So I've never thought about it before on a detailed level. But I want to learn more about animation, story writing, script writing, character, Arc, character design, and all that stuff! I want to look into this as a side project for fun. I have had a story in mind for the longest time but there's so many things that I just can't figure out and I'm hitting walls!

I used to draw a lot but don't finish any of my drawings. Partly because I'm ADHD. But also partly cuz I really would just kill to have an instructor to help me walk through some of the problems I'm having. I've only ever made characters and they've always been the same. I've never made backgrounds or environment or any detailed stuff. Another thing I would love to do! I want to understand three-dimensional space to make better characters and environments! I want to be able to do voice acting and add sound effects and music!

Aside from this being A LOT of information for someone who doesn't know anything about it....😅😅 I'm going to take it a step at a time

I wanted to ask if anyone has some advice on things I should look into to start! I'm primarily interested in the characters and learning how to make character designs, character personalities and things like that.

For the life of me I can't think of what it's called! But what is the concept of visual association with characters? Like as a bad example LOL. If you see someone with shorter hair versus longer hair? It may be subtle, but it can help you associate characteristics with that character. Same with clothing, design, environment, accessories, things like that. Now I know that that doesn't make a character to fit the stereotypes of their appearance. But I've always been interested in that concept. 🤔 Is it called visual association? Anybody know what it's called?

Also, does anyone have any recommendations on where I can start to learn this stuff for free? I don't want to pay to go to school for a hobby because I don't know how far I want to take this. I really would like to just start off by making better connections, taking free classes, or cheaper classes as introductions to this stuff to see how I feel about it.

What was your journey into this? How did you find out whether you enjoyed doing this as a hobby or something further? What steps did you take? What kind of classes or people did you connect with to help you learn these things better?

What are some ways to develop a single character story without losing your audience? I’m thinking about Gary Paulsen’s novel, “Hatchet” in particular. How was he able to create such a dynamic solo character? How did he keep the central conflict exciting? How did he create such a vivid setting using only one set of eyes, so to speak? So far I’ve only managed to write a very tedious, droll inner monologue, and the beginning of what turned out to be nothing more than Hatchet in a different setting. I have tunnel vision I can’t snap out of it.

So I’m wondering what techniques were most effective in “Hatchet” in your opinion? I need to escape my comfort zone and rethink my voice entirely. Everything I write feels monotonous and overdone to me. I’ve tried making subtle adjustments based on suggestions I’ve heard or read, but I always ends up sounding more like an imposter with a poor imitation of another, much better writer who influenced me at some point. I can’t get anything to sound like myself, but a 2.0 version of myself if that makes sense. I feel like I’ve forgotten some very important basics of story structure and if I want to grow as a writer, I really need to I need to flip the script and challenge myself. Additionally, I have a story in mind that I’d like to write someday but the only way it works, is if my character is alone in the dark for the majority of the book. I am planning on introducing two other silent characters near the end, but they’ll play only minor roles. Right now it’s a journalist who will have been listening to and recording my main characters retelling of his experience. And an unseen witness who will only address the character directly at the very very end.

I’m also drawing a bit of inspiration from styles that I know very little about - The Odyssey, The Divine Comedy, etc. I know that those both make use of multiple characters obviously, but they’re still essentially one-man journeys

GENRE: Fiction/Fantasy

passive or stable character conflict is when something goes against a characters values but they tolerate it anyway an example would be doing your bosses dry cleaning tokeep your job or something goes with a characters values and they dont tolerate it anyway an example would be two characters wanting to be together but them both knowing it would never work.

active or unstable character conflict is when something goes against your characters values and they dont tolerate it like a women getting her ass grabbed and then proceeding to smack the guy that did it, or when something goes with your characters values so you do it despite conflicts that arise with others from doing so ordering pizza even though everyone wanted chinese food.

the title has them mixed up its supposed to be passive/stable active/unstable

As a very amateur writer, I don't know much about writing super compelling characters. However, a trend that I've noticed among well-written characters is that they tend to have their own thoughts and feelings, in such a way that you could analyze the character like a psychologist, to figure out how their past connects to their feelings connects to their actions connects to their words.

I think it is very important to treat characters like you are a psychologist trying to pick them apart and put them back together. When I find characters to be uncompelling, it's usually because I get the sense that they don't have anything going on in their head or their heart. The writer doesn't take time to think about the character's emotions, morals, goals, drivers, or anything at all. They don't shape the character into any type of person and only use them to further the plot. The character doesn't have any clear sense of identity and thus the story suffers from it. Often their lines and their actions will feel random or directionless, and the character feels undefined or vague.

This is where I think psychology comes in useful in creating a character. First, you define the type of story and the type of struggle they will be going through this is useful in defining the purpose of the character. Then, you define how the character will change throughout the story. Perhaps they have a flaw that they overcome to succeed, perhaps they slowly decline throughout the story, perhaps a certain flaw, aspect, or quality is brought out, or perhaps a character's inability to change is what leads to their downfall. Your focus should be on defining a character's core qualities and visualizing where the story will take them. Think of the emotions that they feel, their thoughts and goals, their sense of identity, their habits, connections to other characters, and how the story will rock the boat on who they are.

Second, you consider what has caused these characters to become how they are. Maybe they were simply born with a certain tendency towards certain actions and behaviours, or maybe a traumatic or formative experience caused them to react a certain way and take on a particular identity. This experience doesn't have to be obvious, it could even be a series of experiences or just a general lifestyle, but you need to think of why a character is the way they are.

Third, you need to think about what aspects of the story will prompt them to change their actions, thoughts, feelings, etc. Maybe a character who has been traumatized by betrayal and is suppressing their emotions learns to care about others again after another character demonstrates how it can be done. Maybe a character is thrown off course from one of their largest goals and is left lost and directionless, and through one way or another finds a new way and redefines themself. Maybe a character unearths hidden insecurities they have about themselves and manages to become a better person by confronting or challenging them.

Throughout this 3rd step, you should constantly be thinking, "How would an actual real-life person with these qualities react to this situation?" Consider how someone would react, but also what things would make them react in the way you need to move the character along their story at the pace that is needed.

I guess if I were to summarize my points, it is that you should think of:

1. Who your character is and what defines them.
2. How the character came to be this way.
3. What the events of the story will do to change them.
4. How a real person would react in these circumstances.

I'm writing 12 "main" characters (most are pretty much side characters) in my one story, and 7 of those characters are based on the 7 deadly sins, the 5 others representing other sins. Basically, each of the characters begins the story embodying each of the sins, and throughout the story, they learn to be better people and overcome their flaws.

Currently, I'm going through some writer's block at the conceptual stage and I'd like some help jotting down how the character arks of some of the characters might work. You got ideas?

I find myself generally thinking in first person and wanting to default to 1st person. It feels like most books I've been reading are more 3rd person, but I've only been paying attention now that I'm trying to write something of note.

​

Example:

"I can't be believe you'd say that" I shake my head looking at my husband with sheer disgust
vs
"I can't believe you'd say that" Amy shakes her head looking at her husband with sheer disgust.

Would writing in 1st person limit you in any kind? It feels like i'm losing my narrator godly powers though maybe I'm over thinking it. Any thoughts?

​

PREFACE

I remember, when trying to figure out what actually makes a great character, I would grab a bunch of different characters from different popular movies, books, shows, comics, etc, and I would try and find throughlines on how they're handled to understand a core idea of what makes a great character. I realised later, it doesn't exactly work, as I think now there are fundamentally two major components of stories, and a lot of popular forms of media don't necessarily make use of both. I do think, however that it's important to be aware of these two sides when creating your story, as to understand what you're trying to achieve. It also helps in really understanding simply the basics of storytelling I think.

A lot of people discuss this as "STORY VS. PLOT". I'm going to use examples from different popular media to help realise my points but will leave out spoilers on plot beats, I'll simply just use them to explain how they fit in this framework. Lee Child explained in his NYT article on "A Simple Way to Create Suspense" that you want to give the reader a question or imply a question and delay the answer for as long as possible. This is the basic idea, you give them the setup in the form of questions and you give progression towards the answer over the course of the story.

THE 3 BIG STORY COMPONENTS

I've actually seen this idea pop up in a few places now. The idea of framing your story or thinking about any story in the form of questions. These components are...

EXTERNAL CHALLENGES

INTERNAL QUESTIONS

INTERPERSONAL CONNECTIONS

I saw Craig Mazin mention these 3 when discussing screenwriting but I think he was really vague on their application and didn't really go into depth about them. I personally got these 3 from a book called "The Compass of Character" By David Corbett. It's a book that's very specifically about exploring nuances about character motivation. These are the different components of a story, I mentioned, and the idea is that you can interweave them or even just focus on one or two. I did mention two major components before and while there are three, I believe interpersonal connections are shaped around the other two. So what does each really mean and how do these apply to a story exactly.

EXTERNAL CHALLENGE

• These rely on a specific goal the character has. To kill the dragon, save the world, find the treasure, etc. Questions are thus framed around the goal (Can Character A defeat Character B, find the treasure, etc.)
• External Challenge is best thought of as the PLOT in the STORY VS. PLOT argument
• It creates curiosity about the characters' capabilities in achieving their goals
• It will also reveal the characters capabilities in dramatic payoff moments
• This curiosity naturally leads to suspense/tension as Lee Child put it "Give them a question and delay the answer for as long as possible"
• Wish fulfilment characters work very well with these types of stories since you're seeing a unique skill set reacting to solving a challenge that requires their skills, creates admiration for a character instead of empathy (James Bond, Jack Reacher, Sherlock Holmes, etc.)
• You can of course also have the "Wrong Person, Wrong Time" plots that rely on putting a normal person in a extremely challenging situation like North by Northwest
• You can also have a sort of hybrid, you may have a character that is fundamentally a normal dude, they don't have a special skill set (that can be utilised) and thus struggle because of this with bad odds but they still possess more bravery, determination, wit, luck than an average person (Indiana Jones, MacReady and Co. from The Thing, Nostromo Crew from Alien, etc.)
• As long as the tension of the story doesn't suffer, you can give your character whatever skills you want. The dramatic tension only suffers when the conflict can be easily resolved.
• You may even need to give your characters extraordinary skills because the plot challenge puts them in such a disadvantage, and as we mentioned these wish fulfilment characters absolutely have the potential to be entertaining
• Beloved characters from stories that just focus on External Challenge are beloved more so because the plot built for them is that captivating, their personalities can be charming but on a surface level, they stick in your mind because the plot that they inhabit is so thrilling
• Character Arcs rely more on internal questions than external, however you may have an external arc of the character acquiring the skills, for example, they need to face the opposition. (Training Arcs in anime for example)

