Good news, everyone! We are all characters ‘pon a stage. We are all aged, lowly creatures destined to shine only so bright upon the massive canvas of space and history – our time upon this planet a brief if noble gesture to the inevitablity of death. Some of us are lovers, fighters, bloggers, painters, and builders. Others are doctors, nurses… the list is endless.

Fortunately, in order to comprehend the entirety of human emotion, writers throughout time have appealed to stock characters. See, if this were a movie, I would be the sarcastic bum with a heart of gold. Mitt Romney might be a cruel and heartless businessman. That’s sort of how things work. It’s hard to write War and Peace on a cocktail napkin, to put it one way.

Pretty girls that change people’s lives through their quirks and help male characters better themselves have been reduced to one thing – the Manic Pixie Dream Girl. That character has been around for 75 years now. Thanks to our friends over at Hypervocal and Flavorwire, we too can see just how much the stock character has permeated our collective mindset over the last three-quarters of a century.