bimbo is the gentler half of the chip van partnership. where jimmy sr. is all bluster and survival instinct, bimbo is careful, a bit earnest, wants to do things properly. the van is really the story of what happens when money and desperation get between two men who've been mates for decades. bimbo's tragedy is that he can't be jimmy's mate and his boss at the same time.

darren is the rabbitte kid who's always around but never quite the focus. he drifts through all three books as a background presence in the household. in the van he gets his moment, helping jimmy sr. and bimbo with the chip van — the next generation watching the older lads try to hold it together.

deco is the commitments' secret weapon and their biggest liability in one package. he can sing — properly sing, the kind of raw soul voice that makes the band actually work — but he knows it, and he won't let anyone forget it. he's the tension that makes the story go: without his talent there's no band, and with his personality there might not be one either.

jimmy jr. is the engine of the commitments — he doesn't play an instrument, can't sing, but he's got the vision and the mouth to make it happen. he's the one who decides that dublin's northside is the new detroit, that working-class dubliners are the irish equivalent of african americans in terms of being shut out and overlooked. it's audacious, a bit daft, and completely sincere. he's doyle's portrait of what happens when ambition meets a council estate.

jimmy sr. is the heart of the trilogy. in the commitments he's background — the da watching telly while his son builds a band in the front room. in the snapper he steps forward, learning to stand by sharon when the neighbourhood's whispering. by the van he's the main event: redundant, restless, trying to claw back some dignity through a chip van and a best mate. colm meaney made him immortal on screen but doyle made him real on the page.

joey the lips is the oldest member of the band and the most mysterious. he says he's played with wilson pickett, with james brown, with everyone who matters. nobody can quite verify this. he brings a kind of zen soul philosophy to the rehearsal room and a trumpet that actually works. whether he's a genuine legend or a magnificent bluffer is part of the fun — and doyle never fully answers it.

outspan is where the commitments begin — he's already in a band when jimmy convinces him that what they need is soul, not indie. he's the everyman of the group: decent player, good craic, no notions. he's the friend who goes along with jimmy's mad schemes because that's what mates do.

sharon's the centre of the snapper and she holds it together by refusing to buckle. she won't name the father, she won't apologise, and she won't let the neighbourhood's gossip define her. in a country that was still sending unmarried mothers to institutions within living memory, sharon's stubbornness is quietly radical. she's funny, she's sharp, and she's doyle's best argument that the women of barrytown were always tougher than the men.

veronica doesn't get the spotlight jimmy sr. does, but nothing in that house works without her. she's the one who actually processes what's happening while everyone else is shouting. in the snapper, she's the quiet counterweight to jimmy sr.'s mortification — she just gets on with supporting sharon. she's doyle's acknowledgment that working-class irish mothers were running everything while being credited for nothing.