INTERNAL QUESTIONS

• These are harder to pinpoint as they are so broad, but they generally reflect an inner emotional need the character is longing for or relate to how the character views themselves, asking questions of purpose, worth, integrity, dignity, meaning, etc.
• Internal Questions usually create a different emotional reaction, these create empathy & intrigue in the characters, wanting to know more about them and how they'll react/change/refuse to change throughout their journey
• The internal question is usually seen as the WHY for the character's goal, and is what I think is what depth in a character really is. For example, say a character's external goal is to find a notorious thief, the why may be is his deeply rooted belief system on justice & law
• Internal Questions are the STORY side of STORY VS. PLOT
• It's not enough for these internal sides of the character to be just inferred, they need to be emphasised to get the right emotional reaction from an audience, character arcs are usually how they are shown to the audience
• You may just imply an internal question at the start, showing a character's die-hard loyalty, for example, but they're not exactly tested on it until Act 2, where the question of if the character's loyalty will win out is shown to the audience
• The setup/act 1 phase of a story is all about showing the audience where the character is at the start of the story, their internal need/longing (Ned Stark's honour & love for his family, MacBeth's ambition, Captain America's loyalty & righteousness)
• Act 2 is the bulk of their arc, a character may not change from Act 1/Act 3 but the only way you get a powerful emotional payoff to their arc/story is with Act 2. They are confronted & tested on their internal needs/longings their beliefs, values, longings, etc. You may have the rising opposition make it more difficult for the righteous hero to remain completely righteous, make the seemingly apathetic protagonist start losing people around him and bringing out a more emotionally caring side to them, etc.) You're not just getting them to their climax, you're building the pressure for them to get them ready for their ultimate climactic decision, all the while building emotional investment in your audience
• Act 3, right from the crisis point is the ultimate answer to the character's internal question. A character may ultimately sink into their vices and abandon their virtues. A character may realise their wrongdoings but be doomed to still suffer for the external consequences but have changed still internally.
• Internal Questions are, what I believe, to be the theme/meaning/point of the story. It's not enough to say the theme is a broad subject like Honour, Loyalty, Family, you have to phrase it in the form of an argument or question as it relates to your main characters' and their journey's. The theming of MacBeth is the corruption of unchecked ambition, or if phrased as a question would be "What is the consequence of unchecked ambition?"
• Nobody is going to really care about a theme unless you use the character's and their journeys to embody that thematic question/argument. Good news being that you can get away with the most simple, repeated themes ever, as long as you use solid characters and you build their journeys right then you'll still create that emotionally powerful experience in the audience
• Elements such as plot beats, setting, etc can hold symbolic meaning that relates to the theme however these still won't hold as much emotional weight as the character's embodying that theme in just who they are
• Characters must embody that theme organically, you can't force a theme onto a pre-established character who doesn't fit it. You need that theme to come from that character's internal side, their values, longings, needs, beliefs, motivations, etc

INTERPERSONAL CONNECTIONS

• These are common, and I'd imagine hard to avoid in any story, however I believe a story will use these in tandom with one or both of the other two components for a satisfying story
• They relate to the character's and ALL of their connections, positive or negative
• They also relate to if those connections are progressing positively or negatively
• These connections will ultimately also relate to an internal question or external question
• A skilled rival in a sports story may relate to the external question side as it raises the tension, making victory seem more difficult but that much more satisfying and may still relate to internal questions, as the main character may struggle with their feelings of worth/skill/confidence when confronted by a rival that outkills them. Maybe the rival is an old friend, and the emotional feelings tied to beating them are a lot more complex now but that much more emotionally engaging.
• Interpersonal Questions, raise the stakes whether externally (damsel in distress for example) and/or internally (their connection with another person is directly related to their own internal arc)
• If the story is ultimately built on an interpersonal question, they must have some external goal therefore (like winning the girl) and obstacles to overcome, and these may also exist internally for them (like gaining the confidence to ask them out)
• Taking this question for it's most popular example: love. Think of your favourite love stories, or love subplots in fiction and I'm willing to bet they will relate to something internal for the characters involved. If they get together just to get together and it doesn't fulfil anything internally for either of them then chances are it's a dud relationship and I doubt anyone cares about it.
• Even in stories not about them getting together but may just have a pre-existing relationship, you see their dynamics and how each one completes the other, like an actual relationship. The person is who they are because of their connections, if you took away that connection/dynamic then something would be different about them. Again this isn't just romantic, and don't forget that the internal sides of characters are what evoke empathy in an audience. Seeing a character's devotion and love for their family like Ned in ASOIAF or GOT, creates an empathetic connection between him and the audience as we naturally have concern for what will happen to him and them.
• Simply seeing people start to grow more warm around each other in a long-form story is enough to create a strong empathetic connection, as we just see them organically grow closer together and importantly see each of them as being more complete because of those connections

DISPELLING COMMON WRITING RULES

There are a lot of story craft principles, I believe, get preached way too much as gospel and I wanted to use the question method I have mentioned to basically argue against some as I believe the popularity they get spread around is kind of dangerous to beginner writers or the rules have lost the intention of what they originally were meant for.

Characters Must Change

Why? This can be said for a lot of these arguments however there exists a lot of stories that serve as living examples for why this doesn't apply. Sometimes people argue that a character, if they don't change, must at least grow but still I'd argue a character's refusal to change can be the catharsis of a story all the same as a character that undergoes change. A character that gets tested but ultimately stays steadfast in his values and integrity after a hellish conflict that tests and tries to bend them I think has the potential to be equally as emotionally compelling as a character who changes after their conflict. You may also have characters that inspire change in others, characters that possess a certain perspective in the story, and their interpersonal connections and action in the story will impact those around them.

Uncle Iroh in ATLA is one of the most beloved characters while being exactly this, and he still has emotional depth in the story, seeing his backstory for his current attitude, seeing his relationships change with those around him and how they impact each other emotionally while he still remains the same, the only internal change being an emotional one if anything.

Characters Need FLAWS, or flaws make a character more realised

This is a complex topic and I think mostly my issues come from how a lot of people use and apply the term "flaws". If a character is to undergo a positive change arc, then the character will need a "narrative flaw" to overcome to make that change possible. The existence of these flaws alone don't make a character compelling, it's the question on if the character can overcome this flaw that makes them compelling.

I've already mentioned the existence of external only stories, and characters that don't undergo any change arc at all but still have emotional depth. There are also characters that don't change but rather grow, not overcoming a flaw but adopting a new perspective or appreciation for an existing internal trait.

If the story is a tragedy, then the character may not even show he has a flaw, or may have a trait that at first seems positive, but may change into a more negative person by the end of the story. For example a character's earnest service to justice at first may twist over the story as we see in new context that it's a lot more sinister in just how devoted to that principle they are. Or the other way round, what appears to be an initial weakness may be recontextualised later in the story as a virtue.

I see a lot of people mention Indiana Jones as an example of a character with a flaw that makes him empathetic. I'd argue Indy is a character that just exists on the external side of a story. The interest coming from the plot and him overcoming the obstacles in it. His fear of snakes isn't a traditional narrative flaw since he doesn't exactly overcome it but the trait does help make the plot funnier (when it's introduced) and more tense (later on in the plot, adding suspense to the scene) I don't think the fear makes him more nuanced but it does make him more charming and the plot more fun.

Similar to Indy's snake fear, there are a flaws (or think of them as weaknesses, limitations and such) that aren't to be overcome but just add to the tension of the narrative. A normal dude that has been put in the wrong place at the wrong time in an action movie may not turn into a hardened badass by the end but just seeing someone like that in that situation adds tension to the plot.

Also be aware, that it seems a recent trend is to give a character a bunch of negative traits/ flaws however these aren't narrative flaws and aren't the basis of some arc or add to the plot in any way, they just exist because the writer thinks they will make the character seem more interesting and human. These negative traits, at worst, can lead to the writer invertedly rewarding action that is based on these negative traits to push the plot forward, these will heavily disconnect your audience from the characters and plot as the logical cause and effect makes no sense and the character no longer seems like a flawed character but an asshole that the audience should approve of. If a character is arrogant, for example, then make them suffer consequences in the plot for it, make it humorous just how cocky they get and let it backfire on them, they don't have to ever stop being arrogant but let them feel like a real person by actually utilising the negative trait in the story in some way. Don't just have the negative trait exist thinking it makes the character more 3-dimensional, acting in ways that make no sense and make them seem more confused than complex. You have to rely on the organic reactions of other characters and the world as well. If Character A is an egotistical asshole around Character B, don't just have Character B accept them, maybe Char A just supresses that side of them more and more around Char B as a reaction to Char B calling them out on being an asshole.

Depth = Number of Traits

A character doesn't need a set number of traits. You give them however many that makes sense for the story. As long as they have relevancy in the narrative then you're fine. If you add too many and the story never makes use of them then there's a disconnect with the audience and the character, this also usually happens when you have to tell the audience about the large list of traits your characters have. If you don't focus on a list of traits but rather the character's purpose in the story and their journey and you organically show them off in scenes, whatever traits will naturally be shown to the audience and feel more substantial. If a character's trait is utilised later in the story but doesn't show up in a while and you're afraid of it coming out of nowhere then find a way to organically fit it into the earlier stages of your story, the entire point of the Act 1/Early Act 2 is SETUP. So if you need your character to rely on a skill later, for the plot to make sense, then at least allude to this skill early on but don't just outright tell the audience and still try to make them seem consistent.

Some traits will add to the EXTERNAL/PLOT side, these may include skill sets, fears/limitations/weaknesses that aren't overcome as we discussed previously, virtues that are relevant to the plot like bravery, wit, etc. The important part being that the trait adds to the tension of the story in some way, it may act as an obstacle to make the external challenge seem more difficult, may add to the wish fulfilment of a character and be something they use to fight the external challenge, or may just evoke some charm/humour in the plot.

Some traits will rather add to the INTERNAL/STORY side, including a character's morality, value system, beliefs, perspective, emotions, longings, needs, fears (that aren't there for plot tension but for a character level). It's where the emotional depth of the story and the empathy for the character will come from. To clarify my distinction on fears for INTERNAL STORIES I mean fears that the story is about the character overcoming, coming to terms with or failing to overcome, that fear may manifest as an extension of some core issue the story is actually about like a fear of ghosts that's connected to the core internal question about the character's grief about losing several loved ones. The traits can seem surface level but may actually be a connection to something more deep and internal. A clumsy trait may be an extension of a character's anxiety (Or could just be for the sake of the plot to have a humour) just don't give them traits like clumsiness to make them seem more human when it adds nothing to the story, themes or plot even.

Characters must be likable

Just as we mentioned in the flaws section that you don't want to give a character a bunch of negative traits to make them seem complex as it can backfire, you also don't want to give them a bunch of positive virtues that aren't utilised properly otherwise the character can seem boring and fake. So this point is not only about arguing that characters don't have to be likable but in fact that forcing scenes or aspects of a character where the only purpose is audience sympathy can harm the emotional connection to the audience.

If this character isn't even remotely heroic, kind, compassionate and the story never utilises these aspects then don't have him save a cat at the start. Show them for what they are honestly. Nobody really cares for a virtuous protagonist unless the journey is about that aspect like Captain America and his stories that test his righteous values and loyalty. If they're an apathetic asshole but you want them to undergo an arc of gaining empathy then by all means show something that helps make that arc make sense early on, just don't have them do something that will gain audience sympathy if it is never used outside of that. There's plenty of pitfalls the forced sympathy aspect early can lead to like making it seem like you want the audience to approve of all the negative stuff the character does.

You want the audience to empathise not sympathise. You want them to understand the WHY behind their actions and journey not just like them early on to draw them in. Kindness in one character may seem like a boring aspect to them while for another character it may be incredibly resonate because the story actually focuses on exploring that trait.

Contradictions = Complexity

Sort of, but not exactly. Be aware of invertedly making your character seem confused instead of complex. The contradictions should feel organic and believable not just there to have a contradiction in itself. They may be incredibly xenophobic but love their family, this is believable and it's a organic complex aspect to their moral system. They may have a reputation for a good ruler, but in actuality, from an objective viewpoint, they may have been a cruel, vicious conqueror that treated only his people fairly (thus earning the positive reputation)

Don't make the character seem schizophrenic (unless that's the point), we need to understand the contradiction not just see a contradiction. It can work if the point of a setup scene is to show a contradiction and raise mystery. Have the audience question "Why are they x sometimes but y other times?" Giving clues to why that contradiction exists before actually revealing the why behind it. This aura of mystery around a character can add intrigue however I feel it doesn't work as well with protagonists. Especially if you're writing a book, the reader should be getting an insight to the character's mindset from the beginning.

