I've done a few movie reviews in the past, and I think I'll pick them up again. They won't be pretty, and they won't be professional. But they WILL be honest.
Before I spew a giant wall of text, I'll come clean, I'm primarily a Marvel Comics and Independent comics guy. But!!!!! I DO love Batman (most of the comics runs have been fantastic and I've been reading them for years), and some of the Superman runs hold a place close to my heart.
Now, onto the wall of text...
There were parts of the movie that I LOVED, standing on their own, apart from the rest of the movie, because the movie as a whole is BROKEN. I'll give some specific thoughts without going into spoilers (because people can read this before seeing the movie, though I really suggest they don't... see the movie).
Ben Affleck was phenomenal as Batman, and frankly, I had my doubts going in. I believed. He WAS Bruce Wayne, he WAS the Dark Knight. Boy got RIPPED for the role too. And Jeremy Irons was a sassy MF Alfred.
The BvS fight was AWESOME, even if the story that led to there rang false because there wasn't enough of it to make it matter.
Gal Godot IS Wonder Woman, and there simply wasn't enough of her. I can't wait for her stand alone movie.
The reveals of C, F, and A were just right (though I do have issues with some of the hand wavy around some of it). I can't wait to see A's movie right along with Wonder Woman's.
And that's the entirety of what I loved about the movie.
Middle-ground?
Zack Snyder gets a rainbow sticker, because he seems to have learned how to break up long-ass fight scenes so I don't get too bored, which is an improvement. But then I'm going to light that sticker on fire because he can't tell a coherent story.
And then there's the stuff that just blew bloody little goat chunks.
Henry Cavill is a pretty damned good actor, but we're not allowed to actually give a damn about him in this movie (or the last). There was so much potential for the whole story around "do we need Superman" and what that says about us, but it seems like Snyder got bored with it partway through and just started smashing his toys around. The explosion, you know the one I'm talking about, was a great opportunity, and the story started to ask the right questions, and then seems to have dropped them.
The dreams... WTF is up with them? Completely unnecessary and so BADLY done. Were these just Zack Snyder spending all the money they could throw at him?
There's the unnecessary "origin story" one at the beginning of the movie? Remember how it ends? With a certain physics defying act? There's no lead in that it's a dream and not a memory, that gets revealed in a voice over.... yay?
The post-apocalypse one from the trailer? Why? If the supposed purpose was to show how Bruce was tortured by a dystopian vision of what unchecked power can do? So he has a reason to go down a dark path? Meanwhile he's running around unchecked himself? Ben Affleck can act. Let him. The little discussion Bruce had with Alfred did fine on its own.
Then there's the illogical car chase stuff, and the over-equipping of bad guys. Who uses a heavily armed convoy of private contractors to covertly transport/smuggle something into a city? Way to fly under the radar... and there's a part near the beginning of that chase where the hero,
A) stands somewhere really stupid to do something really simple, (because it's dramatic?), and
B) does something no one would do if they were trying to move fast. Do you drop anchor on a ship and drag it behind you if you're trying to catch something? Oh, but look, it magically came in handy... good thing our hero has some sort of bat-precognition.
The final fight scene, how nice that they gave us time to breathe and a few lighter moments that were robbed of their levity by the trailers (haha, is she with you?). It's nice that Snyder watched the Avengers movies, isn't it?
Also... kudos to Perry White, the most powerful journalistic (illuminati) editor in the world. Despite the fact that "no one reads the newspaper any more" he can fly his ONE reporter all over the world, AND serve up a helicopter "ON THE ROOF" at a moment's notice... damn that man's got power.
And last, the part of the movie that drove me batty (pun intended) was Eisenberg's Luthor. Who would let that man do ANYTHING? Oh, wait... maybe it's an allegory, where Lex Luthor is a stand in for Zach Snyder, and the authorities in the world around him are stand ins for DC/WB?
I give it 3 stars, out of 10. There were some absolutely awesome elements to the movie (see what I loved above), but there's just too much crap and garbage packed around it.
It earns the distinction of being the first movie below the threshold of suck on my Movie List
Showing posts with label TV/Movies. Show all posts
Showing posts with label TV/Movies. Show all posts
Saturday, April 23, 2016
Friday, March 6, 2015
Brainstorming: Building on The Idea
Let's pretend you have an idea. Don't be alarmed! It happens to the best of us.
Walk it off.
As I've pointed out before, sometimes you can't shake the idea off. It sticks to you. It won't go away. It keeps you up at night, like a dryer that squeals because it's lost that little felt ring that stops the metal drum from rubbing against the housing as it goes around and around and around squeaking and squealing intermittently until you jUSt cAn'T TAkE iT aNy mO.... ahem.
