Today's word of the day is Canon Sue, a stereotypically perfect fan-fictionesque character who appears in the official version of a story.

When the odometer clicked around onto the 200th episode of "Law & Order: Special Victims Unit", the producers celebrated with a very special episode starring Robin Williams. I could have said "featuring Robin Williams" or "with a special appearance by Robin Williams" but "starring" really is the most appropriate word. This was "Robin Williams: Special Victims Unit" with a supporting cast of SVU regulars.

Robin portrays Merrit Rook, a brilliant engineer with a tragic past, a disarming sense of humor, and a problem with authority. On trial for an anti-corporate prank that went too far, Rook chooses to defend himself in court. Despite having no legal training or court-appointed advisor, Rook dismantles the A.D.A.'s case, destroys an expert witness on cross-examination, and handily wins over all twelve members of the jury. His anarchist politics and clever mind win him the fawning adoration of the entire city including Sergeant Munch, who attends a Central Park rally in Rook's honor. When necessary, Rook's sympathetic backstory allows him to deflect criticism and monopolize the camera with emotional soliloquies. When a squadron of New York's Finest attempt to arrest Rook on a second charge, while he is unarmed and in a crowded public space, he manages to not only slip away but to disarm and kidnap veteran detective Olivia Benson in the process. After playing psychological mind games with Detective Stabler, Rook dramatically escapes from custody and vanishes, seemingly into thin air.

Something bothered me about this episode, but it wasn't until later that it hit me... Merrit Rook is a Mary Sue, or a Marty Stu, or Gary Gnu, or whatever you want to call the male version of...this:

Mary Sue is perfect. All of her friends are colorful. Or, alternately, they may be the palest of shadows next to the glow of her magnificence. She speaks at least seven languages and can communicate with small woodland creatures. She knows all about quantum physics. She has an excellent singing voice and plays at least one instrument -- probably guitar, violin, or flute, even in worlds where these instruments do not exist. She becomes, without effort, a world-class expert at anything she puts her hand to.

In fanfic she is often better than the canon hero in the hero's field of expertise. She will lecture canon heroes and canon villains on how to overcome their flaws, and can singlehandedly convert an Evil Overlord to the side of light simply by the power of her Goodness.

The problem with Mary Sues of either gender is that they are too good to be true and/or interesting. They overshadow the other characters, they lack emotional depth, and they often represent some idealized version of the author. They are, generally, a bad idea. The writing on "SVU" is strong enough to almost offset these issues but, in addition to not explaining how Rook is able to become a world-class defense attorney overnight, the character's emotional substance comes from a backstory in which he somehow became a world-class obstetrician overnight and correctly diagnosed a problem with his pregnant wife, only to have the actual doctor disagree and end up negligently killing the wife and newborn child.

Before this week, I'd have had a hard time imagining a Mary Sue in the "Law & Order" universe. The "Law & Order" franchise, for a long time, attempted to heighten its realism by using guest actors who weren't recognizable from other roles. When big-name actors appeared, they were used in smaller roles that allowed them to go against their usual casting. The show delves a little into psychology, when the police or district attorney need to get into a criminal's head to put them away, but the main focus has always been on procedure.

But I can understand that when you have an A-list actor willing to do the show--with some arm twisting from his off-stage friend, Richard Belzer, from what I understand--you want to showcase him as much as possible. So they let him impersonate a cop. They had him out-lawyer the lawyers. They had him manipulate the detective. He becomes an explosives expert overnight, and an experimental psychologist, and a social networking expert, and a shepherd, and a voice actor, and a cult celebrity, and as a teenager he drove a violent gang out of his neighborhood by burning down their clubhouse. Suddenly Merrit Rook is a Mary Sue in the canon of the show: a Canon Sue!

There's a writing lesson here, that if tropes that are usually associated with sloppy or amaturish writing can slip into the professional writing machine of "Law & Order", they can slip into anyone's writing at any time.

Be careful out there!!!