Six* plural characters and how they're portrayed

For whoever's reading this without some familiarity with me as a person: I'm plural, also known as being a system. My brain is a bizarre stew of different identities, personalities, and beings, and this affects my daily life and the way I consume media. Much as I might say "I" and "me" for simplicity's sake... it's messy in here. And when you're plural, you really start to notice the fascination much of the media landscape has with the idea of plurality – without ever actually interrogating its implications, oftentimes not even realizing that that's what it's depicting.

When I see plural characters in media, intentionally-written or not, I tend to latch onto them. They always have good and bad in near-equal spades; there is always some element holding them back, either because they didn't consider that their writing could be interpreted as representation, or because of their ingrained biases about systems. Still, it's so rare to see people in fiction whose brains work even roughly like I do that I tend to take what I can get, applying a critical lens while letting myself get a little emotionally attached anyway. Here are some of the plural characters I've encountered and resonated with across fiction, and my honest thoughts and feelings on each of them.

Please note that my opinions do not reflect those of all systems. Systems are a hugely diverse range of beings! Every system works differently, thinks differently, has different experiences and opinions, and I don't claim to speak for all of them. These are just my takes.

(Spoilers ahead for OK K.O., MILGRAM, miscellaneous Eighth Doctor audios, Faction Paradox: Spinning Jenny, Elle(s), and Fullmetal Alchemist!)

Glossary of system-related terms used in this article.

OK K.O.! Let's Be Heroes — K.O. & T.K.O.

"It's not a phase, mom! This is who I am!"
—T.K.O., "T.K.O."

When I encounter systems in fictional media, usually they're one of three types. Either they're personified symbols of an (often young) character's conflicting emotions; they're an unstable murderer whose plurality is depicted as a mental disorder; or there's a fantasy explanation such as the character being an alien or possessed. The titular character of the cartoon TV series OK K.O.! Let's Be Heroes is an example of that first type; K.O. is a cutesy, bright-eyed six-to-eleven-year-old looking to become a great hero, and early on in the series he gains a headmate, T.K.O. (or Turbo K.O.), a bratty and destructive edgelord who expresses a constant resentment at his own powerlessness.

Initially believing T.K.O. to be a foreign entity planted in his mind by a villain, K.O. soon reconciles with the fact that T.K.O. is a part of himself, representing the feelings he keeps hidden. Nevertheless, the two's relationship remains rocky, with K.O. attempting various strategies to retain dominance over front. Though in several instances the two merge or coöperate, K.O. mostly relegates T.K.O. to various parts of headspace that go from a cage, to a separate house, and eventually to his subconscious. T.K.O. is clearly discontent with being repressed like this, and K.O. attempts at various times to give T.K.O. more time in front, but never lets the two be anywhere near equal. This changes in the finale, when T.K.O. takes control and attempts to wreak destruction and domination across the plaza; K.O. manages to placate him with a song, talking about how the two need to develop coping mechanisms for their anger as opposed to K.O. just hiding it away. The two clasp hands and merge into a single being.

The foremost thing that stands out to me here isn't to do with the emotional arc, though we'll get there – it's to do with the headspace. The power balance between the two headmates is represented with headspace taking various forms, such as a control panel in an episode where the two co-front, or the furnished-but-lonely house T.K.O. lives in during the show's second season. While headspaces aren't a terribly uncommon feature for the "emotional conflict metaphor" brand of fictional plurality, it's nevertheless nice to see how dynamic this particular one is, feeling homey at points and always representing the various emotional stages the system goes through. K.O. and T.K.O.'s headspace, and in particular the control panel scene, really made me feel seen.

Now, of course, one can only feel so seen when the intention was never to represent systems in the first place; and thus, the storyline itself only hits the mark partway. K.O.'s arc of burying part of himself, then unburying said part but struggling to figure out how to handle it is pretty apt, and feels reminiscent of many experiences I and plural friends have had. T.K.O. is very easy to see as a "problem headmate" who needs to be hidden away, but ultimately he's as much a part of K.O.'s life as K.O. himself, and he just needs outlets and coping strategies. This is the ultimate conclusion the story reaches, and it's a strong one. But the very ending, where the two fuse into one, is more complicated.

