Survival Of The Fittest

Name: Josie Lynn Castellaneta
Gender: Female
Age: 18
Grade: 12th Grade
School: Southwest Red Rock High School
Hobbies and Interests: Mixed-Martial Arts, Cheerleading, Pro Wrestling, Writing

Appearance: Josie is a woman of average height, standing at 5’5” and weighing 130lbs. She is Caucasian and of Irish-Italian descent. Josie has light skin, bordering on pale at times due to a lack of tanning, with an oval-shaped face, hooded brown eyes with neatly trimmed eyebrows, a round, button-shaped nose and small, narrow lips, sometimes marked with a pimple by her bottom lip. Josie has frilly brown hair that she keeps tied in space buns. Josie has an athletic frame with slight muscle tone. Josie’s voice is raspy and low, although extremely powerful when angered.

In terms of clothing, Josie often wears athletic and comfortable clothing, usually being found with an unzipped jacket, T-shirts and denim shorts. On the day of the abduction, Josie was wearing a black jacket with an orange buttoned shirt with a white tank top, blue denim shorts and black combat boots.

Biography: Josie Castellaneta was born on April 13th, 2006, becoming the middle child of car salesman Eric and retired stay-at-home mother Gertrude. Eric and Gertrude first met approximately thirty years ago in Eric’s car dealership, Gertrude admiring Eric’s charisma and charm from afar before finally building up the courage to ask him out. Eric and Gertrude, now in their late fifties, have two other children, twenty-one-year-old Helen and sixteen-year-old Edwin.

Throughout her childhood, Josie would be focused on grabbing the attention of her parents however she could, particularly since Helen was excelling in school, especially with social studies. Edwin meanwhile would try to imitate those around him, including his father, Eric. During this time, Josie had developed an interest in romance novels, having accidentally snatched one from the bookshelf back home. Upon reading it, Josie would be hooked, even attempting to write her own, with predictably chaotic results. In spite of this, Eric and Gertrude never seemed particularly interested in her writings, although they'd never outright trash them.

One person who was always interested in Josie's novel was her grandmother Beatrice, who would constantly listen in on Josie's ideas and give her good advice. Beatrice was a published author, having written poetry and short stories throughout her life, and during Josie's formative years, she was able to help instill Josie's love of writing. She would tend to all of the children, especially whenever Eric and Gertrude were on a date. She would read them stories and play board games with them to pass the time. Josie loved being around Beatrice, enjoying her warm, sunny vibes and her general company. Tragically, Beatrice would pass away in 2013 at the age of eighty-seven, succumbing to natural causes. Her death greatly affected the family, particularly Josie, who had formed a special bond with her. Having not formed a strong bond with anyone else in her family, Josie began to shut herself out from the rest of the family, while also giving up on her novel.

Josie would start having graphic and vivid nightmares regarding Beatrice's death, mistakenly believing that her death was a sudden phenomenon caused by some omnipotent being set out to target those who were too nice to her. This coincided with her acting out in elementary school, often going on scared tirades about how someone had gotten to Beatrice and that she could be next. This baffled teachers, as Josie had been a well-behaved student before Beatrice's passing. This also confused Eric, who had noticed Josie isolating herself from the rest of the family. This would cause a shift in the overall dynamic, as Eric would be doing all he could to garner Josie's attention. Josie, however, would ignore Eric outside of important occasions. During this time, Gertrude would spiral into an alcoholic depression, having also been close with Beatrice.

By this time, Helen would start playing a larger role in Josie's life. Initially planning to enter a more prestigious college for her psychology degree, she felt a need to stay local upon seeing how the family was negatively affected by Beatrice's death. Josie resisted, being jealous of Helen's success in life, often snapping at her whenever she felt Helen was being too nosy. Helen persisted, trying to talk with Josie as best she could. In fourth grade, Josie got into her first fight, attacking someone at the playground out of fear of being touched. The fight left both students bruised and suspended, with visits to the school psychiatrist mandated. Josie found that those sessions were lacking, particularly in regard to her psychiatrist, who would mostly ask her questions about her feelings.