So. There's that. What do you do with the idea once you have it and it won't go away? What if, and this is a big if, What if you like the idea? As in, cute little kitten or puppy "like" the idea? I've found one of the best things to do in that case is to hide around a corner until it sticks out it's little head and then BASH IT IN with a crowbar!
The idea!!!! Not the puppy or kitten!!! NEVER the puppy or kitten!!!! You MONSTER!!!!
Now that you've subdued the idea, it's time to shape it into what you want it to be. Whether that's a soul-stretching, heart-wrenching, teary-eyed horror novel, or a pulse-pounding, hair-raising, can't-sleep-without-the-lights-on romance comedy, or any other sort of compound-modifying hyphenated-verbing, run-on-sentencing goodness... is entirely up to you. It's your idea to inflict upon the world.
Let's dig into the meat on how you could go about the exercise of expanding and improving on that idea.
To be fair, some of these processes will work better for Outliners than they will for Pantsers. Others should work just as well for anyone. I'm not covering how to build your entire story, only how to go about brainstorming a single idea. Of course, that idea could be a character, plot point, scene, world, what have you.
The key to story brainstorming is to ask questions, and then keep on asking questions. The same principle questions we were all taught in Primary School. Who, What, Where, When, Why, and How. Take your idea and expand it by asking those questions. As for where you get the answers, there are a few avenues you can take. In all cases though, you should always consider looking past the first and obvious answer for a deeper, less expected answer.
And make notes (while you brainstorm, not while you read this post... unless you want to)! This is where I usually break out Scapple if I have my MacBook, or Google Keep if all I have is my phone.
Research
I used to think research was boring. Ok. In so many cases it still is. However! I've found that researching a topic that I'm genuinely interested in can be exciting. So much so that I've lost entire weeks worth of writing time digging into actual, real-live history research! I passed history in high-school with a 51%, exactly what I needed to never do it again!
That said, history isn't the only subject you can research. There's plenty of science, psychology, economics, and so many other things. I urge you to find reputable sources of information for any research you do. It's great to dig into something on the black hole that is Wikipedia, but make sure you source anything you intend to use. I'm not saying you need to put a bibliography at the end of your work (ugh). Just be warned that if you do put something that is both real and inaccurate into your story, people will call you on it.
Remember to take whatever you find and expand upon it even further by asking the principle questions, not only for how they fit the subject of the research, but for how it fits into your story.
Discussion
It never hurts to talk it out. I use this one all the time. My wife and kids hear about sticking points and ideas in my stories constantly. Often they don't even have to respond. Simply throwing it at them seems to help. That said, no one will find gaps or flaws you need to fix in an idea faster than someone who doesn't have a whole lot of context.
Try it. If they're paying attention, I guarantee no matter how much you explain it, they'll have some of those principle questions at the end. Those questions can be the grease that keeps your wheels turning.
A small caveat: One experiment I've tried that you may, or may not, want to avoid is picking a subject of debate and choosing a fixed and intentionally contrary point of view to present to people. Without proper framing and context, this can lead to some very heated arguments (which can still be good). Chances are you want the person you're discussing your idea with to still talk to you afterward.
Theft
Last week I covered some methods of kick-starting your idea engine (oooh, idea engines... sounds cool! I'm going to write that down). One of those methods involved theft. Theft is a fantastic way to expand upon an idea, but here you have to be careful, especially if you stole the idea in the first place. But as I always say: A little larceny is good for the soul. So let's work with theft.
You've got your idea. Find things that have something similar to that idea in it. If you stole the idea and you aren't intending to write fan fiction (and there's NOTHING wrong with writing fan fiction, it's a great way to exercise your writerly muscles), you should really look for similarities in something unrelated to your original source.
That doesn't mean you can't use the same source, but you're only making your work harder on yourself than it has to be. Oh! And comic books or adaptations/sources count as the SAME source, so no you can't claim that the Serenity comics are a different source than Firefly or the Serenity movie.
So, once you've found your source, dig in. Ingest a bunch of it, just like you did for finding the idea. Unlike that searching process, take notes on the ideas and tropes that flow through it. But try to stick to the points that directly relate to your idea, you don't want to steal more than you have to, or you're going to let someone else build your playground for you. You don't want that for an original work.
Then walk away from it and try to think of everything you loved and hated about it and write it down, but in this try to be non-specific.
For example: I've been watching a lot of Buffy and Angel on Netflix lately (I'm not justifying that here, Whedon is a master!). Taking the idea of "My main character is a monster hunter." my following lists could work for one or both.
Loved:
Tight-knit group of friends
Witty banter
Kick-ass fights (yes, they're cheesy, but fun)
Protagonist who just wants to be normal fighting against insurmountable odds
Real-life complications
Hated:
Chosen one
Destiny/Fate overtones
Whiny protagonist
Dumb predictable villains
Same old monsters
From that I get some pretty nice launching points that come back to the principle questions.
And so on.
Last but not least...