A mysterious protagonist, when the story never really expands on their internal side and their motives until much later on is a boring protagonist, how are you supposed to feel emotionally connected if you have nothing to latch onto. A mysterious antagonist, side character or a protagonist who you have some sense of at first but gets expanded on throughout adds intrigue. You can have a protagonist who you empathise with for one reason but something is revealed later on that recontextualises their actions for example.

These were just some common rules I wanted to at least argue against, as I think they are harmful to a lot of beginners and especially since they're always broadly used in essays and such but never expanded upon.

CONCLUSION (Or what to take from this)

Hopefully you can understand the two different aspects of your story, the external plot side and the internal thematic side. The best stories will have strong sides in both but you can write a story with just one. (Though I find it hard to imagine a internal story without any plot at all, mostly you get boring slow plots in these) The Internal, External and Interpersonal components in your story should interweave, the external plot being a metaphor for the internal struggle for your character and such.

Of course, this doesn't go over how you actually make those individual sides as powerful as possible I just wanted to get this framework out there to anyone that may benefit from it. Learning this idea really helped me analyse and look at stories better. I would love to discuss this if people are interested and maybe expand on using actual examples more and applying this idea to see how stories work with it in mind.

This stuff may honestly seem really basic and obvious to a lot of people but it helped me at least and may help others. Also I heavily recommend the book I mentioned "The Compass of Character" by "David Corbett" he goes a lot more in-depth about interweaving these different levels.

##Are your scenes too plot-heavy or character heavy?

A guide to making your plot- and character-driven moments work better

#Preface

Tell me if you've been in this situation before:

You are writing a plot-heavy scene, and you're aware that you have to slow things down and have a character-heavy scene. Then you know you have to write a plot-scene again, and then after that another character-scene.

But things aren't feeling quite ... right.

You're conflicted about what to do next. You want to make things progress better, somehow. Faster paced, more intriguing and interesting. You want to cut the slower scenes and get right to the interesting stuff ... but you also know that your hands are tied. You have to have slow scenes, scenes where the characters talk about stuff ... but what stuff?

Maybe you fill the talking scenes with conflict. Instead of discussing things, the characters bicker constantly. Or maybe you end everything on cliff-hangers, hanging the tension on higher and higher cliffs. Maybe you cut the slower scenes right down. Maybe you keep the slower scenes, reasoning that people who have a taste for slower stories will like it, at least.

If people don't have an attention span, that's on them, right?

You don't like writing the slower scenes because you're stopping all plot movements to have some character time. And you genuinely do need to have slower, more character-focused scenes. Those character scenes – more dialogue, slower paced, less plot-focused – are the only spots in the story where the audience gets to learn about the characters, right?

Similarly, when you write your plot-focused scenes, you've paused all the character development. The plot-focused scenes are the only scenes with stuff happening. In a way, it feels like they are the main draw. They’re the reason people like stories. Right?

Writing character scenes and plot scenes feels like the right way to do things. Pausing is just such a hassle. Going from 100% character to 100% plot is the problem. It's the part that drags, wrecks the pacing, kills the tension.

And it's not even necessary.

The trick is to let your characters into the plot scenes, and let your plot into the character scenes in a particular way. Maybe not a 50/50 mix. Maybe more like 80/20, or 70/30. What matters is how you let character stuff into a plot scene, and vice versa.

Here's how you do it.

#Introduction

We think about plot in a limiting way

What comes to mind when I ask you what goes into a good plot?

Pacing? Tension? Set-up and payoff? Conflict?

Surprises and reveals? Resolution? Act structures, beat sheets, Dan Harmon's story circle?

What is a plot, really?

A bunch of stuff that happens in a story. The stuff you mention in a synopsis. Everyone knows that, right?

We tend to draw a box around 'the stuff that happens.' We talk about it as a separate thing from character, setting, and everything else.

The way we talk reveals the way we think. Inevitably, it affects how we write.

Consider a few common problems:

• A difficulty finding the right balance between 'plot scenes' and 'character scenes'
• Cutting scenes that don't contribute
• Slack tension
• Poor payoff
• Too much shoehorned conflict
• Too little conflict
• Twists and reveals that seem cool, but don't work
• Too much "fluff", not enough focus

What if a huge contributor to these problems and more is simply the way we think about plot as a concept?

What if drawing a box around it is the mistake?

By isolating plot as a series of things that happen, we might start to think that the remedies for all our plotting problems lies with the happening of the things. We need to edit the stuff that happens, the pace of it, the tensions of it. Right?

Often, that's not actually true.

We end up making a thousand little balancing acts out of these problems.

Don't pace too fast or too slow.

Don't have too much conflict or too little.

Don't have bad twists, but also don't be predictable.

Don't blindly follow 3-Act structure, but don't stray too far from it.

The balancing act gets chaotic very quickly. That's a lot of plates to spin. Worst of all, you can tinker with the pacing and twists and everything else for a long time and yet still find that the problems have not been fixed.

Where do we go from here?

#Body 1 – Redefining Plot

Define plot in terms of characters and the choices they make.

Here is something people always say: "Your protagonist should be active in the plot"

People also say: "If a scene doesn't advance the story/plot, it should be cut"

People also talk about scene/sequel structures and try/fail cycles. They talk about 'yes, and' vs 'no, but.'

I find these to be useful ways of looking at things. My main problem is that it's very rare for people to tie these ideas together.

So let’s tie them together.

If you pursue them all separately, I feel like there's too much going on. Usually, for example, people write try/fail cycles ... but without any clear idea of what to try or how to fail.

What's missing is an overall framework, a game plan, something to steer by.

Here is the way I define plot to help me navigate:

Plot: The events which inform, involve, evolve, and result from proactive character choices.

It all hinges around the active choices made by the characters, especially the protagonist/s.

I think this is better than saying that the protagonist has to be active in the plot. That sounds like the plot is a separate thing, and the character is just visiting. You can't always keep the plot and edit the character. You can't keep the character and edit the plot, either. Usually, you have to change both. Unite them, merge them, blur the lines between them.

Their involvement in the plot has to be there, deep in the bones of the structure. The structure ought to be built on a foundation of choice.

So, breaking it down piece by piece, here's how the framework can help.

#Character Choices

**Characters change the course of the plot when they make choices.

Choices are the moments when the plot and the character blur together.**

The simplest type of active choice is proactive. That is seeking a goal, usually facing steep obstacles and resistance. The more they want to pursue their goal, the better. When the character has the freedom of making the next move in an unrestricted way, that is proactive. They will choose the way of doing things that is most comfortable to them, which makes it an ideal way to show their usual problem-solving skills.

Another powerful type of choice is a dilemma. Some stories (It's A Wonderful Life) are all about dilemmas. They are powerful when both possible routes are equally desirable — or equally unpleasant. The choice the character ends up making demonstrates who they really are.

Another type is reaction. Most stories cannot hinge totally on reaction, which seems passive. However, sometimes reaction is crucial. When a character needs to face new, unexpected trouble, their reaction can drive the plot forward. It is better if their reaction is unique to them -- some people fire up while others crumble under pressure. Who is your character? Sometimes, being forced into a reaction is the only way a certain character trait or plot point can progress. Usually, pure knee-jerk reaction should be kept out of the climax, unless that is the whole point of the story.

In every case, choices show the audience who the characters are. Not their favourite color or their starsign or their place of birth. Real information about them. Who they are on the inside. The choices they will or won’t make, especially when they’re under pressure.

Use choices to design the plot, then focus the other elements around it. That way, every scene advances both plot and character, at least to an extent.

Once that foundation is laid, you can give the character all the fleshing out they need, with details and backstories and quirks and unique dialogue.

But when does this information add to the story and when is it just fluff?

#Contextualising the Choices

Contextualising the Choices

Imagine an action scene in a blockbuster.

In the scene, our square-jawed hero has to wade through crocodile-infested water to get where he has to go. There are no boats around, no other choices.

Dilemma: Go ahead or turn back?

He takes a moment to steel himself, then wades through. He fights off the crocodiles and makes it through easily. Onto the next scene.

That would be a scene of almost pure plot. A bunch of stuff that happens. It can involve perfect pacing, tension, conflict, resolution, etc. The audience might even enjoy watching it.

He made a choice, too! The audience sees that he's uniquely brave. Most people wouldn't try that. Character is inescapable, it seems.

The thing is, I don't think it really ‘deserves’ its place in the story. Think about it: the whole scene could be cut and the plot would be unaffected. Especially if other scenes have proved that he's brave. What would it be adding, other than padding out length?

Let's involve character a bit more, now.

My recommendation is to always use quieter, slower, or dialogue-heavy scenes to serve as context for choices.

If you know what conflict is up ahead, and you know what choices need to be made, you should use your 'set up time' to make the plot and character mesh together. (Or, write the conflict scenes and go back to edit earlier stuff)

First, let's make the scene character-specific. That involves using the unique personality of the characters.

I'll design a better character.

This action hero has a particular fear of crocodiles and the water. They certainly don't like swimming, either. They've also been shown to be resourceful, able to cobble together tools for any situation. Additionally, they have to get to the other shore -- their close friend is in danger.

So now we have a character who I think is better designed. Crucially, I designed them for this situation, but it could always be done the other way around. As long as the situation and the person fit together in the end.

So, our resourceful adventurer comes up to the bank. Crocs everywhere. Nothing but rocks, trees, and water around. They look at the crocodiles in fear. But they need to get across to save their friend.

Dilemma: Proceed to save the friend, or go back and abandon them.

They choose to proceed of course, but first they search the riverbank. They find a broken rope and plank bridge. But it's guarded by a big croc! They take out some rations from their pack -- their last bit of beef jerky -- and lure the croc away. Doing so nearly scares them out of their wits, but they manage it. Now they have access to some rope and planks.

Choice: How to use their new tools to save their friend

They try to throw a line across for a simple rope bridge, but the line won't catch onto anything. The crocs keeping swimming menacingly around, closing in. At last, the hero decides to lash some planks together in a type of raft, and make a precarious journey across. Crossing is terrifying, especially for our croc-phobic hero. The crocs snap and churn around in the water, knocking the flimsy raft. At last, the hero makes it across. They are a little shaken, but safe.

The contextual information there was supplied by me, of course. In a real story, you would put that information in previous scenes.

There is no need to drag down the pacing with aimless dialogue scenes ever again. Now, you know that you have to design the slower scenes to support the unique character choices of the upcoming high-conflict scenes.

Think of these scenes as if you are actually writing a dynamic, plot-driven scene. It just so happens you are writing the dynamic tensions of the conflict ahead of time. Doing so well can be challenging, but hey, maybe it will make the process less boring.

What context would the audience need for this?

• Proof that the hero is resourceful, handy
• Knowledge of the friend they are rescuing, and how close they are
• Knowledge that the protagonist is usually pretty fearless, but has a specific phobia of crocodiles. Or alligators, what do I look like, a fact-checker?
• Also, a little detail -- the beef jerky they use to lure the croc away. It will be a more satisfying moment if the audience knows it's the hero's last scrap of food. This means they've made through one conflict, but now there's a new problem -- how to get more food

Take care with the order information is given. Many writers might choose to have this scene happen, then fill the audience in afterward. "Man, I really hate crocodiles. And that was my last scrap of food!"

