With about fifty articles of Insurgency lore (and many more that are no longer extant) we've arguably made a few characters that have stuck on and found themselves used and reused in other stories as part of our community's greater literary effort. From Halsey to Ed, and Victor to Cad, as a relatively long-time site member, I seem to be recalling a much more vivid portrayal of the above such characters than what's been written about them on the site, which is weird, but I chalk it up to behind-the-scenes experience like reading the Quiet Thread's in-character stuff, #basesix logs, and private exchanges.
Going back to 2014-2015, the height of characterization in Insurgency literature had got to be the inklings of the sad personal drama of Doctor Halsey and his wife, Claudine; the slapstick adventure of angry Martin Caduceus at the peak of his caricature-ish phase (I might be mistaken but McFlurry appears to be the only CDC-focused extant tale right now, since Cad deleted Storm and Contact - the two first ever tales of this wiki); and E's crackfic portrayal of Edison Denhai, QUAESITOR, and Caduceus. Of those three, only Doctor Halsey seemed at the time to focus on giving characterization. Cad focused on components of the Insurgency, while E focused on… that storyline of his. On the sidelines were Victor Strate (who wrote swathes full of tale material but never posted any), and mostly wrote shenanigans which might not have been best for the developmental phase of the wiki at that time; EdAWACSdenyY, who drafted a melodramatic and personally kinda bland evil mastermind; Creed's portrayal of his OC/AA as the leader of the defeated CI faction (which was sort of interesting for its brevity); and of course, I myself had Steffanie Kojcewska, an underwater Insurgent operative.
At this point, the newest character I should note is Dr. Dean Kuhli, a biologist, but there is no characterization of him yet outside from Cyto's drafts. I also have to point out Wonderrat's mish-mash of ideas, not one of which I have the energy to fully comprehend, but Meta, the character, has as of now only existed in drafts. I'm excited to see Dr. Kuhli in action as Cyto works on his drafts. And speaking of drafts, I hope Cad doesn't mind if I mention "Hot-Blooded with a Razor," a new draft from a storyline entitled "Red Cell Death," the characters of which are apparently taken from the OCs of the "old members" like Dr Hockenberry, Grittz, and Dr Nouva, with Director Cavendish - a character from Cad's "Storm Brewing" - featuring with some other vaguely familiar faces.
I admit I check on some of my fellow contributors' sandboxes from time to time, since seeing the changes on Wikidot's activity feed makes me intrigued on what other writers have in store for the wiki. That said, finding "Red Cell Death" in Cad's drafts was like finding a rare but sweet-tasting berry since, from the sandbox content alone, it manages to hit a lot of the stuff I want to see in the wiki. In regards to the characters, it feels really nice to delve back into familiar (but still rather hazy) territory. We see Caduceus, in sorta-still slapstick but with the old DrCaduceus' flavor of humor, and a portrayal of Lewis Brine that Dr Nouva is sure to like. Two of the oldest written 'Sites' of the CI are the main settings, Bases Four and Six, and the tales feature old items: the Contagion, GGM, etc. There's also a secret little background detail with regards to the IC Falchion revolution.
All in all, Red Cell Death is one author's endeavor to bring characterization to the Insurgency wiki's many unpainted canvasses. The thing is, I'm sure it's not open to collaboration, meaning Cad will write things his way. Which is fine. Let me openly say I enjoy his canon views and portrayals, even if they shouldn't be the official or baseline storyline. But if anyone wants to have a piece of the character pie, I encourage you to join in. Breathe life into the wiki's lore. Give your OCs a solid leg to stand on. Let other writers' characters have a chance to work in your story.
Now, my thoughts on CI characters are kinda focused all over the place, but these are what I have observed about our lore: a need for more characterization.
Wanna discuss?
Post-Script Nods of Encouragement
To Cyto: perhaps Kuhli and Steffanie might have worked on marine biological anomalies and the like before? I'd stand you to making a plan on synergizing our characters together.
To Cad: best of luck with RCD. I'm enjoying Hot-Blooded so far. Love that the Hippocratic Oath gets destroyed by a fire extinguisher.