expy

expy (plural expys)

1. Contraction of expressway.

A blend of exported +‎ character

expy (plural expys or expies)

1. A character in a work of fiction who is a stand-in for or knockoff of a character from an unrelated work.

   I like your novel but your protagonist is pretty clearly a Scooby-Doo expy.

   • 2013 June 17, Hillary Busis, “'Mad Men': Bob Benson is the new Don Draper”, in Entertainment Weekly‎, archived from the original on April 22, 2017:

     When expys aren't the result of writers plagiarizing their earlier work — see the collective animated offerings of Seth MacFarlane — they're typically introduced in order to extend the life of a long-running show

   • 2014 October 8, Derik Moore, “Free To Play: Bioshock's Andrew Ryan, Ayn Rand and Going Galt”, in Gaming Rebellion‎, archived from the original on June 5, 2017:

     The perfect example in gaming is Andrew Ryan, creator of Rapture, the city under the sea, in Bioshock. I'm fairly certain that the majority of gamers are well aware that Ryan was designed as a deliberate expy of Ayn Rand

   • 2018 September 2, The Big Peat, “The Tea Master and the Detective by Aliette de Bodard”, in Chronicles: Science Fiction & Fantasy Community‎, archived from the original on November 8, 2018:

     The ex-military transport expy of Dr Watson has the right mix of brittle anger, tiredness and idealism; they view the former scholar Sherlock expy with the right mix of fascination and disdain.

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