Final fusion, as it's called, is a touchy subject for systems, one I won't claim to have the final say on. The strategy of all a system's members merging into one combined being as a way to stabilize themself is one that works just fine for plenty of dysfunctional systems – while for others, final fusion reads like a form of identity death. Healthy multiplicity – system members coöperating with one another and tending to one another's needs – is a great goal to have, but it's not a preferred or even viable solution for some. Different things are best for different people. Still, final fusion seems to be a much more common end-point for dysfunctional systems in fiction, as if to disregard the idea that systems can exist healthily while still being systems. It's fine to depict it, but it can't be treated as the only possible positive outcome.

Now, imperfect representation is a given when the intention seems never to have been that K.O. at all represented real-life systems – it's only natural it'd end up a little off-beat when viewed in such a way. And as it stands, accepting your "bad" emotions as a part of yourself is a great character arc and a great lesson for viewers young and old! This plot beat works just fine from that lens. Nonetheless, my viewpoint is one of assessing plurality in media, intentional representation or not, and K.O. is textually plural. He has an alter with independent needs, a headspace, and switches, for goodness sake! His arc will come across a certain way to plural viewers, and because it's so reminiscent of real-life systems, it will inform singlets' perceptions of us as well. In an ideal world, viewers and creatives alike should both be mindful of that. 

I come down pretty positive on the story of K.O. and T.K.O., all things considered. K.O.'s arc of sympathy and acceptance for T.K.O. feels a lot like what I've been through, and learning to accept every part of yourself is a lesson that's good for systems and singlets alike. The most literal reading of the ultimate ending doesn't quite sit right with me, but I can appreciate the emotional arc it represents nonetheless. More than anything else, it's refreshing to see a plural main character in any series, and so K.O.'s systemhood becomes just one more out of many reasons I love this show.

MILGRAM — Mikoto Kayano & John

"Are you really satisfied [with your judgment]?! He turned into a murderer overnight!"
—John, "Neoplasm"

And on another end of the representation trichotomy, we've got a character who by authorial intent had DID – yes, DID specifically – from the start. And surprise surprise, he's a murderer. Not your typical cold-blooded killer, but a murderer nonetheless.

To explain Mikoto's case, one must first understand how MILGRAM as a series works. This is a web series that presents viewers with a set of "prisoners" who each slot into basic anime character archetypes at a glance, tells you that each of them is somehow a "murderer", and challenges the viewer to delve into a multimedia morass to determine the actual details. And then, fans get to make a yes/no vote on whether to forgive each character. This is an intentionally poor modus operandi. Chaos and tragedy ensues.

Prisoner 09, Mikoto Kayano, is Schrödinger's plural rep. He is the classical "clueless innocent alter, evil murderous alter" stereotype with a pair of big green anime eyeballs tacked on. But... is he anything deeper than that? Well, yes, but viewer interpretation determines how much more depth he has. And viewer interpretation is the defining trait of MILGRAM.

Let's start with what we can be reasonably sure of, based on what the series has told us thus far. Mikoto Kayano is an overworked fashion designer with a downright nasty boss, one who keeps him coming back in to work overtime until Mikoto just can't take it anymore. As a result, he unknowingly develops an alter, dubbed John (from the term "John Doe"). Where Mikoto is mellow and friendly, John is harsh, forthright, and constantly stressed, an outlet for Mikoto's pain and rage at the world. John's memory of his first conscious moments is a blur, but once he stabilizes, he realizes he has just committed murder. Mikoto and John are then transported to the magical prison known as Milgram, where they are judged by the series' audience for their sins. Mikoto has no idea what's going on, and after the audience dubs him "not forgiven", is slowly forced to accept that he is on trial for a crime he has no memory of. Meanwhile, John is not subject to the prison's restraints, and ends up getting into scraps with other characters, while grappling with his own self-hatred and protectiveness of Mikoto.

John pleads with the viewers, saying that he killed out of a desire to save Mikoto from his own emotions; if Mikoto is forgiven in the second round of voting, Mikoto's stress will disappear and John will simply fade away (he presents this as a good thing). The viewers do indeed end up forgiving Mikoto, and by the start of season three, Mikoto is by himself, lamenting his own crushing stress and complaining that something feels "missing". And, well, that's where we are right now; there's sure to be a smidge more clarity as the story progresses. MILGRAM is notably still an ongoing story – this is an assessment of the version of Mikoto and John that's been presented to viewers as of late 2025!