Unfortunately, this common choice is often a mistake. If the audience knows just how croc-phobic the character is, they'll be on the edge of their seats the whole time. Likewise, if the hero makes a raft without demonstrating how resourceful they are earlier, the audience will feel like they skated through the conflict in a contrived way.

Prior knowledge turns an interesting scene into an emotionally engaging one. As long as that prior knowledge is targeted -- strengths and weaknesses aren't just there to 'flesh out' characters. They're there to charge the plot with emotion.

Proper set-up that contextualises a character's choices can be the difference between believable tension and boring, contrived filler.

#Evolution

Most writers agree that character arcs lie somewhere between a really good idea and compulsory.

So I won't labor the point: let's assume you have a character who grows and changes over the narrative.

With this element added, you no longer need to spend much time wondering just how many try/fail cycles you'll need. Nor will you need to ponder what's the right ratio of talking to action scenes. Instead, you can pursue an active goal -- just like your protagonist does.

A plot is a series of meaningful character choices, and the context that highlights those choices.

If all the choices and the context for those choices add up to a character arc, a lot of the task of focusing and balancing becomes much more streamlined.

Before we were juggling tension, conflict, set up and payoff, and a host of other things.

Now, we have a consolidated goal and method.

Early in the story, the protagonist is early in their arc. They choose to do things one way -- the flawed way.

In the bulk of the story, their flaw holds them back from resolving the conflict. They try to solve things with all their strengths, but their flaw is still there to block them. Tension grows and grows.

Finally, the protagonist hits rock bottom. Their flaw has seemingly brought them to the depths of failure.

They fix their flaw and win, or they stubbornly hold onto it an fail. The denuement is a snapshot of them making new choices -- if they triumphed over their flaw, better choices.

Don't think of a plot as a sequence of interesting, well-paced things.

Don't think of character as someone who has an intriguing assortment of flaws and strengths.

Think of them in terms of each other. Plot reveals character, character drives plot.

The plot can force the character into tough dilemmas.

The character can change the course of events.

The plot is engaging because we care about the character.

We care about the character because the plot showed us who they are.

The loud scenes work because they are the payoff to the quiet scenes. The quiet scenes work because of the loud scenes they're setting up.

Both kinds of scenes work when character and plot drive each other.

#Keeping the Plot Interesting

Pacing

Most think of pacing the wrong way.

'Good pacing' and 'fast pacing' are not the same thing.

The pace, on a scene level, depends on the way you pursue your goal for that scene. People wrongly assume that slow scenes intrinsically make the story slower overall.

As a result, they agonize about cutting slow dialogue scenes so that the reader can get to the conflict, the action, the fun. They agonize over writing slow scenes, feel obligated to have them, are tempted to cut them, but they just get dizzy.

The problem is not actually how slow or fast the story unfolds moment to moment. You can and should work on that, but it's not the real problem. The real problem is when the writer doesn't know what slow scenes and fast scenes are for.

The pace on a story level depends on the progress of the character arc.

Sometimes people love quiet, emotional scenes. Sometimes people hate loud, vibrant, well-choreographed action.

Slow and fast, quiet and loud -- these things don't matter. The only thing that matters is progress.

Not all conflict is a violent battle or a screaming argument. Each story defines its own parameters. Progress along those parameters, using character choices to show the way.

A story about grief will often involve a catharsis for the protagonist. A way to move beyond the grief, assimilate it in a healthy way, and keep on living. (Pixar's Up)

A thriller about catching a serial killer will involve uncovering shocking truths and probing the unknown. Often, the protagonist is changed by the horrors they see. (Silence of the Lambs)

A fantasy epic about a farm boy fulfilling their grand destiny will involve maturation and coming of age. (Star Wars - A New Hope)

Each story defines its own parameters.

Once you know what they are, pace according to them.

Pacing is good when the audience is happy with the progress toward the overall goal -- the character's evolution.

Cut action that doesn't involve their unique flaw. Cut slow dialogue that doesn't contextualise the arc. Or, if you cannot cut, change.

You can keep things the same 'pace', the same word count, the same slow or fast movement, and yet still drastically improve the feeling of pacing this way.

A related quotation here to demonstrate:

"I was once editing a manuscript that had all the right beats and emotional draws ... But it felt slow and boring ... I discovered it was because it had next to no subtext, and ... I wasn't actually invested in understanding and figuring out the text."

• September C. Fawkes.

The above demonstrates that pacing can be determined by factors other than the external trappings of pacing.

It makes even more sense when we understand subtext -- message, theme -- as the lesson learned by the protagonist. The character arc is the theme in most stories. When the story is founded on character choices that make up the spine of the character arc, then the subtext has a real impact on the feeling of good pacing.

The subtext isn't just the secret sauce, the garnish put on at the end. Subtext is the foundation, the solid base the rest is built on.

#Tension and Conflict

Tension is created when a character wants an outcome, but there are powerful barriers in the way.

Survival is an obvious source of tension, but it often fails. Protagonists usually survive until the end. Characters that face death-defying odds over and over start to feel invincible.

The best tension is couched in character, so it's good to design them together.

Characters, especially protagonists, ought to have a goal in the story. Something they want.

There ought to be a reason they can't get it. That's conflict. Good conflict creates tension.

Now, your goal is to unite plot and character.

The more a character wants their goal, the more actively they will pursue it. By pursuing it, they will influence events. By influencing events, they will drive the plot. The way they do this, the reasons they do it for, the outcomes of their actions, their reactions to the outcomes -- these things all reveal character.

Character is not revealed with teary backstories or quirks or favourite colors or childhood memories. All of those things are details, and they can potentially add to the character's depth.

The real, concrete, deep knowledge of who a character is comes out in the conflict and tension.

If a character doesn't want their goal very strongly, there's no tension.

If a character gets what they want easily, there's no tension.

If a character is passive in the plot, and their goal falls into their lap, there's no tension.

If a character could never plausibly get what they want, but the story hands it to them anyway, there's no tension.

So give your character something they desperately want. Spend some of the quiet scenes demonstrating how much they want it. (Edit: a good character arc also involves want vs need, look into that for more detail because I can't fit it here)

Show profound conflict blocking the way forward. Internal, external, monsters, battles, divorce proceedings, surviving the wilderness -- whatever it is. Give them a tiny 1% chance of succeeding.

And remember what the conflict is for: it is to drive their character arc. To exploit their flaw.

If they have a fear of crocs, force them to face crocs.

If they have trouble keeping secrets, give them an especially juicy secret and an urgent reason to keep quiet.

If they can't control their anger, make them angry in a way that's laser-targeted at them. Make them the angriest they've ever been, then make them destructive, then force them to see how bad things are -- show them that they need to change.

If an older man is the expert in his field, but resistant to a new way of doing things, give them a young rival who is innovating everything. He'll be forced to change, use his superior experience, or retire.

The reason to heighten tension and conflict is not for their own sake.

That's why SFX battles and screaming matches don't always work.

The actual goal is for conflict and tension to reveal character, to put pressure on them, and to instigate the need for a character to change.

The thing that makes tension work is the fact that the character cares about getting their goal, but they can't get there.

Plot drives character, character drives plot.

When we forget that, all tension goes out the window.

#Payoff

Whenever the big, crowning moment of success and victory feels hollow, writers often feel like the scene that needs work is the moment of victory.

In nearly all cases, the scenes that actually need work are earlier in the story. They also usually involve moments where character and plot should have been more intertwined.

Most of the time, when an ending falls flat, it is either because:

• the story did not lead up to that ending
• the story did not lead in any coherent direction in the first place

It is not often that a story will have the first 90% of scenes point the right way and then fumble with the final climactic scene. Stories written with a clear focus tend to stay focused.

The stories with bad, mediocre, or hollow endings are written without a proper understanding of how things work.

They don't realise that you have to write the catharsis for the character and the plot, or they don't know how.

You can only do this if decisions made by the character resolve the plot.

This only feels like a proper payoff when the character chose one way (early arc), faced conflict from their flaw (middle arc), then finally overcame their flaw with a clearly different choice (catharsis).

If the character's personality changes in a way that has nothing to do with the plot, things don't feel like they actually resolve.

Too many stories fail by doing something like this:

• The plot is to find the key to unlock the box of lost souls so they can stop the evil wizard. They must face their many fears in the wizard's evil dungeon.
• The character arc is that the protagonist used to be bad at keeping track of time, but after they defeat the wizard the protagonist is always on time for appointments.

There is no possible payoff scene that can be a catharsis for those two different things.

Writers will too often design a 'cool interesting dynamic' plot, set the plot aside, then design 'cool, interesting, dynamic' characters.

If they are not designed together, it fails.

Instead, make them unlock the Chest of Time with the Time key, to defeat the wizard of the Dark Timeline. Along the way, the protagonist learns how crucial timing can be, and that by always being late, they were holding everyone up. That flaw matches that plot better.

There can only be payoff when the set-up works.

The set-up AND the payoff need to be based around active, personality-revealing choices made by the protagonist.

#Character

Many writers consider good characters to be:

• Fleshed out with many details
• Feel 'real', act in a lifelike way
• Have a rich backstory
• Have a unique way of speaking
• Have a clear goal, active in the plot
• Have strengths, but not too many
• Have weaknesses, but not too many
• Have quirks, foibles, mannerisms, etc

These things are all true. However, if you look closely, this list explains nothing.

What these things boil down to is a bunch of observations that are passed on but haven't been properly understood.

Yes, it's good for a character to seem lifelike ... but why? Why is that good?

It's good for a character to have strengths and weaknesses, but why?

It's good for a character to have a good backstory, but why? What makes a backstory good?

The most usual set of answers here is to say: because it makes them relatable.

Now we've just retreated a step, instead of making progress.

WHY should a character be better just because they're relatable?

Here's a test for you. Imagine a character who feels lifelike, but is still a bad character. Or, perhaps, a lifelike character who is trapped in a bad story. Can you think of a story like that?

I can think, for example, of a lot of prestigious character-driven films that won Best Actor or Best Actress ... and yet nobody watches them. They have been totally forgotten.

How strange! I thought the pleasure of watching them was to see how lifelike that character was? How come nobody can stomach going through those plotless, meandering movies?

They are often written as showcases for the actor's talent, of course. As such, they lean heavily on character detail: backstories and monologues and conflict after meaningless conflict. Most people don't invest in the story. Most people sit through it thinking "Wow! Such good acting!"

Could it be that 'lifelike' is not enough?

Apply that thinking to all the other ingredients that make a supposedly 'good' character.

Once again, we circle back to the same thesis.

Separating character and plot leads to bad writing.

You cannot have a good character without a good plot to back them up. And in both cases, 'good' is defined by how well they work together.

There is no way for an audience to get to know a character except through the things that happen in the plot.

The plot must therefore be engineered to paint a vivid picture of the character. Likewise, the character must be tailored precisely to match the conflicts and dilemmas of the plot.

Why, though?

It comes back to subtext -- the lesson, moral that lies beneath each story.

Why should characters change in the face of conflict?

Because it's the truth. In real life, conflicts change us.

Why should characters feel lifelike?

Because we need to feel that a story is real and true to learn from it. To take the truth of a story and to live it out in our own lives. We can't get the truth from cardboard cutouts. We need real people.

Why should characters have strengths and weaknesses?

Because the plot intersects with characters with their choices. If they choose wrong, the plot goes wrong. If they choose based on their flaws, the plot pressures them to change. In the end, they succeed or fail. A happy ending goes to those who change and grow. An unhappy ending to the stubborn who don't change -- or those who change in the wrong direction.

