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⌈ PLAYER SECTION ⌉
Player: TF
Contact: teeff or PM this journal or teeff
Age: 34
Current Characters: N/A


⌈ CHARACTER SECTION ⌉
Character: Iago
Age: Who the heck knows, he's a parrot. He's an adult parrot?
Canon: Aladdin

Canon Point: Aladdin: the questionable sequel Return of Jafar - at the end of the movie.

Background: Insert clever Shakespearean parallels here

Personality:

"That kid saved my life. Nobody's ever looked out for me before. Now it's like I owe him. ...NAH."

The first impression anyone would get of Iago is that he is an exceptionally angry little parrot. His emotions seem to teeter nigh-on constantly near boiling point, and when they do inevitably boil over, he falls into fits of sarcastic ranting. He gets frustrated very easily, and takes offence with a hair trigger temper. He has absolutely no problem telling people, loudly and angrily, just what they have done to peeve him off- even if that thing happens to be existing in his general space. He's rude, loud mouthed and often tends towards narcissism - in his view his problems are everyone else's fault, not his own. He struggles to admit to his own flaws.

He's also generally not the nicest of birds. After all, for a long time, he was quite happily perched on Jafar's shoulder- more than willing to help him in his nefarious schemes and to take over Agrabah - by any means necessary (he was quite willing for the Sultan and Jasmine to die horribly, for example). He has a strong desire for money and power, and tends to overlook the moral high ground in order indulge in his avarice. He will always try to get to where the grass is greener, his credo being to look after number one. It was only for the fact that Jafar became too high-maintenance for him and said the wrong thing at the wrong time that Iago even attempted to defect to the other side. Even then, he did it initially so he could get himself a cushy palace life again, and saw Aladdin as the perfect means to achieve that.

It's no surprise, then, that he's very manipulative. "Tricky, I can do", he states with no small amount of pride. He can figure out how to tug at someone's heartstrings, or feed into their desires, and convince them to do whatever he wants them to- and he's opportunistic enough to snatch the chance when he sees it to do just that. He knows Aladdin has a bleeding heart, and uses that to get himself back into the palace. He later uses this manipulative streak for good, convincing Jasmine to forgive Aladdin- and to remember that she does truly love him.

He's pretty intelligent. It's Iago that concocts the plan for Jafar to marry Jasmine, pointing out that it was the easiest way for his former master to become Sultan- an avenue Jafar himself had never even considered. It's up to Iago to obtain the lamp from Aladdin- where he uses his mimicry skill to get the guy to follow 'Jasmine's' voice, while he heads inside and snatches the unguarded lamp. He angrily rants to Jafar, after being free of the lamp that it's he who has all the plans and does the hard work- and there's more than a little truth to that statement.

Trust doesn't come easily to Iago. Until he defected to Aladdin's side, and grew close to him- no one had ever really taken care of him, or truly cared about him. His "look after number one" mantra is largely due to the fact he's had to look after himself for a long time. He's good at self preservation, willing to aid Jafar in his rise to power again, to avoid a grizzly death at the hands of his former master, because if he didn't look out for himself, no one else would- certainly not Jafar. He was genuinely surprised when Aladdin put his future with Jasmine (and life in the palace by extension) on the line, just because he felt Iago deserved a second chance. Slowly, the group began to accept him and show him real friendship and trust he had never truly experienced before. It took him a while, to truly accept it, but when he did, he returned the favour. He put in trust in Aladdin, and risked his life to save him, and by extension, Agrabah itself - twice.

Despite being a character full of largely negative characteristics, his experiences with Aladdin and the gang do change Iago for the better. Despite his refusal to admit his conscience exists- it does get the better of him. He feels guilt when his actions actively harm Aladdin and the gang, and does his best to repair the damage he helped create. He turned a corner, learning that people can show him compassion and friendship, and he can reciprocate such things. Though his less desirable traits remain, and can often sway him back towards greed- he is more prone to doing the right thing, when the chips are down. He still doesn't like it (he accepts having a conscience and a sense of moral right and wrong kicking and screaming all the way) but he does accept them, even if he doesn't quite embrace them.

Iago is an angry, sarcastic, greedy little schemer- with some major trust issues, but despite everything, he can be counted on to do the right thing when called upon. He's not a villain any more, but he's not quite a hero either. He's something in-between.



Abilities:

He can speak coherently - a skill not seen in any other non-mystical creature in the canon. Chances are that Jafar enchanted him that way, given he states he originally found Iago 'in a cage in the bazaar, squawking "Polly want a cracker"'. He can also translate other animals - he speaks fluent Abu, much to his disdain.

Thanks to his years of being Jafar's familiar, he's pretty well versed in dark and arcane magic. He can't cast any magic himself, but boy will he be able to recognise it.

He can mimic anyone's voice perfectly. Presumably he'd need to hear it first.

He can fly...on account of being a bird.

Alignment: Piphron - though Sosyne would also be a good fit; given his near-constant state of sarcastic rage, the real meat of Iago's character is his untrustworthy nature and his reluctance to put his trust in others. This is where his big emotion drops will come from.

Other: He comes with nothing but a few mild injuries after the whole nearly-dying thing.


⌈ SAMPLE SECTION ⌉

General Sample: HERE

Emotion Sample:

Iago had, quite frankly, been minding his own business when it happened. He'd just been perched on a tree, watching a business transaction perfectly innocently, and absolutely not seeing if he could find any way to pickpocket his intended targets. He had been leaning in a little, observing innocently when the VOICE happened somewhere near the left of his head.

"Aww, Polly want a cracker?"

Iago froze, then slowly turned to give a death glare at the poor, stupid sap who had opened his mouth. The smile on the guy's face very quickly faded at the parrot's expression. An expression that melted into genuine worry as the ground began to rumble.

"You wanna run that past me again BUB?" snarled Iago, not noticing the earthquake growing stronger as his anger grew. "What? You think it's funny? HA HA let's offer the parrot a CRACKER. That's obviously the HEIGHT of humour."

The guy started to make a quick exit, not that it stopped Iago's ranting.

"OH NO, COME BACK! I THOUGHT YOU WERE GONNA STUFF A CRACKER DOWN MY THROAT!! COME ON, PAL. DO IT. I DARE YOU, YOU BUG-EYED, BIG MOU-"

Self-preservation kicked in as Iago realised things were actually starting to fall over. He ruffled his feathers, taking a deep, not-very-calming breath, and the earthquake ebbed.

"Yeah. Yeah I thought so. Jerk."


Questions: I'm sorry I did this to you all.