Back home, however, Josie would start coming around to Helen, realizing that she genuinely wanted to be a part of her life. One night, after another nightmare, Josie would tell Helen that she was terrified of death and what it represented. The following day, Helen and Josie would travel to a graveyard to examine its contents. Here, Helen would tell Josie that death, while sad, is a natural process of life. Now with a better understanding, and working with a proper therapist, Josie's behavior began to improve, though Helen still felt Josie needed a system to help prevent her emotions from growing volatile. On Josie's eleventh birthday, Helen would gift her a diary to write about her innermost thoughts. She would also receive a book on anger management and how to control emotions from Eric. The diary also helped bring Josie's passion for writing back as she would attempt to craft long-flowing narratives regarding her day.

One night, while looking through YouTube, Josie stumbled across highlights from a bout between two MMA fights, Conor McGregor and Nate Diaz. She would immediately be hooked by the intense combat styles the fighters shared, including each strike and kick. By the end of the fight, Josie was desperate to learn more about the world of MMA, watching several highlight reels of famous MMA fighters, most notably Conor McGregor. His confidence and swagger going into bouts and willingness to speak his mind inspired Josie, feeling that she found someone who could speak for her. She also loved his kickboxing style, finding it explosive and highly pleasing to watch. Upon discovering several kickboxing schools nearby, and after much pleading to Eric and Gertrude, Josie joined a kickboxing class. She'd show signs of promise, showcasing some educated feet and timing her strikes for maximum impact. Her greatest flaw, however, was a lack of discipline, often striking fast or hard too soon, leaving her vulnerable for shots back and usually leaving her gassed early into the fight. Thanks to some good training from her teachers, Josie would develop into a promising young kickboxer, one with good power and agility.

Josie would also make a few friends during her time in class, finding her to be a solid person behind the tough exterior. On days off, Josie would hang out with her kickboxing friends, usually playing video games in Josie's house. One night, one of Josie's friends invited her to their house to watch a pay-per-view called Backlash. Having never watched a professional wrestling show, and unsure of what this would entail, Josie reluctantly accepted the offer. By the end of the night, however, Josie had become enthralled with the pomp and circumstance of professional wrestling, particularly WWE. She would especially be captivated by Becky Lynch, becoming starstruck by her every move and larger-than-life personality. Everything about Becky just clicked in a certain way, enough to make Josie a diehard wrestling fan. As the days passed by, Josie would find that she was more comfortable talking to girls rather than boys and had far more girl friends than boy friends. To this day, Josie claims that this experience was her sexual awakening.

As Josie reached puberty, she began to notice other changes to her appearance and mood. Josie would notice pimples on her face and back, and noticed that she would smell badly after training and classes. She also became more relaxed and stoic, as opposed to energetic and short-tempered, although her temper would occasionally flair up whenever she felt she wasn't being treated fairly. One particularly embarrassing moment came during a kickboxing class where, during a sparring session, Josie felt that her partner was taking liberties against her, ending with the two girls clawing their eyes out and being forcibly restrained. The two would talk after the fact and make amends.

As Josie entered Red Rock High School, Gertrude’s alcohol abuse had reached a crisis point, with outbursts and late nights out becoming common occurrences. Eric had been doing everything he could to try and support her, even taking her to rehab in order to get treatment. However, nothing ever stuck longterm. Seeing how her mother had deteriorated over the years, Josie began spending time with Gertrude, similar to her interactions with Helen. One particularly rough night saw Gertrude admit to Josie that she felt she had wasted her life, attempting her own writing career only for it to fall apart after taking a bad publishing deal. Without Beatrice, Getrude had no clue what her purpose was. Feeling sympathetic, Josie got into contact with Helen, who had graduated from high school by this point, and with her help, got in touch with a high-quality therapist in the area to help. During these sessions, Gertrude would learn that she was suffering from depression and that alcohol was worsening her mental health. With the help of Josie and Eric, Gertrude was able to quit drinking and put her life back together. To this day, Josie and Gertrude still spend plenty of time together, usually talking about their day by the kitchen table. The situation also played a major role in repairing Josie’s relationship with Eric as he was impressed by her maturity during this challenging period. He would take far more interest in Josie’s school life, often being her biggest supporter in kickboxing events.

When Josie first applied to Red Rock High School, she saw that they had a cheerleading program. Wanting to branch out beyond kickboxing, Josie joined the team, not expecting much. As with MMA and wrestling, however, Josie would again be surprised with their innate athleticism and kind-hearted, team-based mindset. Josie would again grapple with her own sexuality, as she grew to have a crush on Clarissa Shoemaker. A crush that has gone mostly unrequited in spite of multiple interactions. At the age of sixteen, Josie would come out to her parents as a lesbian, being met with a warm embrace.