From the largest flaws to the smallest quirks and preferences, every character trait matters. But no traits can possibly matter in a vacuum.

Does your character like vanilla or chocolate ice cream?

Here's a better question: Who cares??

On it's own, that detail is utterly meaningless.

Instead, let's say we have a character who's flaw is a taste for excess. They want more and more of everything, to the detriment of everything else.

So, imagine they walk into an ice cream store in Chapter 1 and this happens:

"Chocolate or vanilla?"

"I'll have a double of both."

Then, they walk out, all four scoops piled so high with toppings that they leave a trail of nuts and sprinkles behind them.

This tells us something about the character. Its such a little moment, but at least it tells us about their flaw, the conflict to come, and it distinguishes them from other people. Everyone else is either/or. This protagonist's answer to life is to say 'both.'

Is that a plot moment or a character moment?

Well, if the story is written well, it should be ....

Both.

There are no pure character scenes. There are no pure plot scenes.

Every scene can be, and should be, both.

https://www.reddit.com/r/storyandstyle/comments/auvdww/essay_settings_why_it_rains_at_funerals_and_why

Be kind and be good.

This month's recommended resource: John Truby's "Anatomy of Story."

By imagining plot, character and theme as interconnected parts of a living body, Truby teaches you how to craft an organic story by understanding its deeper anatomical workings.

You may ask questions in the comments of other people's essays, but not as a top-level post.

There will be a (probably monthly) thread where you can ask general writing questions or ask for help on your projects.

The main feed of the sub might move slowly, so I will try to post suitable essays, blogs or video essays that I find, or re-post some of our well-received essays from the past. You all are welcome to do the same.

Suitable content includes but is not limited to:

• Analysis of a film, book, play, or TV show
• Breakdown of a particular writing technique, such as foreshadowing or metaphor or dialogue
• Argument against a commonly held but mistaken view of writing craft, eg. "Why show don't tell is not what you think."
• Anything related to the craft of storytelling, so long as it is analytical, decently lengthy, and generally applicable to other writers.

Usually unsuitable content includes:

• How to motivate oneself or get into a good writing habit
• Making money or getting an agent
• Anything more related to the lifestyle of writing than to actual technique

https://www.reddit.com/r/storyandstyle/comments/8d6dfb/case_study_efficient_storytelling_using_narrative

Please aim for this level of analysis in your posts and comments.

Edit: Dagnabbit, this essay's actually about the film Serenity. I saw the word 'Firefly' and didn't read further.

Also, pay no attention to my abysmal spelling of the word 'efficient'

https://www.reddit.com/r/storyandstyle/comments/dsupwo/essay_subtext_in_emotionally_charged_dialogue

Please aim for this level of analysis in your posts and comments.

https://www.reddit.com/r/storyandstyle/comments/f6n6bj/on_writing_emotion_how_to_show_not_tell

I am posting this essay, among others, to help our newer users become familiar with the original intentions of this subreddit. Please aim for this level of analysis when making a post or comment.

Storytelling is about taking a protagonist and sending them through their own personal nightmare.

What are the best examples of this?

Here's my pick: In The Dark Knight, Batman has one rule, and breaking it is the one thing the Joker wants him to do.

I don't naturally use metaphors or similes. Are there any exercises or practices that I can do to make them more top of mind when I'm writing? It's not so much using them, as picking a good metaphor or simile that is evocative. Here's one I came across (which I have paraphrased/changed details so the person is not like, wtf why is this here?):

"If there's a good side to all my heroes slowly but surely fading out like lights in the Eastbound 10 Waffle House neon sign of my life, it's..."

That may be an excessively bad paraphrase, since I wanted to change the specifics, but even so, how does it even occur to you to use that simile? Any advices would be most appreciated.

Recently, I listened to someone read something out loud. Sometimes they'd reach a tense scene, whether it be because of the prose or events. They would, as you'd expect, speak in a more tense way when this happened. But even after a new chapter began or a new paragraph started, for a while, they'd still have the same intonation in their voice. Like the tension lasted residually.

I imagine that they also still felt the same way for a while, that they still had the tension for a short period, even after it was released by a short sentence after long ones.

I also noticed that in audio books (and in the way the person read) pauses were ignored. It's a book that famously overuses commas, but a lot of the time the readers ignored the commas pause. Or ignored the pause from a ***, or the pause from a new paragraph.

I'd be interested in two things, I guess; are there any websites or resources where I can just listen to normal people read things out loud, without their mistakes and the way they read being edited or anything. Secondly, how do I prevent people from ignoring the feeling or way of reading that the prose suggests?

This is a more general problem but I need to explain it with a concrete example:

MC is seemingly 'sex obsessed' (it's exaggerated so you get the idea) when she is with SC. MC is talking about it, teasing SC, etc, while she doesn't have such needs (at least not to this extent and probably not with SC.) She is partly putting on an act (pretending), partly believing this could be a solution for her issue which is rooted in the fear of loneliness. The narrator is objective and describes MC as she behaves, so the reader will easily get the wrong idea about her. Moreover, the prominent thoughts of hers that the narrator can access and share with the reader are thoughts of delusion, still in the frame of this act, so they don't help much understand the true nature of MC, they actually have the opposite effect.

What can the author use to help the reader figure out MC's real traits and realize she is not what she seems to be? I know we need to trust the reader's intelligence, but I also trust them to be legitimately annoyed by MC's apparent personality, and at first they'll misunderstand the authorial intent. I'm afraid they could be so upset that it could blind them to a point they won't see the subtle clues that points to MC's deep feelings.

I've identified the blend that makes this a challenge for me:

1. MC is pretending / being delusional (and it's about sexual desire or something close to that)
2. The narrator is objective, not giving any opinion (readers are left alone to make their own), not telling anything about the past or the future (simultaneous narration in present tense)
3. The overall situation is problematic (readers are already worried and jumpy)

I'm keeping these elements (1 & 3 are at the core of the concept and changing no 2 means a full rewrite and a change of tone and a different direction I'm not willing to go).

How would you convey the real intentions and the deep feelings of a character, through external observations, when so many elements points to another direction?

I've thought of:

• MC having some dream —not really a good fit for my WIP, at most she could tell others about a dream, but the narrator won't dive into one.

• Chapter epigraphs —already working on this to clear up the global authorial intent, not specifically this aspect.

• 'Compromise' with the MC's thoughts the narrator reveal, and give more direct clues —this seems a bit clunky to me, as the prominent thoughts are naturally the most deluded ones, but I could try to slip some clues here on lesser prominent thoughts.

• A special friend she confides in, with whom she doesn't need to wear her mask —a viable option to some extent, but she is usually not even honest with herself so I don't see her that much frank and honest in her confessions. It could help.

• A late epiphany where she realizes and tells someone how she sees her past self —good but also too late for the readers, I'm afraid.

• In another post here, I got the pointer to "apostolic" fiction, where the story of the MC is recounted by another character, usually one who admire MC, to some extent. —It would have been a solution, but I don't have such character in the story and inserting a new one to fill this role would break most of the story, this isn't suitable. I can spread this role on the other characters, they are non-narrator but they can share views with the reader when they react to MC's words and deeds.

All those points can provide a limited help. That said, I can use all of them, so the meager clues are all sprinkled. Listing those tools helps me focus in this direction. Also, I need a leap of faith in the reader to stich all this back together.

Thanks for any help and suggestions!

In The Art of Subtext Beyond Plot, Charles Baxter emphasizes how a character having a mania serves has a 'focusing agent', also stating that such character is not only unreliable as a narrator, but also inadequate.

It is often a mistake for a writer to give the narrative reins to an obsessive unless the novel is organized to produce a comic effect. You need an explainer, someone who will make a social effort in the direction of the reader.

Examples are Moby Dick  (with Ishmael) and The Great Gatsby (with Nick Carraway).

This idea is very timely for one of the problems I have in my novel, it could be the base to remodel a new character I introduced early on to solve a facet of the same problem (which I'll explain in another post if one of you is curious).

Did you use this sort of trick? How did you implement it? Do you have some nice example where it is done well?

EDIT - more info

C. Baxter starts from the wants of the character, the spoken ones and the unspoken, which sometimes leads to "some kind of obsessional and unspoken mania", and how this is put to good use as a "focusing agent", much needed for a story to have a center of interest.

A mania creates what I want to call a congested sub-text, and often the best interests of a story are served when the subtext is as congested as possible. 

 here "congested" = "a complex set of desires and fears that can't be efficiently described, a pile-up of emotions that resists easy articulation"

Looking into Moby Dick, with captain Ahab:

Despite his eloquence, Ahab in some fundamental way cannot explain himself. He cannot quite articulate what drives him to his personal extremes. He doesn't know why he needs to kill the whale, [...]

and later C. Baxter concludes

A person navigating through a congested subtext rarely has the self-possession to tell a story, and therefore he or she needs a witness, [...]

... who is Ishmael, the "tour guide" of the boat and of this adventure.

Here's the thing. I'm currently writing for two characters to have an extremely torrid, but short lived love affair.

Think of Fantine in 'Les Misérables:' "He spent a summer by my side. He filled my days with endless wonder. He took my childhood in his stride, but he was gone when autumn came."

In essence, she's referring to a passionate love in her past that lasted less than a full season.

I'm looking to write a similar scenario, but I want to explore the love affair and go into detail about it.

However, I can't seem to write anything palatable. Everything is either super cringy or super forced... either way, it doesn't read like romance much...

I have, in all honesty, never been able to write romance convincingly... everything is always very fromage and very purple and just makes me want to heave... If anyone out there knows how to write romance, I would love to pick your brain.

Any advice? I love romance, but have never been able to write it.

Once upon a time I started to write something in 1st person, but 3rd person seems to be a much more popular option in writing, is it a big deal or am I over thinking and should just keep writing in 1st?

My reasoning for using 1st to start was to show the progression of a character through different life events but clearly that can be done through 3rd as well.

Just curious what everyone thinks, thank you!

Hey all,

I'm just wondering if any of you know of any other good forums, discords, slack groups, etc., for writers of literary fiction.

Thanks in advance!

Have you heard? The queen of England is dead. It's only everywhere.

I don't know about you but the constant mini-biographies, retrospectives, and highlight newsreels being shown on television has brought a certain show to the forefront of my mind. 2016's The Crown. Callous, I know, thinking about tv shows when a woman has died, but I suspect Queen Elizabeth's death has moved that show to the top of your watch lists. Perhaps you're thinking this could be a fun way to learn about the highlights of the second longest reigning monarch in human history, or to delve deeper into those tabloid headlines you remember from your childhood?

Well, my recommendation is not to bother. It's vapid story about pointless people who spend their lives doing nothing. It's a story unworthy of being labeled a 'drama'.

...I can't be the only to feel this way, right?

---

To be clear from the get-go, I know that I'm in the minority here. The Crown is a massively popular four-season series that is rated 90% on Rotten Tomato, 8.7 on IMDB, and is referenced quite frequently as 'a great show' in the dialogues of laughtrack sit-coms that I still much prefer despite their mediocrity. Yet, for the life of me, I cannot understand why people like this 'story'.

Actually, I have some pretty good guesses, but I'll list them later for the sake of this essay's flow.

Personally, The Crown is my least favorite show of all time. On a technical level, I can't necessarily say that it's the worst show I've seen -after all, it has an amazing cast, beautiful and period-accurate set design, and touches upon just about every major event to affect the UK in the past century. And it's about the life of the second longest reigning monarch of all time! How can it possibly be bad? Do I just hate royals or something?

