so there's very little to her. Hooves don't do much for her dexterity or agility, and her thin limbs leave her lack of muscles and strength on display for the rest of the world. With the benefit of her unique hairstyle (although would "wool style" be more appropriate?), she stands at two and a half feet tall - short by most people's standards, but she likes it that way.
Any unique traits (optional): None really. Just your average sheep.
Original character analysis (In your own words and please be thorough)
Personality:
There's a stark difference between the personality that Bellwether displays to the rest of the world, and the thoughts and plans that actually drive her. On the outside, Dawn is the archetypal sheep, presenting a front that is quiet, meek and oh-so-helpful. While acting this way often leads her to seem quite neurotic and agitated, she allows herself to be pushed around and harried by others, as this feeds into and reinforces her more deeply held prejudices about the world and how it ought to be. When presenting in this way, then, Dawn comes across as naive, slightly bumbling, but with a heart that's ultimately in the right place.
Deep down, however, Bellwether is a villain. Harbouring anger at a world that both metaphorically and literally walks all over her, she is prone to scheming and manipulating people and events in order to achieve her goals. While she may dress up her goals as being for the betterment of prey animals such as herself, her primary motivation behind her schemes is an obsessive fear and hatred of predators - as well as a desire to see herself in her rightful position as leader. Normally, she knows better than to let this side of her be seen, though on occasion - usually when she feels utterly safe and secure in her position - she'll let slip her egotistical and megalomaniacal nature.
While she professes solidarity with people like her, and feigns subordination to those who would consider themselves her superior, the cold truth is that she is comfortable sacrificing either of these groups when the need arises. Bellwether hides behind the rules when it suits her needs, rather than obeying them at all times out of respect for the law. In order to maintain her image as a docile, helpful sheep, she most often resorts to manipulating people and events, letting them further her goals and, most of the time, take the fall for her.
In short, she is a wolf in sheep's clothing. Shrewd and intelligent, hiding behind a bumbling facade.
History:
Dawn Bellwether was one of many, born into a family of brothers and sisters and aunts and uncles and cousins and more cousins. In this large flock, a young Dawn found safety, acceptance and, strangely, power. Her older cousins and siblings outnumbered just about every other would-be gang of children at the schoolhouse, such that any would-be bully could be scared off should the entirety of the group stand together and face them. A good-natured person might use this as a means to look after friends and family, but Dawn saw another use for it, which was to get her way. Soon the schoolyard had a new unwritten rule - be nice to Dawn Bellwether, or every sheep in the suburb will come for you. As far as most were concerned, then, Dawn's childhood was perfect - she had no shortage of "friends", and her keen mind allowed her to excel at school.
The real world, outside of the safety of the flock and the bounded limits of the schoolyard, was not so kind. Taking up a career as a civil servant in the city, Dawn held a number of minor administrative positions, which gave her ample opportunity to understand how the city worked, but little control over the direction that Zootopia was heading in. To make matters worse, she could see the hierarchy that existed, but by all rights shouldn't - she saw herself passed over for promotion multiple times in favour of predators, and it became apparent to her that predators could enjoy positions of authority, while prey were held back. Years passed, and each passing year of frustrated ambitions and being sidelined by others fuelled the part of her that wanted revenge.
Naturally, Bellwether came up with a plan. After subtly placing herself as the ideal candidate for Assistant Mayor alongside the most charismatic mayoral candidate (through a few well-placed letters, and accidentally misplacing a few others), she found herself at what should have been the lofty heights of power. The position of "second most important person in Zootopia" that she had been promised, however, amounted to nothing at all. Being trapped in a position that was closer to a harried secretary than a second-in-command necessitated a more serious plan to remove the Mayor and to take charge herself.
The plan worked, to an extent. The Mayor was framed, the city was hers, and every predator, not just the ones who held her back, but all of them were ostracised and feared by the majority. Things would have been fine. Things should have been fine. When her crimes were discovered, however, it all fell apart rapidly - a short trial was followed by a long prison sentence. Outside the walls of the prison, the city returned to its flawed normalcy, though perhaps a little wiser.