In spite of her improved familial relations, Josie holds a strong hatred of her younger brother, Edwin. As the years went on, Edwin began to emulate Eric, especially once he started taking Edwin to his car dealership for ‘Take Your Kids To Work Day’. When Edwin saw him spin deals with customers, he took it upon himself to start his own hustle, selling baseball cards at random areas of the school. This proved to be a problem when Edwin started making people run errands for him if they aren’t able to pay. These errands would often be degrading, often embarrassing themselves for Edwin’s gain. When word got out that he was attempting to do this to some of the cheerleaders, Josie went in search of her brother. Upon finding Edwin and angrily confronting him, Josie proceeded to knock her brother out with a roundhouse kick. She would be suspended for over a week for this, but the moment made her a viral figure for at least a few days, and a hero to the cheerleader team for even longer. Josie still maintains that she did the right thing.

Josie is usually an average student in school, hovering around a C average. Her worst subject is math, especially when it comes to advanced calculus. Try as she might, she has never been able to fully understand the concept of x + y. Her best subject, meanwhile, remains English. Josie constantly excels at reading and writing cohesive, well-structured sentences that work factually and narratively, depending on the direction Josie is going. One such example occurred early in senior year, when, after much cajoling from some of her cheerleading friends, Josie signed up for a poetry contest, writing a poem straight from the heart. To her surprise, Josie would win the contest, obtain a free gift card for any restaurant of her choosing and got to recite her poem in an assembly. As Josie approaches the end of senior year, she plans to enroll in a community college to go for a degree in Creative Writing. She is currently mulling over whether her first official project should be a collection of poems or a reworked version of her old romance novel. Josie also looks to go into MMA full-time, with aspirations of reaching the UFC in some capacity.

Advantages: Josie is a practiced combatant with good stamina and agility, meaning she can throw a strong punch during melee combat. Josie has also developed a high tolerance of pain thanks to said combat training.
Disadvantages: Josie’s abrasiveness and hesitancy to interact with others could alienate potential allies, as can her hot-headed nature.

Hi Jacob! I'll be critiquing Josie for you and she's off to a good start but is going to need some more work before she'll be able to be accepted into the pregame. The main thing you need is expansion and more detail, in addition to the critiques below I would also advise that you go through the profile and read everything and add more, ask yourself why for certain things and give us the answer to that question. I will say that you need to add more detail for all of Josie's hobbies and interests as currently they are all too sparse. We'll need to things about why she enjoys the hobby, how she participates or practices it, where she's at with it in the present etc.

borderlining on pale at times due to a lack of tanning,

Bordering not borderlining.

with an oval-shaped head,

Do you mean face here instead of head?

average-shaped nose

I'm not sure what average-shaped nose is supposed to mean.

Josie has an slender yet busty, athletic frame with noticeable muscle tone and strong thighs.

A slender. Also, please rework this description as saying slender yet busty and athletic with noticeable muscle is kind of all over the place, and busty is really not the way I'd like to see a character described.

usually being found with an unzipped jacket, T-Shirts and denim shorts.

Found in rather than with. You don't need a capital S on T-shirts either.

Josie will attempt to feminize herself by wearing midriff-exposing clothes or tight-fitting miniskirts,

If she's already wearing denim shorts on the daily I am unsure what wearing miniskirts would accomplish.

When Josie did finally grab their attention, she didn’t receive that same level of enthusiasm, her accomplishments being regarded as fine or acceptable.

Why? What was so different about anything that Helen or Edwin were doing that led to this outcome, I'd like more detail on this please. What age are her siblings also?

There was one person in Josie’s life who always seemed to have time for her, however, her grandmother Beatrice. Josie loved being around Beatrice, as she consistently indulged in Josie’s interests.

When was this during her childhood and what interests exactly?

Tragically, Beatrice would pass away in 2013 at the age of 87.

Can you put eighty-seven in letters rather than numbers for me.

With no one to really talk to regarding her wants in life, Josie struggled to cope with the world around her, especially with Helen and Edwin getting all the attention.

What wants in life? Keep in mind here that based on this timeline Josie is around six or seven years old at this time.

The paragraph about Josie's anger during elementary school is messy and needs some reworking. You kind of bounce around tenses which will need to be fixed up. But mainly it's very vauge about a lot of details. Remember that the profile is omniscient so even if Josie's parents or the therapist are unsure what the root cause of her issues are the profile should include this information. My guess from the profile so far is that it's a result of grief due to Beatrice's death but this will need to be written down for us. An explanation for why Josie resented Helen's status, whatever exactly that is will need to be added as well.