Certainly, writer Takuya Yamanaka is really trying to take a tired trope and make it worthwhile. The writing of every prisoner in MILGRAM starts with a basic character archetype and twists it, interrogates it, grants it depth – exemplified well by Mikoto and John. And yes, he— they— have got lots of depth! Mikoto is portrayed as a victim of circumstance, and though John declares himself a killer, he's still sympathetic enough to get the system forgiven by the audience. Both alters are depicted with lots of personality, and both end up resonating well as character studies, alone and with each other.

And sure, John says some relatively implausible things, such as the idea that he'll "disappear" completely once there's no need for him, the idea that he and Mikoto are the only two people in the system, or that Mikoto could have just involuntarily spawned a headmate in mid-adulthood. But John's clearly clueless too – can't we write this off as simply character writing, John not knowing any better? After all, contrary to John's claims, Mikoto doesn't seem better off now that John's not around. And even though the number two appears all over Mikoto's content, so does the number three; there's a myriad of theories that suggest there are actually three Mikotos, with a blasé, disaffected third alter likely having done the actual killing. For all we know, Yamanaka's done his research, and John's explanations and rationalizations are intentionally written to be entirely false.

And yes, some of them probably are. I myself think much of the above speculation has merit! But at the end of the day, a fictional plural killer is still a fictional plural killer. Mikoto and John are the latest in a long line of murderers with DID, and you can't break the pattern while simultaneously contributing to it. Especially not when your series spends multiple seasons having characters directly state so many inaccuracies and stereotypes. Even if Yamanaka does pull the rug out from under the fans at the very end and reveals that his character was realistically-written all along, said fans have still spent half a decade and counting with the character that was initially presented, making an impression on them and the media landscape.

I'd like to hope Mikoto's system proves itself to be more realistic than John's claims are, in the end. I don't really know how the story will turn out. But right now, viewers look at this character and see what they want to see. If you recognize the flaws in the way he's been presented thus far and want to see better representation, you'll probably call bullshit on John's statements and maybe even buy into the theory of three Mikotos. If you're invested in the Mikoto and John that have been thus far established, you'll probably look at that dynamic and try to find nuance inside of that framework, interrogate the complexities the narrative inserts into the stereotype. If you're not a super-fan and just watch the cool music videos... you'll probably just see an angsty plural killer. And so, Mikoto Kayano becomes little more than a window for others to project their own feelings and wishes regarding this character archetype. I appreciate the depth to which he's written, but I'd be lying to say he contributed much to the conversation on plural characters. Mikoto Kayano simply is.

The Eighth Doctor Adventures — The Multitude

The Eleven (left) and the Doctor (right).

"Not a freak, then? Merely an interesting concept? That's who I am...?"
—The Eleven, "The Eleven"

Doctor Who is a franchise where the framework for plural characters already very clearly exists, waiting to be capitalized upon. The main character, the Doctor, is part of a race known as Time Lords who, upon "dying", simply change their form (read: actor) – and this usually comes with a shift in personality. At their core, a Time Lord is the same person across different incarnations, but each incarnation displays surface-level differences in mannerisms, emotional tendencies, and interests; as the main character, the Doctor has been through countless "regenerations" both on screen and off. Oftentimes this feels unintentionally plural-coded, with scenes where the Doctor worries about becoming a "different man", seems disoriented after a change in form, or even has past incarnations phone up nervous human companions, in order to reassure them that even after a change the Doctor is still the same person at heart. The Doctor often talks about having other selves and other lives contained within himself, and in one example even enters a sort of headspace and converses with her past selves shortly before her own regeneration. Still, the Doctor largely retains one active personality at any given moment, whatever that personality may be.

So it's only intuitive that at some point a daring writer would take this to the obvious extreme and introduce a Time Lord whose past incarnations coexist more actively inside their consciousness, influencing everyday actions and interactions. And that's how, in an audio drama spinoff series, we got the Multitude. This is a Time Lord who takes on a different name every regeneration, so as to symbolize the amount of selves past and present within them; the first was known as the One, the second was known as the Two because there were two of him in there, the third as the Three because there were three of him, and so on. Most incarnations of the Multitude are – say it with me now – homicidal megalomaniacs intent on universal domination. This includes the most frequently appearing incarnation, the Eleven: a conniving, unstable man who constantly has out-loud arguments with his past selves while trying to enact the evil plot of the week.