Well, I do see royalty as a affront to democracy and our obsession/worship of them as unhealthy idolatry... but that's not why I dislike The Crown. I dislike The Crown because it's bad storytelling. Simple as that. Even worse, it's bad storytelling that doesn't realize that it's bad storytelling.

And the reason is simple. Queen Elizabeth II makes for a terrible protagonist.

---

I know, I can scarcely believe it myself. How is the second longest reigning monarch of all time -sorry, I'm sounding like a broken record here- a poor main character? Surely, she's had an interesting life, right?

I mean, sure, it is interesting to get a peek behind the gates of Buckingham palace. But sad truth is, the Queen was an uninteresting person.

Oh shit, did I just speak ill of the dead? Well, rest easy knowing that this isn't a disparagement of Elizabeth's character. Elizabeth very well could have been an interesting and charming human being in person for all I know. The issue is not with the person, but the position of Queen. And the Queen of England fundamentally cannot be interesting, because by law, by mandate of their constitution, she cannot do anything. She cannot state her own opinions. She cannot take action. She cannot do anything that might influence the outcome of anything important at all. The Queen has no agency, and a character without agency is barely a character at all.

To be clear, the Queen's lack of agency isn't some temporary thing, like when a hero loses their power or a protagonist is kidnapped. No, she does this her whole life. It's the character's defining characteristic. She says nothing, does nothing, and never has an arc where that changes. And for every episode that depicts a greater conflict affecting her nation, you can count on its resolution being that Queen Elizabeth does nothing. Honestly, given her impact on the story she might as well be a NPC.

By the way, these national conflicts make up about fifty percent of the storylines in the show (the other fifty percent being family 'drama') and almost all of them follow this mind-numbingly boring plot progression:

1. Major historical event is established (development of atom bomb, occurrence of natural disaster, etc)
2. The Queen learns about it, feels she ought to do something about it,
3. She is talked out of action, by herself or by others, because the Queen is not allowed to do anything.
4. Someone else actually deals with the problem (entirely offscreen). If the Queen is allowed to contribute, it's only in some meaningless, token way.

Again, this isn't Elizabeth's fault- she's legally not allowed to do anything and she's being a good constitutional monarch by doing nothing. But in terms of storytelling, she's clearly not the person to be following if we want to learn anything meaningful about these important events. A fictional comparison would be a version of LOTR that exclusively followed Galadriel instead of, y'know, Frodo, Aragorn, and all the other people actually working to bring the ring to to Mount Doom. Narratively, this is such a big interest-killer that it ought to bury the show. Luckily the writers can rely on nostalgia and name-dropping to keep viewership going.

Speaking of Elizabeth, this is the part where I start to disparage her as a person. Or rather her character in the show, as I'm perfectly aware that the show doesn't have the full picture of what's going on in the palace. But if you look past the showrunner's desperate attempts to tell you that Elizabeth is heroic, you'll see that she comes across as quite a mediocre person.

• She repeatedly keeps her relatives from marrying people they love (a hilariously hypocritical stance given that she's the head of the Church of England, a religious institution founded on expanding marital freedom).
• She decides to forgo learning about the atom bomb because all that her education needs to cover is how to be 'the dignified part' of the English government.
• She is pressured into scapegoating a senior official for a comment she made when she could've just owned up to it (he gets fired and blacklisted from his industry).
• She visits her Nazi uncle when he'd dying (he's a Nazi, let him die alone).

Some of her achievements felt over-inflated too, like when she originally banned her Nazi uncle (not an accomplishment), or her contribution to the anti-apartheid treaty (Funny how they can't provide concrete details on how she contributed, huh? Way to ride the coattails of hardworking civil rights activists and diplomats). But her repeated insistence that her family cannot marry for love is honestly what leaves the worst taste in my mouth. It just makes her seem like she's following an 'if I can't be free, neither can you' philosophy.

So not only is the show narratively dull, the main character is actively unlikable. Not a great combo. But what about the other half of the show?

Unfortunately, the other fifty percent of the show -the family 'drama'- is no better. There is only one type of conflict, really, and it's Elizabeth's relatives whining about how they feel stifled by the restrictions placed upon royals. This conflict is repeated multiple times over the course of the show, starting with Elizabeth's sister Margaret wanting to marry a man she loves, then her husband Phillip feeling overshadowed by his wife and unable to pursue his own desires, then her son Charles going through both those same conflicts, and so on. Granted, it was fairly interesting the first time around with Margaret -seeing Elizabeth quietly envious of her sister's popularity was very juicy- but they pretty much 'solved' the conflict so every iteration afterwards feels like a re-tread of old material. And when I say 'solved', I mean explored to the point that we can see that it comes down to a simple choice.

Elizabeth explains it quite well to her sister at the end of their little arc. After Margaret pleads for the million time to be granted the freedom to marry her commoner lover, Elizabeth says "Sure. If you really want to marry him, give up your royal status and you'll be free to do whatever you want." Obviously, I'm paraphrasing here, but that's the gist. And once we learn this, we realize that every single complaint made by Elizabeth's family is self-imposed, and exists only because they don't want to give up the wealth and status that comes from being royalty. How I'm supposed to sympathize with them after this (or convince myself that a conflict even exists) I don't know.

On top of that, it's not like the royals have interesting personalities to make up for that. Most come across as vaguely petty and entitled, but some, like Phillip, are even more unlikable than the already uncharming Elizabeth. He has this scene where he talks down the accomplishment of going to space because the astronauts didn't have some divine, transcendent experience, and it's somehow presented as... poignant? Because he was struggling to find a purpose beneath the shadow of his wife, he has to tear down one of the greatest feats mankind has ever accomplished*?* I swear, I nearly had a coronary watching that scene.

---

So on the one hand, you have a storyline that follows an impotent Queen that watches as other people fix the important problems plaguing her nation. Then on the other hand, you have the storyline that follows an entitled royal family as they complain about restrictions that they could easily opt out of. So why do people even watch this show?

Nostalgia and a lurid fascination about the lives of royals, is my guess. Which are fair reasons to watch this show; even I got quite a kick out of seeing familiar historical events/tabloid headlines pop up during the course of the show. And again, the technical aspects of the show -the acting, the directing, the set design- is all stellar. But that's not enough for me to like a show, let alone give it a high rating.

In my head, there exists an alternate version of The Crown. One that shows the royals as real people, but ones trapped under the thumb of royal institutions, stunted from being told how to act their whole lives and warped from a life of unbelievable excess. Envy them? Idolize them? Don't. Imagine being called a monarch your whole life but unable to lift a single finger or voice a single opinion. Imagine having freedom and love within reach, but being too scared to grasp it out of fear of what they'll lose. Imagine living with the eyes of the world on you, constantly and forever, from birth to death.

I wish this was the story we got. Instead, we got a giant nothingburger of a narrative. A hot gasp of air in the face of the sun. A fart in the wind.

Do you agree, or am I missing something? Let me know what you think.

Stories can be serious, stories can be pulpy. But regardless of their style, most readers will count stories of both types amongst their favorites. Despite that, modern pulp stories -especially with drawn stories like manga and anime- are often underserved in terms of high-level analytical attention. This is a rather nonsensical phenomenon as pulp stories are perfectly good examples from which to learn writing craft (Shakespeare's works are longstanding proof of that) and illustrations have no quality inherent to them that makes stories childish or simplistic. In fact, a mixed medium format opens up many possibilities for storytelling, so any writer looking to level up their writing craft will benefit from reading across not just genres, but mediums as well.

Kaizen is a Japanese term that means continuous improvement, and it represents the belief that with constant iterative conversations about what we can do better, we can reap immense benefits over time. This series is an attempt to embody that sentiment in the context of story critiques, specifically by analyzing a story, deciphering the authorial intent behind it, and recommending changes that will 'fix' any errors in execution. I cannot promise that my perspective will match yours or that all my ideas will be good, but by reading and participating in the conversation, hopefully we'll all get better at thinking about stories. And never hesitate to let me know if you don't think I'm respecting the intent of the original creator. Straying from that would defeat the whole purpose of this series.

Apologies beforehand. This is going to be long. And a bit melodramatic.

Spoilery Preface

*Side Note: Death Note (and most other anime) is definitely on the side of pulpish storytelling. Which is to say, they are written with entertainment as the main goal. Given that, be sure to give my descriptions and edits of Death Note a smidge more suspension of disbelief than usual. I swear, there is something about drawn stories that extend the limits of believability, and a text-only post on the internet cannot give justice to that feeling. You may have to extend that effort yourself.

*Side Note: Also, I won't be distinguishing between the manga & animated versions of this story as they are close enough in execution (as well as flaws) that it's not worth the effort to do so.

Death Note is a story about a Japanese high school student named Yagami Light who finds a magical notebook that allows him to kill people simply by writing their names into it.

Damn. Don't you just wish you'd thought of that first?

With that premise, Death Note could've easily been a bit of trashy justice pornography. Or a tepid exploration of what an ordinary person would do with such a power, like a dressed up version of the trolley problem. It also could've been uninspired, like the live-action movie Netflix 'adaptation' that came out in 2017.

*Side Note: The directors and writers from that adaptation are permanently on my 'don't bother watching anything with their name on it' list. They could've copy-pasted the script of the Japanese live-action adaptation, they could've filmed a shortened version of the show, they could've come up with their own twist on the premise, anything. Instead, they worked hard to produce a boring piece of drivel that was forgotten within a week. Failing with such an easy slam-dunk of an IP is blatant proof of incompetence or, if this was due to executive pressure, a lack of a spine.

Instead, Death Note comes in guns blazing. The moment after Light finds the Death Note and confirms that it works, we cut straight to him cackling over the hundreds, maybe thousands, of names of criminals he has already penciled into the Death Note. So many names that when the Shinigami Ryuk -a grim reaper and owner of that particular notebook- drops in to check in on what's what, he's impressed by what Light has managed in the short amount of time he's had. Then Light has the audacity to proclaim to a literal god of death that with this new power, he plans on becoming the god of a new world for humanity.

It is with this insane bang of megalomania that Death Note begins, which is followed up by an equally thrilling introduction to his rival, the mysterious detective 'L'.

Just as we are beginning to believe that Light might be unstoppable (after all, he is the one man with supernatural powers in an ordinary world) a man named Lind L. Tailor appears on his television. Tailor proclaims that all these recent deaths are the work of history's most heinous and egregious serial killer, that he will catch this infamous Kira (Light's serial killer name), and that what Kira is doing is undoubtedly evil. This last line triggers Light's ego and for the first time, he steps beyond just killing criminals. He violently scrawls Tailor's name into the Death Note.

Lind L. Tailor dies. Of course, he does. The power of the Death Note is absolute.

But then the screen flickers and a large gothic 'L' covers the screen.

Face hidden and voice scrambled, the real L speaks and reveals the truth. Tailor was a decoy, a death-row inmate that he had set up to draw out Kira. Furthermore, the television broadcast wasn't worldwide, meaning Light has given away that he's currently in a specific region of Japan. And though L can scarcely believe it himself, he has even confirmed that Kira can kill without direct contact. L ends the broadcast by stating he is very curious about how Kira kills people, but that he can find that out once he catches him.