Blending
This is one of my personal favourites. Take two ideas from wherever it is you hide them, and mash them together to see how they taste. Without such a genius method of creation we wouldn't have the wonders of Dark Chocolate covered Pretzels, Dinobots, Firefly, Star Wars, or Jim Butcher's Codex Alera.
The ideas don't even need to be similar to be made into something fantastic. The total can absolutely be greater than the sum of its parts. It may take some work to get two (or more) things to fit together, and all things likely won't fit together without getting a little bit creative. But you're a writer. That's what you do.
I use some or all of the above methods to build on things before I start writing, while I'm writing, and sometimes just for fun. Whatever methods you use, always chase the answers deeper. That's how you make a unique and compelling story.
Let me know what methods you use to expand upon your ideas down in the comments.
-Alex
This is the third entry in a series of posts about my evolving writing process.
Walk it off.
As I've pointed out before, sometimes you can't shake the idea off. It sticks to you. It won't go away. It keeps you up at night, like a dryer that squeals because it's lost that little felt ring that stops the metal drum from rubbing against the housing as it goes around and around and around squeaking and squealing intermittently until you jUSt cAn'T TAkE iT aNy mO.... ahem.
So. There's that. What do you do with the idea once you have it and it won't go away? What if, and this is a big if, What if you like the idea? As in, cute little kitten or puppy "like" the idea? I've found one of the best things to do in that case is to hide around a corner until it sticks out it's little head and then BASH IT IN with a crowbar!
The idea!!!! Not the puppy or kitten!!! NEVER the puppy or kitten!!!! You MONSTER!!!!
Now that you've subdued the idea, it's time to shape it into what you want it to be. Whether that's a soul-stretching, heart-wrenching, teary-eyed horror novel, or a pulse-pounding, hair-raising, can't-sleep-without-the-lights-on romance comedy, or any other sort of compound-modifying hyphenated-verbing, run-on-sentencing goodness... is entirely up to you. It's your idea to inflict upon the world.
Let's dig into the meat on how you could go about the exercise of expanding and improving on that idea.
To be fair, some of these processes will work better for Outliners than they will for Pantsers. Others should work just as well for anyone. I'm not covering how to build your entire story, only how to go about brainstorming a single idea. Of course, that idea could be a character, plot point, scene, world, what have you.
The key to story brainstorming is to ask questions, and then keep on asking questions. The same principle questions we were all taught in Primary School. Who, What, Where, When, Why, and How. Take your idea and expand it by asking those questions. As for where you get the answers, there are a few avenues you can take. In all cases though, you should always consider looking past the first and obvious answer for a deeper, less expected answer.
And make notes (while you brainstorm, not while you read this post... unless you want to)! This is where I usually break out Scapple if I have my MacBook, or Google Keep if all I have is my phone.
Research
I used to think research was boring. Ok. In so many cases it still is. However! I've found that researching a topic that I'm genuinely interested in can be exciting. So much so that I've lost entire weeks worth of writing time digging into actual, real-live history research! I passed history in high-school with a 51%, exactly what I needed to never do it again!
That said, history isn't the only subject you can research. There's plenty of science, psychology, economics, and so many other things. I urge you to find reputable sources of information for any research you do. It's great to dig into something on the black hole that is Wikipedia, but make sure you source anything you intend to use. I'm not saying you need to put a bibliography at the end of your work (ugh). Just be warned that if you do put something that is both real and inaccurate into your story, people will call you on it.
Remember to take whatever you find and expand upon it even further by asking the principle questions, not only for how they fit the subject of the research, but for how it fits into your story.
Discussion
It never hurts to talk it out. I use this one all the time. My wife and kids hear about sticking points and ideas in my stories constantly. Often they don't even have to respond. Simply throwing it at them seems to help. That said, no one will find gaps or flaws you need to fix in an idea faster than someone who doesn't have a whole lot of context.
Try it. If they're paying attention, I guarantee no matter how much you explain it, they'll have some of those principle questions at the end. Those questions can be the grease that keeps your wheels turning.
A small caveat: One experiment I've tried that you may, or may not, want to avoid is picking a subject of debate and choosing a fixed and intentionally contrary point of view to present to people. Without proper framing and context, this can lead to some very heated arguments (which can still be good). Chances are you want the person you're discussing your idea with to still talk to you afterward.
Theft
Last week I covered some methods of kick-starting your idea engine (oooh, idea engines... sounds cool! I'm going to write that down). One of those methods involved theft. Theft is a fantastic way to expand upon an idea, but here you have to be careful, especially if you stole the idea in the first place. But as I always say: A little larceny is good for the soul. So let's work with theft.
You've got your idea. Find things that have something similar to that idea in it. If you stole the idea and you aren't intending to write fan fiction (and there's NOTHING wrong with writing fan fiction, it's a great way to exercise your writerly muscles), you should really look for similarities in something unrelated to your original source.