Now, the Eleven makes it clear from the get-go that he's not evil because of his "regenerative dissonance"; he was already an evil man, and the regenerative dissonance is something he just so happens to also have. Still, these two things are not so easily extricable in a throwaway line; all aspects of identity inform one another, and it's hard for any listener to believe him entirely when he says they're separate. Beyond that, he is the only example in the franchise of a character with his condition, making his plurality seem like nothing more than a surface-level gimmick to inform his particular flavor of villainy and thus distinguish him from the hundred other cackling, conniving Time Lords out there.

Still, we could talk about the problems inherent to the "murderous disordered system" stereotype all day. It's hardly a trait unique to the Multitude. What's really interesting here is the way that their plurality feels like an accurate, if unintentional, representation of a dysfunctional system; each alter is constantly vying for control, and the Eleven can't do much but tell them to shut up. The various incarnations' arguments can feel genuinely relatable, and that's fun! (More on intercommunication shortly.) Heck, certain incarnations are even reminiscent of common system roles; the childish Three, the violently tetchy Six, and so on. But the Multitude is convinced that the only "solution" to the maelstrom of voices is to suppress their alters; we see this with the Eight, the "good" incarnation who meditated the voices away, the Eleven, who constantly yells at his past selves to shut up, and the Twelve, who is more outwardly stable due to a "neural inhibitor" that "locks away" all her alters.

And frankly, it's nice to interpret this as simply the Multitude's belief, a refusal to accept the idea of healthy multiplicity, and interpreting it this way gives the character a rather interesting undercurrent of only being so unstable because they refuse to work alongside their alters. No, the issue here is that this seems to be a belief of the writers, not just of the Multitude. When the kindly old Twelve tells the Doctor that she's suppressed her alters, the Doctor's resultant worry that the alters will resurface reads less like "there are more effective coping mechanisms than this" and more like "you can't repress your plurality and that's bad because your plurality is bad". And as the Doctor is so often used as a moral mouthpiece for the writers, well... it's not a good look.

There is one element that really sets the Multitude apart from other stereotypical portrayals of evil, disordered systems such as Mikoto; the fact that everyone in the Multitude's system is constantly conscious, but nobody except the current incarnation is ever actually in front for a meaningful amount of time. This is the opposite to a lot of these kinds of portrayals, where alters control the body at different times, don't share memories, and may not even be aware of each other's existence. It certainly sets the Multitude apart and adds a distinct flavor, and it's part of why I enjoy listening to them in spite of myself; they actually get to communicate, a privilege not afforded to many fictional systems simply because any level of intercommunication (even unwilling, as shown here) brings systems closer to being functional, and thus makes them less scary. The Eleven won't appear good and then suddenly dissociate only to have a spooky evil alter pop out at you – he's evil from the get-go, which at least makes for a change of pace.

Still, hard to say this is anything approaching good representation. I only listen because I'm fascinated to see what they'll do with this mess of a character next. I'm aware that the Multitude appears across a variety of audio dramas, some of which I haven't listened to, in which they variously get a somewhat heroic arc, merge into one, put their alters into separate bodies, and so on... seems there's always more to discover with the Multitude, and none of it sounds all that promising. And yet, in spite of myself, I find myself appreciating his presence. At the end of the day, at least I've finally found a Doctor Who character whose brain works like mine. And if that appreciative attitude doesn't say something about the current state of plural representation, I don't know what does.

Faction Paradox — Sergeant Brierly

Notably not an image of Brierly, but something had to go here.

Brierly: My body was only ever a house for all the people I was. When I need a new [body], I invite [its] owner to join me and ask them to allow me in.
Elizabeth: Would that we could all be so versatile.
—"Spinning Jenny"

So, the Eleven, huh. Not great. Let's move on to talk about how a different, more obscure corner of the Doctor Who franchise handled plurality. Faction Paradox, an esoteric pseudo-spinoff of Doctor Who, introduced a plural alien to its franchise in the book Spinning Jenny.