Ambitions:
Get power, get revenge. Prison isn't a nice place, but it does give you plenty of time to think about what you've done wrong. Some people use this time to think about the crimes they've committed and how to make amends for them. Bellwether has used this time to see exactly where her plan fell apart, so that she'll never make that mistake again, and come up with a long list of things she'll do to those that brought about her downfall. Outside of these rather nefarious ambitions, the other thing she desires most is safety and comfort - ideally from a lofty position where she is utterly unassailable, but part of her pines for the strength in numbers, and the security that comes with it.
Strengths & abilities:
Bellwether, for all her scheming, is pretty smart - she's good at understanding how things work, which made her particularly good at navigating the political bureaucracy of the city, and manipulate that to her own ends. Her unassuming appearance counts as a strength, as she uses it like a weapon, disarming people with a smile and a folder bristling with papers.
Flaws:
Other mammals might get to count horns or claws or teeth or nimbleness as a strength, but as a sheep, she doesn't have much going for her in the physical department, and so relies on others should any actual fighting need to happen. Outside of lacking somewhat in the physical department, her flaws are mostly with her personality - she is prone to obsessive behaviour, she's got a lot of strange ideas about the relationship between predator and prey, and beneath that cheerful exterior boils an ocean of anger.
Likes:
Being in control. Prey mammals. Reading and collecting books. Feeling appreciated. Hot chocolate. Eating salad for lunch. Eating salad for dinner. Plotting. Awful romantic movies.
Dislikes:
Predators. Loud people. Loud predators. Prisoner uniforms. Other people touching her wool. Going to the baa-bers (ha!) for a trim. People looking down on her. Unpredictable people.
Fears:
Being rendered powerless and helpless. Letting them win. Being alone.
Anything to add?:
This is where they do a Zootopia II and it explores Bellwether's background and it completely invalidates my little history I wrote up, isn't it?
RP SAMPLE:
PAST TENSE ONLY. MUST BE ABOUT THE CHARACTER FOR WHOM YOU ARE APPLYING.
Bellwether stared at the ceiling of her prison cell, going through the motions of counting each familiar crack in the concrete. It was that awkward gap between the uninspiring dinner served to the inmates and lights out, part of the familiar and boring routine designed to give prisoners a steady and predictabl-
The entire cell block was unexpectedly plunged into darkness, not just the cells themselves, but also the corridor along which the prisoners paced during their free time. Even the guards office fell dark and, curiously, silent. A power outage would normally be followed by emergency lights flickering into life as the ancient generators in the basement roared into life. There'd at least be noise, as the rowdier inmates gladly took every opportunity to cause trouble with the guards, or settle some perceived wrongs with their fellow prisoners.
Sitting up on her bed, she tried peering into the darkness to get some idea of what was going on, but even the expected ambient light had been swallowed whole. All she could do was feel her way around, sliding off her cot, only to find that the drop to the floor wasn't quite as short as it ought to be - she fell, tumbling through a void, wind whipping at her clothes as she fell, presumably, towards the ground.
"It's just a dream," she tried to reassure herself once she'd stopped screaming in terror, and by the time she'd hit the ground, not with a splat but more with a gentle thud, Bellwether had almost convinced herself that it was a dream. Gone were the four oppressive walls of her cell, gone was the dull grey of the ceiling and, mercifully, gone was the cold floor that no amount of scrubbing could make look clean. Instead, the world she opened her eyes to was bright and colourful, busy with sound and full of strange smells.
While she had absolutely no idea where she was, she knew where she was not, and that was the most important thing. Standing herself up, and dusting herself down, Bellwether took a deep breath and started to walk towards the sound of a bustling main street. Her only regret was that the time she'd spent plotting her own escape from prison, on her own terms, had gone to waste. The little smile she wore froze on her features as she stepped out onto the unfamiliar, busy boulevard of Main Street. The architecture was familiar, but the inhabitants were decidedly odd.
Still, she thought, it was freedom. Bellwether had yet to realise she'd been broken out of one prison, only to be placed into another.