Josie doesn’t cope with the idea of dying well at all, having lost her grandmother in the past.

This isn't really a disadvantage as written, I think a lot of kids at eighteen will have likely lost a grandparent at some stage, some more detail will be needed for this one.

With Gertrude delving into alcoholism

This phrasing is off, it makes it sound like Gertrude is getting into alcoholism like it's a hobby.

That was when Helen suggested that Josie see a psychiatrist to understand the root of her problems.

What were the root of her problems?

Conor McGregor's name is spelled with one N not two.

At the age of ten, Josie enrolled in a kickboxing class for youths and, despite being something of a late bloomer

Age ten isn't really late to get into kickboxing.

Despite her progress since elementary school, Josie still occasionally has fits of rage, though in her mind, they are more justified than before. One time, Edwin had been caught cheating some people out of their cash, running one of his get rich quick schemes.

The profile says one of, but this is the first time this has come up so we will need some more detail and expansion on this.

When Josie confronted Edwin, her young brother tried to shift the blame until finally, he attempted to invoke the family. That tactic ended with Josie hitting a roundhouse kick that left Edwin with a broken nose. Josie, for her part, was suspended for two weeks, but maintains that she did what was right.

I don't know what he would be invoking their family for, and writing it as you have here is very strange. I'm assuming this encounter happened at school as Josie was suspended but this isn't explicitly stated so please add this in.

Her parents informed her that it was one of Beatrice’s books and that she was a successful and published poet for most of her life.

This never came up before? Like when Josie was spending all that time with Beatrice as a kid? You can combine this paragraph with the one beneath it.

By doing so, Josie won a gift card for a restaurant of her choosing and got to read her poem out loud during an assembly.

Feels like we stop partway through the explanation here as you could get some good characterisation out of going into how Josie felt about winning and getting to read her work to her peers.

The death of Beatrice hit Gertrude hard, harder even than Josie as she turned to the bottle.

This contradicts earlier in the profile where you say no one was hit harder than Beatrice's death than Josie, so one of these statements will need to be amended.

Josie also helped Gertrude during her stint in rehab, using her experience with therapy as an example. Gertrude credits Josie for her now being five years sober.

We're going to need a lot more detail about this as we're kind of glossing over a big process here. The times your giving also imply that Josie was younger than 13 when she was guiding her mother through rehab? Which seems like something her father or her mums friends should be doing instead. But yeah, let's get some more detail on all of this.

Josie’s relationship with her father used to be chillier, however, as Eric often neglected her for his older daughter, Helen and later, her youngest brother, Edwin. Josie’s efforts to help Gertrude with her alcoholism helped Eric understand how important Josie was to the family. He took it upon himself to enroll the family into group therapy to try and talk their issues out, finding further common ground when Josie learned that he too was the neglected child of his family.

Again this lacks detail and kind of glosses over a lot of details that should be spread throughout the profile rather than crammed in at the end here.

Once done, she’ll move out of home and move closer to California so she can train to become a professional fighter, with wrestling as a backup plan just in case.

I am unsure why she would need to go to California to do this as the UFC is based and runs many of their events each year in Las Vegas and well-known and accomplished teams like Xtreme Couture operate in Vegas. Vegas also has multiple wrestling schools like Future Stars of Wrestling and Snake Pit Pro. Future Stars of Wrestling runs kids classes as well. This is also why I loop back to what I said at the beginning of the critique as MMA and wrestling are large enough factors in Josie's life that she is planning to move away from home to pursue them but they both only got detailed in a short paragraph each. So more detail will be very beneficial to make us understand her decision making here.

Josie doesn’t cope with the idea of dying well at all, having lost her grandmother in the past.

This doesn't really work as a disadvantage as is, losing a grandparent isn't that unique of a life event that it would qualify as a disadvantage by itself without some further explanation as to how Josie doesn't cope with the idea of dying.

And that is everything for this pass! Post back here once you've made the edits and I'll give Josie another look!

First revision finished! It was...a lot to work on, but I think I've almost got her in a completely functionable manner. While I'm here, I want to thank you for the initial critique you gave her, I think it really opened my mind as to where Josie could go as a character, and in turn, I think she's improved considerably from that first draft. Obviously, not perfect, I expect further revisions are in order, but overall, I think we're in a better place.