Brierly is a body-hopping alien who exists as an entire "parliament" of voices in one head, making votes what the body will do next. Every time she body-hops, the old owner of the body joins the parliament. After six thousand years of life and several thousand alters, she somehow ended up a sergeant for the British Empire, and throughout Spinning Jenny she flits around attempting to stop protagonist Elizabeth Howkins from enacting a ritual that could tear reality apart.

This'll be a short section, since frankly, Brierly's depiction is rather underwhelming. I've already spoken on her somewhat in my review of the book, but I'll repeat it here: it's very nice that Brierly exists at all, a plural character whose plurality is simply treated as a fact of life and is never treated as some problem that needs solving. Sure, she's morally questionable what with the whole colonial military thing she's got going on, but she's got plenty of positive attributes too: she's brave, kind, and saves the lives of people on all sides of the fight. Moreover, unlike so many, she's both able and willing to let the whole system have a say. All of that is really nice and refreshing.

'Course, she's not perfect. There's the whole "plural alien" thing, where only non-humans ever seem to be written as plural – echoing a similar pattern in the portrayal of non-binary characters. It's a step in the right direction that she exists at all, and she's got many traits you rarely see in fictional systems; nevertheless, I wish we could have more human plurs too.

Beyond that, she's a little dry. Character writing isn't exactly the defining feature of Spinning Jenny as a book, and Brierly ends up feeling rather underwritten as with most characters in the story. It's hard to give a deeper outline of her character than what I listed above, as she and the rest of the book's cast serve as more of an instrument for the plot. And while it's nice to see Brierly's plurality not being treated as a problem, the converse is that she doesn't have real inner conflict – the parliament of voices is so in-sync that she often feels like a singlet, and one without a strong personality at that. There'll be the occasional exposition dump, mention of a disagreement or mental vote being called, but in the end she almost reads like a single person with extra flavoring. That's partially the fault of the book's disinterest in character, but I do wonder if we could have had a little more exposition on the varying people and feelings that composed Brierly.

Really, there's just not much here in general. Faction Paradox is a series of interesting concepts, but it sometimes neglects to really dig into them as much as it could or maybe should. I'm fine with having plural characters that aren't the focus, and it's a step towards normalizing it for sure; Brierly is allowed to just be, and I like that. But at the same time, I would love to see what Brierly could become at the hands of an author more invested in dissecting her.

Elle(s) — Elle

Blondie: Are you trying to tell me you're my five other personalities?!
Rose: It's more like we are six people in the same body...
Blue: Yeah, don't assume you're the center of the universe, Blondie.
—"Elle Together"

This is another obscure one: a comic translated from French which I found in my local library and just had to check out (it was the only piece of fiction tagged with "multiple personalities" that wasn't about serial killers). And for the first volume of the three, I wasn't let down – at first, Elle(s) represents a real-life system with so much accuracy and emotional realism that I assumed it was pulled from real-life experience or at least had plural people advising on it. Everything about the character writing in Elle(s) felt like me.

Elle(s) was so close. So close to getting it right. And that's why it hurt.

The main character Elle is a high-schooler subject to what she calls "mood swings". She regularly expresses five distinct personality states, all of which feel realistic to lineups in systems I've met: Rose (the mellow, friendly host), Brunette (the anxiety holder), Green (the distant, nonverbal, "wise" one), Violet (the silly, mischievous one), and Blondie (the brash, sporty one). And there's a hidden sixth, Blue: the manipulative gatekeeper working to gain control of the system. These alters are all differentiated by their hair colors, but in-universe it's made clear that it's not a physical change but rather part of how the Elles visualize themselves.

Almost every alter is given nuance. For instance, Green is nonverbal and appears distant, but simultaneously she's thoughtful and emotionally aware. Nonverbal characters in fiction are generally rare, and even less often are they given real autonomy! Blondie is rude and competitive, but she's got a variety of practical skills, takes risks the others wouldn't, and clearly acts the way she does as a defense mechanism rather than for the sake of it. Brunette is all kinds of anxious, but she's active on social media, and very into art. They all feel realized and furthermore true to systemhood, Green in particular reflecting a type of alter I so rarely see acknowledged or represented. Blue is perhaps the most frustratingly one-dimensional, being relegated to the role of "the mean and manipulative one", but at least by the comic's end she manages to coöperate with her alters, and it's acknowledged that her traits exist for a reason and shouldn't go ignored.