A serial killer with a god-complex, possessing a notebook with the power of death. An anonymous genius detective willing to sacrifice a man's life for evidence. The scene ends with the two of them both proclaiming that 'they are justice' (a moment that is both hilariously anime and genuinely reflective of the duality of justice that exists in human nature) as they begin this lethal game of cat and mouse. It's an absurdly bombastic story, with a core nature reminiscent of the rivalry between Sherlock and Moriarty,

For the first half of the series, Death Note delivers on this premise pretty damn effectively. Yes, there are some errors in execution -like how a whole five minutes is spent explaining how Light set up a booby-trapped secret compartment to his desk to hide his Death Note without it ever becoming plot relevant- but overall, the story is a blast. It delivers solidly thought-provoking explorations of morality, an unsettlingly appealing anti-hero in Light, and ridiculously overwrought mind games, all without letting up on its relentless pace of twists reveals and unexpected turns.

*Side Note: Check out the soundtrack of the anime. Post-rock is a criminally underutilized genre of music within the tv and movie world.

One of my favorite moments is when L -after he had already narrowed down the pool of suspects to include Light- sits down next to Light after a university commencement speech and reveals to Light that he is the mysterious detective L. As Light can kill with simply a face and a name, the audience is tricked into thinking this is a risky move on L's part, but it's actually a calculated gambit. If L dies there, it would've actually confirmed that Light is indeed the serial killer. Also, he used the name of a famous actor, so if the actor died that would've confirmed Light is the serial killer as well. In fact, Light's only correct move is the act as naturally as possible and do nothing, otherwise he risks raising suspicion on himself. And since L knows that the serial killer is too smart to actually be caught by a trap like this, the gambit isn't actually a gambit. It's a taunt, tailored to infuriate a serial killer with a god-complex.

Death Note is filled with mind-games like this. Yes, many stretch the limits of plausibility, but if you let yourself believe that human beings are capable of countermoves upon countermoves, planning twenty steps ahead of their opponents, that's where the best experience for the story lies. It leads to moments like this, which have become peak meme material, while also being genuinely thrilling story beats at the same time.

*Side Note: Personally, I do think some of the schemes within the first half are definitely overdone, but I won't try to fix them in this essay. Mainly because I think they still fulfill their role of being entertaining, but also because of how much of a pain in it'll be to fix such complex narrative structures with such a high standard of logical coherence. Frankly, it'd be easier to simply rewrite the whole script than to fit them in this essay.

Unfortunately, for every bit of thrilling that the first half of Death Note is, the second half is a dire disappointment.

The mid-point turn of Death Note occurs when Light finally turns the tables on L and manages to kill him without anyone realizing he was the culprit. Of course, killing off a main character in any story is a big deal, but the reason this is an especially big deal, narratively speaking, is because it upends the whole premise of Death Note's story. The aforementioned 'Sherlock vs Moriarty', duel of minds deal. This is not to say that killing off L was a mistake, in fact, I think it's a great choice, but I think it's clear that the author was unprepared to deal with how much the story would need to change after this. And there's no clearer evidence of this than the introduction of Mello and Near.

*Side Note: The Japanese live-action movie adaptation of Death Note actually has quite the clever rewrite of this segment. They simply have L win, but it's by pre-emptively writing his own death in the Death Note. A heroic and clever sacrifice that's quite the satisfying ending if the story were to end at the midpoint. But I'm going ahead with Light winning at the midpoint because then there'd be no need for this essay at all.

Who are M and N? Two children are summoned by an emergency protocol upon L's death to take up his mantle as world-famous detectives. They come from the same orphanage as L, they are geniuses with amazing deductive reasoning skills similar to L, and they even have an eccentric dress style and manners like L did.

Yeah. It stretches the suspension of disbelief, doesn't it? But more importantly, it's a symptom of the author not knowing what to do. Killing off L left a huge vacuum in the story, so what did he do? He created two more L's to fill the void, effectively regressing the storyline.

Obviously, I think this was a mistake. But that leaves the question: how would I have dealt with L's death in their place?

Kaizen Version:

A few goals to identify before we begin.

• First, the story starts after L dies.
• Second, Light must die at the end.
• Third, Light's father must die.
• Fourth, someone must sacrifice themselves to take down Light.
• Fifth, Matsuda must be the one to shoot Light.
• Sixth, the story must contain the same moral and social themes

And here we go. How do we start?

Simple. First things first, we should remove M and N from the narrative.

In many ways, this is a big change. Mello and Near represent the two main forces that take down Light, so removing them leaves quite a hole in the story. If they're not there, who is left?

Again, the answer is simple. The same people who were in prime position to fill L's void when he died. The other members of the Kira Investigation Squad.

Aizawa (cop with the afro), Light's father, Mogi (big cop), Matsuda (rookie cop), and Ide (cop who originally quit the taskforce). Looking back, I think it's clear that these were the characters that should have been placed in the limelight after L's death. Not only is it a more natural and realistic outcome, those ordinary Japanese detectives are also more organic deliverers of Death Note's final thematic beats than M or N could ever be. Themes consisting of:

1. defining true justice (L's evidence-based justice vs Light's old testament justice)
2. teamwork vs individual genius (Mello's selfless sacrificing for Near's gain vs Light's obsession with growing his power)
3. empathy vs using people (The Kira squad standing united at the end vs Light left alone without his sycophants)

With the Japanese detectives taking place of M and N where necessary, all of these themes can be enhanced. And the strength of this set-up is already proven within the story.

In the final moments, when Light is cornered and proven without a doubt to be the serial killer Kira, he attempts to write the names of his enemies on a piece of the Death Note he had hidden within his watch. It's a trick he's used successfully before to trick L, but to our surprise, the person who stops him is Matsuda, the rookie detective.

Before this moment, Matsuda has largely been a source of comedy relief. He's the naïve one, the one relegated to menial tasks, the one who constantly asks questions for the sake of the audience. A bumbling good-natured idiot that we tolerate because of the expository function he provides for the story. A Watson of a sort. Yet when Matsuda shoots that scrap of paper out of Light's hand and demands how he could have lied to all of them, to even his own father, that one line lands better than all of Near's clever monologuing from moments before.

Why? It's got nothing to do with the substance of Near's scheming, believe me. The moment works because it gives Matsuda, a character that has been there from the start of the story, that has suffered through L's death, that has been personally been lied to by Light for years, that has one of the greatest emotional stakes in the scene, a moment to be more than just glorified piece of background decoration.

Imagine if all the members of the Kira Investigation Squad had a moment like that at the end. Imagine how much more impact the scene would've had if they had captured Light, the ones who had been lied to and betrayed, rather than a clone of L and a bunch of foreign operatives.

That's what rewriting the second half of Death Note without M and N would allow. So that's how my Kaizen version begins.

---

Three years after L's funeral, Aizawa stands at the unmarked headstones of L and his butler. The others are walking away, led by Light. He'd given a beautiful speech, just like last year.

A tap on his shoulder. Aizawa turns to find an old friend waiting for him. Ide. He holds out an umbrella.

"Come on. Let's get out of the rain. Don't want to catch a cold, do you?"

The two sit down in a nearby cafe. Aizawa orders coffee and begins to shovel spoonful after spoonful of sugar into it once it arrives. When Ide makes fun of him for it, he laughs, sadly, and says it's a habit he picked up from a friend.

The two proceed to talk about how Kira has changed society in the last year, how the Kira Investigation squad is doing, and ending on how Light is doing, which effectively summarizes what has gone on during the time skip after L's death. As an idle question, Ide asks how a kid could possibly fulfill the leadership role of the group, but Aizawa denies this by stating the many good things that Light has done during his tenure as the group's leader. The boy is a genius, after all.

Then Aizawa falls silent, wracked by a feeling he cannot shake.

Ide asks what's what. He'd always been direct like that. Just like when he'd quit the task force in front of the whole department. It was why he made such a great cop.

Aizawa reveals to Ide that before L died, his main suspect had been Light. Ide, who hadn't known the inner workings of the Kira Investigation group, widens his eyes. He asks how a former suspect could possibly be heading the investigation of into Kira's identity.

There was no evidence, Aizawa says with shrug, and even L admitted the odds were but the tiniest percent. However...

Aizawa hesitates, but Ide already knows. They're both cops, after all.

The two leave the cafe. Before they part ways, Aizawa sees Ide pull something out of his pocket. It's a cough drop.

"Those are mostly sugar you know," Aizawa comments mildly. "They'll put you in an early grave."

Ide gives him a flat look. Then tosses it back, biting down on it with a loud crunch.

"Don't care. They help me think."

---

Obviously, this sugar tooth motif is the same one given to M and N in the original, which symbolized their roles as 'inheritors of L's will'. Repurposing this motif is an easy way to signal to the audience that these are the new main characters. Exactly what confectionary the characters will like is not important. The point is their symbolic function. Ordinary policemen are the main characters now.

Next Aizawa recruits Mogi, who also reveals he's been feeling the same thing about Light. However, during their meeting, they're found out by Matsuda. Aizawa originally doesn't want to include Matsuda because the rookie has been shown to be on the friendliest terms with Light out of the group, but Matsuda forces his way in. He insists, stating that he doesn't believe Light is Kira, but if they're going to investigate he'll be there to make sure no corners are cut. This maintains Matsuda's role as the audience insert (by design, many audience members often want to side with Light or at least believe he's not truly bad) and sets him up for that explosive moment in the finale that I mentioned earlier.

Which leaves Yagami Soichiro, Light's father. Of all the members of the Kira Investigation Force, he will not have the sugar tooth motif. After all, he will die believing his son is innocent, which is an important beat that will serve as the turning point for the second half of this story. The moment when the remaining members of the Kira Investigation squad really begin to make their move.

But before we get there, let's talk about how we get to that point.

On Kira's side of the story, I don't think much needs to be changed. The exploration of how society begins to warp to serve Kira works well. I think the cult-like television program is a realistic interpretation of how people would rabidly support Kira's radical and vengeful justice, as is the idea of a news announcer like Takada supporting Kira's position in a less overt way. Both are quite relatable, as they reflect modern political media in this day and age. Light's search and discovery of Mikami also works, it shows that Light's code, despite his god complex, isn't corrupted by the fawning masses. Other than Mikami's constant and rabid repetition of 'Sakujo', I find this side of the story pretty solid.

The difficulty comes in the schemes and investigations conducted on the side of the Kira Investigation Squad. On one hand, the idea of Light leading investigations against himself, doing a good enough job not to arouse suspicion but also never actually finding any leads is a very fun concept. So is the idea of Aizawa scrutinizing Light's every move without giving away that he actually suspects Light. Both have great potential for providing very tense scenes filled with lies, innuendos, and tests of loyalty.

But the execution falls a little short of the setup. The whole sequence with his sister's kidnapping (which randomly involved the American mafia, the hijacking of a plane, and an overly explained drug trade bunker) was too high action for the series. At times, it honestly felt like I was watching a Fast and Furious film instead.

That doesn't mean the sequence is unsalvageable, though. As I mentioned earlier, I won't get into fixing the minutiae of these schemes, but there are a couple of points that are worth preserving.

• The inclusion of Sidoh (the owner of the stolen Death Note Ryuk had dropped into the world) is a great addition. He is a natural answer to the question regarding whose notebook Light found, and he also automatically poses a threat to Light's alibi as he can easily identify the false rules in the Deathnote.
• The inclusion of a third party that is interested in the power of a Deathnote. I think choosing the American Mafia took the story too far away from an environment that both the author and the characters were familiar with. But if it were the Japanese Yakuza, I think it could've been executed more believably. After all, a third party with a similar narrative function -the Yotsuba corporation- was successfully included without stretching the limits of believability. The Yakuza would have plenty of motivation too as they are likely one of Kira's most heavily targeted groups, and would find great use in a tool like the Deathnote. They wouldn't need Mello to guide them to end up targeting Light either, as information from dirty cops (and potential oversees connections) would be enough to get the basics of L's investigation.

