Disclaimer: I don't own Maximum Ride

Disclaimer, the Second: This guide was written for my own amusement, and hopefully yours as well. I am not, nor do I claim to be, an expert on Mary Sues.

The Maximum Ride series is an excellent fandom for creating original characters, or OCs, mainly because it's so open ended. We all know the story of the Flock, but we also know that there are other recombinants out there. However, when an author creates an OC, they may feel such a 'connection' with them that they end up turning them into idealized author surrogates or Mary Sues. This guide is intended to aid authors in evaluating their OCs to ensure that they are not Mary Sues/Gary Stus.

You might want to rethink your Maximum Ride OC if:

1. They have DNA of multiple animals.

Thunder was 4 percent leopard, 6 percent bat, 2 percent dolphin, 8 percent lemur, and 85 percent human. As a result, he had bat wings, leopard ears and claws, a lemur tail, and a blowhole which he had to hide with a hat.

Not only does that add up to 105 percent, the sheer mass of animals involved is somewhat unrealistic. The scientists have been hard at work to get a recombinant with one different animal's DNA. Two might be acceptible if done well.

2. They cause other characters (usually canon) to fall in love with them on sight.

As soon as Luna strolled gracefully into sight, Fang's jaw dropped and he fell head-over-heels in love with her.

Not only is Fang usually reserved and not likely to give into his emotions in this way, relationships need time to build. Besides, there is evidence in the books that Fang has affections for Max (sorry Figgy fans). You'd probably need to find a good way to explain those away.

While a whitecoat falling in love at first sight is equally unreasonable, it would be most amusing to see, so I won't discourage anyone from doing that.

3. They have multiple powers

Fuscia telekinetically flung a chair at the Eraser while shooting lightning bolts out of her fingers, singing an eerie song to call all nearby animals to lend her aid in battle, and creating a giant storm cloud to pour hail upon the Eraser's head.

Even Angel only has three main powers (telepathy, breathing underwater, talking to fish). Of course, the golden rule to remember is that canon characters will always meet with more acceptance than your OC, even if they are similar. So it's probably best to limit the powers to one or maybe two.

4. They're the ones who are really supposed to save the world.

Deep in his heart, Action knew that he was called by fate to save the Earth from unsurmountable peril. That fool Maximum was nothing but a pawn...

Trying to one-up the canon characters is a bad idea. People like and have an attachment to these characters that they don't have with your OC.

5. They have an even worse past than the Flock

George listened with forced patience to the supposed 'troubles' of the Flock, then snorted. "You think you have problems? I was tested from the age of one, betrayed by six people I called my friends, am attacked by Erasers every single day due to the constant surveillance, and every full moon I morph into an unstoppable killing machine!I.. I killed my best friend!"

See above.

6. They're incredibly intelligent/skilled despite being unschooled.

Maricia smirked. "It's so easy to assemble a silicon phase disruptor! I can't believe you don't know how! And how did you ever survive out here without my seventh-level black belt skills?"

Unless she was altered to make her more intelligent (which would be hard to write without going into psudo-science), I don't see how someone who was raised in a genetics lab would have this kind of knowledge. Unless they were rescued by a genius/master of martial arts at a very early age, and even that verges on unrealistic (what's a martial arts master doing in a lab anyways?).

Hopefully, this list has been helpful to you and will aid you in future OC creations. Thank you for reading!