And then there's the headspaces! They're diverse and beautiful and so, so vivid! Each alter has their own headspace, each depicting a different environment reflective of their personality. In contrast to OK K.O.'s headspaces, they're much more separated from one another; traversing her subconscious in volume two, Rose refers to them as "fortresses of solitude" created as a way to lock away alters other than herself, the host. Each one contains a portal to front, and are normally completely walled-off from one another, resulting in a visual depiction of their unfortunate separation that gives them more depth and is nothing short of gorgeous, besides. The six are only able to work together once the barriers between the innerworld's layers are entirely broken down.

The way Elle interacts with her plurality feels similarly relatable. She characterizes it as mood swings but knows there's something deeper, just has no idea what it could be; she's essentially unaware of what's really happening in her mind, unable to explain it or cope with it, and as a result she can appear to her friends as unpredictable and unstable. Her disorientation and uncertainty hits real hard with how true it feels to my own process of self-discovery; the Elles are mostly unable to communicate with each other, nor do they have the knowledge to communicate their way of being to the outside world. But when she finally interrogates it with her friend Maëlys, she realizes she's got more instinctive knowledge about her system's nature than she's ever bothered to interrogate. And she of course talks about switching exactly like a dissociative episode:

"I hit her. Actually, it wasn't really me... I mean it was, but it's like I watched it happen from outside my body. It's like someone had taken possession of my body to hit Gilda. It's not that I was opposed to it... but generally speaking, I'm just not a big fan of violence. The blows just went off on their own... I wasn't in control."
—Rose

In short, Elle is a system. Yet her unique mental workings are never over-medicalized, which is a relief! She's not diagnosed with DID or OSDD or anything, and while she's experienced traumatic events, there's no indication that they're the cause of her plurality. Her plurality exists outside of the realm of the DSM-5, which is refreshing. No sysmeds here.

However, there is an in-universe medical explanation for her plurality. And that right there is where it starts to break down. Because Elle cannot just be, oh no. She cannot exist as a normal person in the world who just so happens to be plural. There must be some explanation. And so we get the moment that broke me: at the end of volume two out of three, it is revealed that she was originally sextuplets, who fused into one in utero but somehow kept their individual personalities. And that is why she experiences life as six people inhabiting the same body.

...Whuh?

At its core, this isn't that dissimilar from OK K.O.! Let's Be Heroes' handling of the subject matter. With Elle(s), the creators have gone on record as saying that their series isn't about plurality, and instead represents the inner conflict of identity and emotion which is endemic to adolescence. They wrote this system only to serve as a metaphor, and so came up with some fantastical explanation to differentiate it from cases of real-life plurality. And in the third and final volume, the resolution closely echoes that of K.O. and T.K.O.: after a series of disagreements, the alters come together, go through final fusion, and become one "whole" Elle. So what's the big deal here? Why am I so upset about its handling in Elle(s) when I'm willing to let OK K.O. off the hook?

It's the presentation, and it's the juxtaposition! OK K.O. makes it clear upfront that as a series, it is fantastical and silly. Superheroes, robots, and furries are not just real but everyday, and the rules of reality flip between RPG mechanics and cartoon absurdities depending on what's the most fun at any given moment. And it's made clear from the very start that K.O.'s plurality is influenced by the fantastical nature of his world, even initially presenting it as if it's part of a villain's evil scheme. Plus, K.O.'s only got two alters, something very uncommon in real life. He's plural, yes, but it's telegraphed from the start that this won't be written quite as such. Meanwhile, over in the world of Elle(s), everything is meant to reflect real life. We have a relatively down-to-earth set of French high-schoolers, the drama is all emotionally-driven, and up until the reveal, it feels like Elle and her world could very well be part of ours! And that sentiment is amplified by how realistic and relatable Elle herself feels. Perhaps it wasn't intended to be so, but to a plural reader it really does feel like a bait-and-switch. Nothing about the embryo story matches the logic of what came before, and it feels shoved-in just so that the writers could get out of calling a system a system.

