Talk:Jeff the Killer 2015/@comment-26054278-20151208024514/@comment-26054278-20160430001416

A character acting their age or being mature does not excuse that character being bland or under-developed, regardless of the events of the story. At least we do both agree that Liu's character in general could have been improved.

As for your main question (which I apologize for not seeing it when you first asked), it depends mainly on the intention of the author. The rewrite was meant to stick kind of close to the original "Jeff the Killer", and while I would argue that it did hinder the results a little bit (as I think we needed something more creative that took a different approach in order for the story to truly excel), I wouldn't say that there is much wrong with trying to make Jeff sympathetic. If the author can make a character we can sympathize with and want to follow, then his inevitable fall can be viewed as more tragic. However, the scares would be a lot harder to develop unless the kills are heavily detailed or his fall into insanity is described with disturbing detail.

I will say that the sympathetic angle has been the most common one in Jeff Origin stories (that I have seen), and I think the main reason for that is because it picks Jeff as the protagonist of the story. I think having Jeff be a psycho from the beginning would work best in two possible scenarios: Either if Jeff wasn't the main character and he was instead a disturbing person that the protagonist notices and has fears about, or we follow a very deranged, incredibly messed-up version of Jeff that is interesting to read about if only because of how gruesome and screwed up he is. Personally, I can see either approach working, but I am a bit curious to see somebody pull off the second one.

Speaking of stories in which Jeff is not the protagonist, the third place winner by JZoidberg (scroll to the top of the page) follows a detective investigating the case of Jeff, who is uncovering the truth behind what happened and finding out what is going on now with everybody involved in the original Jeff story. Sure, it isn't the traditional Jeff story (if anything it is closer to "Jeff is Back"), but I found that it massively improved on the original story by showing all these different sides to each character. Every single character featured in the Creepypasta felt like a well-developed person, and in the end, nobody is portrayed as the clear-cut villain. I'd probably call it my all-time favorite "Jeff the Killer" story, and for all those who doubt that there is actually a good Jeff the Killer tale (that dislikes this version by Banning), I point you to JZoidberg's fantastic piece (which, having not been posted on this site directly, sadly does not get as much attention as it deserves).

Anyway, I ranted for quite a while. Hopefully you can make sense of it and understand my point of view on Jeff. Neither approach is wrong, and I think that either has the chance to be good. I just think that writers should maybe start to change up the "Origin Story" formula and try to do something wholly creative and new with it. Yes, the sympathetic view can work, but if you really want to write a "Jeff the Killer" story, you should try to bring something new to the table. Take a different approach and it may just prove how strong of a character Jeff really can be.