Besides that, the last thing in this sequence is for Yagami Soichiro to die. In particular, as close to how it happened in the original by:

• having Soichiro sacrifice half his life for the eyes of Shinigami for the Kira Investigation, which Light is intentionally misleading.
• having Light attempt to make him use the Deathnote to finish Mello (can be replaced by a different character) before he dies despite knowing that means damning his father's soul from reaching the afterlife.
• having Light show absolutely no care about the fact that his father is dying except for how he can use him until the last second.

This setup is a trifecta of moral depravity that makes the audience no longer able to sustain the idea of wanting Light, the 'protagonist' to win. And although it isn't presented as such in the original, it also serves as a great turning point for the rest of the Kira Investigation to turn on him as this is simply one too many coincidences to ignore. Yet another person has targeted Light thinking he is Kira, yet they have died and all leads have vanished once again. It is clean; too clean.

From this point forward, the two halves of Light's life begin to collide. With no obvious leads once more, the Kira Investigation squad begins to investigate Kira's most notable followers. Namely Takada and Demegawa, the faces of Kira's Kingdom. As in the original, Light can make contact with Takada under the guise of the investigation and reveal himself as Kira, all while Aizawa tries to secretly ascertain if they're communicating with means beyond what their listening devices can capture. I found this to be a great sequence in the original that was unfortunately overshadowed by the bigger, but not necessarily better, schemes that occurred within the second half.

In the meantime, as Near and his associates do not exist, this is where I think Ide fits into the story. As the only member of the new main cast outside of the Kira Investigation Squad, it makes sense that he has already been pursuing an investigation into Kira's supporters all on his own. And while the others have been distracted by the theft and retrieval of a Deathnote -as well as the death of Yagami Soichiro- he's had plenty of time to find clues and potential suspects. This gives him a plausible reason to identify Mikami as some important figure in Kira's network, and by extension, replace Gevanni's role in the finale.

Now comes the difficult question. Who takes the place of Mello? Who makes the sacrificial play?

Aizawa is a solid candidate. He's one of the characters we spend the most time with, is perhaps the most reasonable viewpoint throughout the whole series, and he has a family; that makes him prime fodder for tragedy. If Light kills him, the emotions of the finale will be all the more heightened, including Matsuba's outcry at the end.

Ide is also a good choice. He's the wildcard in this situation, which makes his role most similar to Mello's. He's also not officially part of the Kira investigation squad which means he isn't nearly as protected as the others (as he isn't necessary for Light's alibi) and he's tailing Mikami which puts him in the line of fire. These circumstances make it almost easy to write an ending where he dies.

However, while both Aizawa and Ide are good options, I think the right answer is Mogi.

As a character, Mogi is shown to be a quiet but competent detective, often seen playing the supporting role in most situations. He's the one who does a lot of the guard work when dealing with Misa, and L even compliments him on his diligent efforts in investigating Kira. He's also the first to get on board with investigating Light when Aizawa suggests it. However, he rarely plays a decisive role in the plot. In fact, his one and only big plot moment may be successfully acting as Misa's manager in an undercover role. Otherwise, Mogi is eminently erasable from the manuscript.

This is exactly why he makes for the best character to sacrifice. Not because his death would be easy to stomach, no, but because having a character that has consistently defined by his minimal impact on the story commit the crucial move necessary for victory is an extremely powerful story beat. And Mogi is precisely the type of character to notice that someone has to rock the boat in order to force a mistake out of Kira, and even though he knows he'll die for doing it, he's the only one in position to make the difference. Rather like a pawn sacrificing themselves to set up a checkmate.

But this is where things get a bit fuzzy for me as once again, things are near the minutiae of Deathnote schemes. I can at least say that there probably needs to be a whole rework of how Light is cornered as I've never found Gevanni's copying and replacing of Mikami's false Deathnote to be that compelling. It's a little confusing and, frankly, a bit lucky. The outcome makes sense on a technical level, but it's too easy to imagine a world where Mikami hadn't deviated from his schedule to kill Takada -a world where the heroes lose. Perhaps it could have been better presented at least, as the original rather understates how much of a gamble Mello's sacrifice ended up being, but I think a rework is in order.

Vaguely speaking, in my version I see the Kira investigation closing in on Light on three prongs.

1. Aizawa investigating the communications between Light and Takada.
2. Ide investigating and following Mikami.
3. Mogi, although I'm not sure how, making a sacrificial play involving Misa.

Three of Light's closest supporters; each representing some character failing on Light's part as well as one of the aforementioned core themes of Death Note.

1. Takada; the way that Light uses and disposes of people.
2. Mikami; the way Light relies on absolute control over his underlings.
3. Misa; again I'm not sure how but, the way he fails to represent true justice

These weaknesses of Light are, of course, mirrored by the opposite strengths of the Kira Investigation squad as they corner him, and their victory shows us what true justice is. True justice is:

1. Selfless, and for the greater good. Represented by Mogi's sacrifice.
2. Not defined by an individual. Represented by the investigation squad including opposing viewpoints like Ide and Matsuda.
3. Not enforced by an individual, no matter how smart. Represented by the investigation succeeding as a group where L failed.

*Side Note: this last theme is also a subversion of the crime/mystery genre which is filled with genius detectives who find more success than 1000 hard-working cops. A nice touch, I think, and it emerges so naturally without any effort on my part that I see it as proof that killing L off at the midpoint of the story was the right choice by the creator.

From here, the story can end as it did in the original, except with Aizawa standing in for Near as the one to explain how they cornered Light. Light reveals his true nature, Matsuda shoots him when he attempts to kill them, and Mikami commits suicide which allows for Light to escape momentarily. Then the story closes with Ryuk writing Light's name into his own Death Note.

The End.

Conclusion:

Sorry that I don't have a concrete narrative hammered out for Mogi's (and Misa's) rewritten storyline, but if you come up with any, let me know. I'd love to hear it.

Also, this essay is a bit long, isn't it? Tl:DR is the following:

1. Remove Mello and Near.
2. Have the other members of the Kira Investigation squad take center stage after L's death. Reincorporate Ide into the story.
3. Rework the schemes in the second half to be more grounded (no moving the story to America, including the American president, etc)
4. Have Mogi make the sacrificial play instead of Mello
5. Corner Light with a three prong approach that uses Takada, Mikami, and Misa.

I suppose I could've just made this summary the full post and that would've captured the gist of my edits. However, half the process of writing these essays is figuring out exactly what edits I think ought to be done, researching to make sure that I've remembered the story correctly, and identifying more subtle aspects of execution like theme and meta-commentary.

I've also been working to make these more interesting to read, let me know if you think the formatting could use work, or what you think about my clumsy attempt to include a scene. And I did change a bit of the naming convention of the series and introductory text to help alleviate the accusations of 'arrogance' that I got for my last entry. I really didn't expect people to be so offended by the word 'fixing', lol, but I'll just take that as a lesson in the power of word choice.

The next entry will be regarding the television series Queen's Gambit, as I am still stuck on what to do with Book Three of Dune. Honestly, I think it's so fucked that I may never figure out what to do with it. Again, for those who don't know, the main villain and killer of the protagonist's father are taken down by a toddler. A fucking toddler. What the hell am I supposed to do with that?

In the meantime, I've trying to get at least another chapter of my novel finished so I can submit it to my writing group and I've also got some non-Kaizen series essays I want to post as well. Let's see if I can keep up with all these writing commitments :)

So I was looking at a picture and thinking about the differences between drawing and writing, and I was thinking about how, if you show a simple picture of something, it can whip up the winds of imagination, but it seems that with a story, it's not the visual aspect but the information.

Take a look at this image.

If this illustration does anything for you at all, then we might ask why. What is it about this image that makes one think, that gives one pause or stirs the imagination in any way, however small?

Initially it's tempting to say because of the dramatic angle, looking down upon the macabre scene, or the skillful lighting, glistening on the rain-slicked planks. These elements, while good and impressive, are not actually the things that make the image interesting—a boring image with brilliant lighting, coloring and line work is completely possible—but are in actuality in service of the true focal point, which is really a concept, rather than a visual spectacle, and that concept can be summed up in an inner monologue of a potential observer:

"This seems to imply that one woman beat all these presumably trained soldiers, and she beat them so thoroughly she doesn't have a scratch or mark on her of any sort. If this is all true, then how did she do it, and why?"

So really the core strength of an image like this is not, necessarily, in the sheer skillfulness of it, or the quality of the lighting, coloring or angle, but in the implied story.

This is essentially that first "hook" sentence in a novel, or the first sentence of an interesting paragraph, or even the last sentence of a chapter.

If we were going to write something like the above image, it would not be a visual description, but a conveyance of significance through information:

The lady stood over the fallen soldiers. They had come for her, as she was told they would, and although she had tried to dissuade them through every manner of persuasion at her disposal—she had offered food, gold and even her home; when that had failed she’d offered prestige through her contacts with great artists and writers; then as she’d drawn her blades, she had finally, with an aching heart, offered even her own body for as long as 48 hours, and yet even this inspired little more than mischievous glances and a few moments of ineffectual rumination.

            They had set upon her then, and she had the choice only to defend herself, which she did with finality. The rain sluiced along the planks, sending soldiers’ blood streaming into the crevices between, and the lady sheathed her blades.

Notice that despite a few descriptive aspects, it’s mostly just telling you information that somewhat indirectly develops more and more of the story, and puts more and more questions in your mind. Why are they after her? Why is she so loath to fight, even at the expense of her own virtue? What will happen now? Also, what the heck? Who is this woman that she can do this? We have a sense of her personality, of her skill and perhaps even a sense of foreboding for what might happen next, whether to her or to whoever is sent to fetch her.

This is not about recounting each blade swing, or line of dialogue, of each raindrop or facial expression. This is about conveying the story, by whatever means is most effective. In this instance, I chose to tell most of it through the past-perfect tense, an interesting tense that oftentimes conveys a sense of non-resolution. If you stick in past-perfect tense too long, you can make the audience antsy as they’re waiting for resolution that is taking far too long to arrive. That deserves its own article, but I don’t have the knowledge to get to it at the moment.

So let’s resolve this article with the upshot:

Don’t mistake the spectacle of excellently crafted visuals for storytelling. There are pictures—drawings—that tell no story and they can be beautiful, but when you see something like the image above, some image that gets your imagination going, that makes you wonder what’s happening, or start inventing things of your own that might have happened, it’s very likely that the image is not just a pretty drawing, but a story in visual form. If you want to transfer that to writing, then you cannot use the tools of a painter, but must use the tools of a writer: Telling, not showing.

(Originally written for the Stained Glass Vista of My Next Idea.)

It used to be an essay sub, now all I see are insultingly basic r/writing style questions. I even keep getting bot spam posted in this sub recommended to me.

A great number of societies in fiction are written uncritically, or with lip service paid to problems or change, which is fine for some entertainment media, - that's not the discussion here, what I'm looking for is resources on how to write it better.

Of course, one should have some understanding of history and politics, etc etc; all that aside, I'm looking specifically for analyses of existing works (or trends of work). These would be critical pieces (whether articles or video essays or whatever) that analyse some better and worse takes on empire, imperialism, corrupt systems and social change in modern fiction.

Any thoughts, even tangential, would be welcome.