Still, if we get past that, we end up in pretty much the same place we did in OK K.O., with a similar arc to boot. We get a character who's textually a system despite being written with other intentions, and who has historically tried to repress their alters to keep themself stable, but whose repression only causes the "mean one" (T.K.O. and Blue) to lash out in defiance. Eventually the "mean one" takes control of the body for a while, causing havoc, and the only possible resolution is the alters all accepting each other and ultimately fusing into one. And I repeat: accepting your alters and/or the other sides of your own personality is great, and moreover final fusion has a place in plural narratives, but I'm tired of the trope popping up over and over. There is a version of this story where the Elles simply learned to coöperate and live together in peace, and that version is inches away from what we got. I can't really fault this resolution, beyond the fact that I know what I'm looking for in plural representation and this isn't it.

I can't say much else that I haven't already said in the OK K.O. section. It's the same exact trope, except that here, writer Kid Toussaint somehow accidentally wrote an entirely real-feeling system near-perfectly for a volume or two – both for better and for worse. At times its emotional beats hit very close to home, even in the last volume – at other times, it just annoyed me. If you don't want to write a system, don't write a system; the half-hearted avoidance is messy and offensive. At least examples like OK K.O. and MILGRAM are upfront about what they are and aren't depicting.

But hey, at least Elle is canonically bisexual. Good for her!

Fullmetal Alchemist: Brotherhood — Ling Yao & Greed

"You're talking to the future Emperor of Xing, monster. I am no normal man. My heart is large enough to hold twenty or thirty of you!" 
—Ling Yao, "Father"

This one isn't perfect, but it's my favorite.

We're gonna have to get into the weeds to explain this one. In the world of Fullmetal Alchemist, there exist superpowered, immortal beings known as Homunculi. These beings reside in a kind of soul-soup realm, and can be given bodies through which to interact with the physical world. Most of the Homunculi in the series have artificial bodies to match their artificial souls, but Homunculi can also be created via merging a Homunculus soul with a human body. The Homunculus' mind usually overtakes the human's, but the human is still somewhere in there, able to resist – hence, the system known by fans as Greedling.

Ling Yao is one of many princes of Xing (basically just China), and he's seeking immortality in order to secure his succession to the throne. After casually flitting in and out of the narrative for several episodes, he gets his golden opportunity in the form of a Philosopher's Stone, a material which will allow him to become an immortal Homunculus. He fully accepts this fate, ceding control of his body as a necessary sacrifice to become emperor. He's so blinded by his desire for power that he gives himself up to the control of another being, a being named... Greed.

Ah, yeah, these two were made for each other.

This plays out at first like your typical "sharing a body is bad because the evil guy in your head will take over" fare. Ling Yao's initial transformation is shown to be painful, and the main characters are scared to see someone else wearing Ling's skin – but right from the start, we get indications Ling is far from gone, with protagonist Ed being insistent he's still in there, and Greed subtly reacting to mentions of the people Ling cared for.

The next time Greed appears, we get to see inside his head, and we discover that Ling is indeed conscious, now vying for control after spending much too long watching Greed enact his schemes from Ling's body. This reaches a critical point when Greed kills a former friend, suppresses the emotional pain he feels, and Ling forcefully berates him for it. Ling says he's just waiting for a crack in Greed's mental state, at which point Ling will be able to retake the body; but in that case, why does Ling go on a passionate diatribe about friendship as if to convince Greed to better himself? These two are already getting invested in each other, just from living in the same body for so long.

The two remain at odds for a while, especially as Greed increasingly attempts to isolate himself from others. Ling Yao is briefly able to regain control, and there's a scene where he's mentally holding Greed back from front that, while dramatized, resonates a surprising amount. Greed eventually teams up with Ed, and continues to bicker with Ling over ownership of the body, but the two start talking and switching more as they realize they can help advance the other's goals. Greed actually lends Ling a compliment after Ling switches in so they can use Ling's unique fighting abilities, and the two start working together more as the plot ramps up. Ling may be a monarchist, but the two of them pretty much become friends thanks to their shared goal of punching fascists.

It's not all about the violence, though. As he inhabits Ling's body, Greed experiences human life head-on; he feels the grief Ling feels and receives the compassion Ling receives. Conversely, Ling gets a close-up look at Greed's psyche, understanding Greed's obsessive avarice and seeing where his mental armor breaks. Understanding that yes, Greed just wants friends, no matter what he says. And eventually, Ling will get him to tell the truth. It's the typical shōnen arc, as applied to systems! Sharing a body helps both of them become more compassionate and collaborative.

