She Had That Option
I’d like to be clear, Michelle isn’t actually based on a certain person I know. A lot of the people in this comic actually are, but Michelle is the only one who isn’t. I don’t think I’ve known someone to be this weirdly complex like Michelle, where sometimes she’s smart, but other times she’s completely a ditz. It’s a little difficult, since I can’t really judge on how far I can stretch Michelle’s character without breaking it.
A trick that I learned to recover from writer’s block is to break a character on purpose. Make them say something you know they wouldn’t say or do something they wouldn’t do. you might discover a new side to them you like, or you will learn their limits (this would be a private project in order to make a strip work)
“sometimes she’s smart, but other times she’s completely a ditz” So, basically, you’re using a female version of me? 😛 I approve this use of myself.
In all seriousness, there are some people that can be quite smart and have frequent moments of absurd levels of ditziness. If it’s very frequent, there’s usually an underlining mental cause; but most go about their entire lives not knowing it. For all intents and purposes Michelle is a believable character as of yet.