Sometimes when I'm watching a movie or TV show, I'll find myself begging the characters not to do anything incredibly stupid. And then I find them doing something incredibly stupid. It just grates on me so much when you see characters who one moment are incredibly smart, but another second cause drama that's completely unnecessary.
Now, we're human. And we're gonna make stupid decisions every now and then. But some of these stupid moments and unnecessary drama can make anyone go "WHAT AN IDIOT!!!" To be fair and honest, I can't think of specific examples. But moments like a jealous lover plotting to off a would-be rival during an emergency can get on my nerves. It's like these characters have no idea what kind of fiction they're in.
This is always the fault of the writers. Sometimes it can be because the author was lazy, forgetting to really foreshadow or set up the drama in the first place. Other times, it's just bad decisions. The lover offing a rival? That's a bad decision on both of their parts. These conflicts have to have a reason to them. You can't just use these conflicts and say, "but it's conflict!" It won't work!
The situation of a lover offing a rival during an emergency can work like this: if the lover is like the Glenn Close character in "Fatal Attraction" and they find that an emergency is the best time to off them. Not because they "had to". It won't make sense at all.
Necessary conflict and drama is a big part of fiction. It's usually one person vs. another person or it can be a group of people vs a group of people, etc, etc. You can't have fiction without necessary drama or conflict. In order to turn an unnecessary conflict or stupid decision work, it has to make sense. Is it within the personality of this particular character? Then it works!
At the same time, a writer can excuse this type of behavior by explaining that yes, people do make bad decisions. But at least make the characters realize they've royally screwed up instead of having them remain totally blind to their failure!
Oh, and another thing, not only can it derail a character, it can derail a plot. When you're engrossed in a plot, you want things to go well. When a character makes a stupid decision that derails the plot, it's not going to go over well.
Your characters are not stupid, and neither are the viewers/readers. Treat both of them with a degree of respect and you'll go very far. If you're going to have personal conflict, it cannot be made by genre blind idiots unaware of what kind of work they're in. I cannot stress this enough, but there has to be a reason for the drama. If it's totally unnecessary, it's not that the audience doesn't get it. You're just a bad writer.
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