Ultimately, Greed sacrifices himself to help defeat the series antagonist, leaving Ling Yao alone in his own body as Greed evaporates; Greed's last words are an internal monologue about the friends he's made during his time with Ling. They'd never quite seen eye-to-eye, and their final words to each other include things like "I need you with me if I'm gonna be emperor" and "I finally got away from that stupid brat" – but it's clear as day that Ling is utterly devastated. He's still a little self-centered, still kept his power-grabbing political ideals, but he's grown just a little more open and understanding after being saddled with Greed for a while.

This is far from a perfect story. Greed and Ling exist in one body because of a case of possession by an inhuman entity – it's that fantasy-plur scenario again where a dynamic like this is only given nuance when it's not really the same as how actual humans experience it. Plus, you know, the whole "their powers change depending on who's in front" thing approaches gimmick territory. And beyond that, Greed just has to go and die at the end, preventing any chance of their systemhood working out long-term. We got so close to a happy ending and the chance was snuffed out. Which sucks.

But at the same time... out of all the examples I've presented in this article, this one dodges more of the common pitfalls than any other. Hiromu Arakawa is the only writer here who bothered to start with the question of "what would it look like if two people lived in the same body" and then dig into the characters from there, positives and drawbacks alike. Their dynamic feels relatable because the baseline is a genuine interest in cohabitation of a body. Arakawa did not set out to write a cool gimmick character, or a new take on the murderer trope, or a metaphor for adolescence or what have you. She set out to write a character study. And so, a simple character study it is.

Ling Yao and Greed may struggle and fight one another; they may not have the healthiest system dynamic; and they may not be a particularly realistic depiction of a system's inner workings. But they work out ways to talk to one another, they start portioning out front time, and most of all they live and they learn, slowly and surely. Elle(s) might get some of its mechanics so on-point that it stings, and OK K.O. might have a character arc that makes me grin like little else. But this here is a story that doesn't try to be anything other than a tale of two people living in the same body. Other stories have their place, and this too is far from perfect; but nevertheless, I just wish more authors would follow Arakawa's example.

In conclusion

damn bro you got the whole squad laughing

The examples I've given are a pretty clear demonstration of the trichotomy I mentioned near the start: plural characters tend to be metaphors for conflicting emotions (OK K.O., Elle(s)), murderers with a diagnosis (MILGRAM, Doctor Who), or some sci-fi excuse to get multiple minds in one body (Fullmetal Alchemist, Faction Paradox). The one thing that ties all of these imperfect forms of plural representation together is that none of them are interested in depicting everyday systems. There's always some underlying trait that either excuses them from being plural by the strictest definition, or narratively denies them a chance to be decent people and have nice things.

Even with these few examples I've discussed, it's easy to see a larger pattern of how much more work there is to do on plural representation in most media. I can't help but love a lot of these examples in spite of their flaws, because they're anything. While I always hope for the best, I've learned to temper my expectations, and get pleasantly surprised when I run into any level of nuance. And yes, I could run off to some queer art circle where these matters will be more thoroughly considered, and the voices of plural characters will be the voices of plural artists; and I am increasingly finding queer writing spaces where this kind of thing is the case. But nevertheless, I continue to look for more from the rest of the media world, perfect or not, because I should not have to burrow into those niche circles (lovely as they are) just for the sake of seeing characters like me. To say nothing of the proportion of fictional systems that are male-dominated and/or white...!

For as much as I've blabbed, I have barely scratched the surface in this post. There are a lot of examples of plural representation in media, intentional or not, often with many of the same themes but all with distinct nuances to their portrayal. Here I've talked about plural representation that's stuck out to me personally, but everyone's media diet is different, and there's a vast number of plural characters with different ups and downs to discuss that I simply haven't had enough exposure to – and ones I just didn't feel like talking about. Moreover, these are all my opinions – I've been putting each example up against the kinds of representation I want to see, but every system's going to have their own idea of how they should be depicted and what's most important. All in all, don't be too surprised if there's a follow-up post...

Norman Bates from Psycho.
Feels like a specter hanging over plural rep.
But hey, it's a pretty great photo at least.