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@shadowwriter161 – Hey, Erica said pretty much all the amazing stuffs, so I’ve just got a little bit to put in here.

Emotional scenes are impactful because of the first word, not the second. The characters and settings are usually fictional, and most of us have never and never will go on ‘adventures’ or will ever have lives like these people. But the thing that connects us is the emotion. Normal human, fairy, monster, king, villain… we all share the same emotions, and that’s what links us to the story. The fact that we too have felt pain and loss and joy before.

You really want to make your character relatable, like Erica said. If she’s an emotional zombie, unconnected with her feelings, above emotion, etc., how are your readers going to connect with her? Make her totally and completely human. Give her little parts of her life and ways she acts and emotions that connect her with your readers because while they may not have tragic backstories, they can still feel sad for her because they’ve been hurt before and humans are designed to have empathy.

And here’s another thing to think about, in reference to making your character relatable and likeable. Villains… they’re the bad guys. You’re not supposed to be sad when they die. They’re evil. And probably no one felt at all sad when Sauron from Lord of the Rings died. He’s a black humanoide shape, who never shows any emotion other than a lust for power and blood.

But other villains… Loki from Marvel, or even Darth Vadar, make us sad when they die. Because we see them with emotions just like us. Loki isn’t some dark magic in a void, he looks and acts and talks and cries and breaks his heart and is selfish and bad then good just like we are. Darth Vadar is a ‘robot’ for most of the movie to the audience. Yet when he dies his face is revealed and he becomes a hurt and broken father. We get that as fellow humans, and it makes us sad for them.

All I’m trying to say, I suppose, is that if you want your readers to feel the emotions, use emotions they can connect with.