That doesn't mean you can't use the same source, but you're only making your work harder on yourself than it has to be. Oh! And comic books or adaptations/sources count as the SAME source, so no you can't claim that the Serenity comics are a different source than Firefly or the Serenity movie.
So, once you've found your source, dig in. Ingest a bunch of it, just like you did for finding the idea. Unlike that searching process, take notes on the ideas and tropes that flow through it. But try to stick to the points that directly relate to your idea, you don't want to steal more than you have to, or you're going to let someone else build your playground for you. You don't want that for an original work.
Then walk away from it and try to think of everything you loved and hated about it and write it down, but in this try to be non-specific.
For example: I've been watching a lot of Buffy and Angel on Netflix lately (I'm not justifying that here, Whedon is a master!). Taking the idea of "My main character is a monster hunter." my following lists could work for one or both.
Loved:
Tight-knit group of friends
Witty banter
Kick-ass fights (yes, they're cheesy, but fun)
Protagonist who just wants to be normal fighting against insurmountable odds
Real-life complications
Hated:
Chosen one
Destiny/Fate overtones
Whiny protagonist
Dumb predictable villains
Same old monsters
From that I get some pretty nice launching points that come back to the principle questions.
- Who are their friends?
- Where did they meet?
- Do their friends know what they do?
- What sort of conflict do these friendships create for the protagonist?
- What do they talk about?
- How do they fight?
- Where did they learn to fight?
- Are they good at fighting?
- What do they want to do with their life if it's not fighting monsters?
- What sort of hobbies do they have?
- If they're not a "chosen one" how did they end up a monster hunter?
- Why do they do it?
- Why don't they stop?
- What kind of monsters are they fighting?
- What special methods are needed to fight those monsters?
- Are they killing the monsters or trapping them?
- What do they do with them once they're killed/caught?
And so on.
Last but not least...
Blending
This is one of my personal favourites. Take two ideas from wherever it is you hide them, and mash them together to see how they taste. Without such a genius method of creation we wouldn't have the wonders of Dark Chocolate covered Pretzels, Dinobots, Firefly, Star Wars, or Jim Butcher's Codex Alera.
The ideas don't even need to be similar to be made into something fantastic. The total can absolutely be greater than the sum of its parts. It may take some work to get two (or more) things to fit together, and all things likely won't fit together without getting a little bit creative. But you're a writer. That's what you do.
I use some or all of the above methods to build on things before I start writing, while I'm writing, and sometimes just for fun. Whatever methods you use, always chase the answers deeper. That's how you make a unique and compelling story.
Let me know what methods you use to expand upon your ideas down in the comments.
-Alex
This is the third entry in a series of posts about my evolving writing process.
Friday, February 27, 2015
The Idea: Something from nothing.
It all starts with an idea. For me that means it can be a character, a scene, a theme, a line of dialog. You name it. That idea can be just about anything and can occur at any time. Which means it's usually in the shower, or while I'm driving, or in the wee hours of the morning when I'm supposed to be sleeping.
That idea is like a piece of sand caught by a clam... except I don't want to be a clam... how about the piece of grit at the heart of a raindrop... no, again, starting with dirt. It's like a random beautiful word, found in the heart of a dictionary, or one of those "word of the day" calendars... wow... NERD ALERT!
Anyway, it nags at me and needs me to do SOMETHING about it. So I'll turn it over in my head until I can write it down (where or how I write it down is very dependant on where I am and what I have available, see The tools I (mis)use).
Ok, so not all ideas are like that, but after it's written down I have one of two choices, dig into it now, or shelve it for later. The deciding factor is supposed to be whether or not I'm in the middle of writing something else. What it often ends up actually being is whether or not I can find some way to fit it into what I'm writing.
That's a key thing for me with "the idea". It doesn't wait for a decent time to show up. It doesn't wait for me to be sitting idly, daydreaming and wondering "What should I do next?". No. The idea is the drunken friend that calls me in the middle of the night, or shows up wearing nothing but a bathrobe and 3 days of unshaven, unwashed growth on their face smelling of stale beer and old cheese. The idea is inconsiderate of what I'm doing. It doesn't care whether or not now is a good time.
Basically, ideas are bastards. But they're my bastards, and I'll take them whenever and wherever they show up. Which is to say, often. I'll take them often. Because they never stop coming.
I'm never one to want for ideas. Writers block as it's depicted in movies and TV will likely never be my problem. Staying on track and moving forward with a single project to completion is... and not getting too caught up on my own insecurities is... but those are other stories.
However, if you're someone who struggles with finding an idea, there are a number of solutions. Want some suggestions?
Boredom!
You'd be amazed what going unplugged or simply letting your mind wander can do. Go primitive for a bit. No Twitter. No Facebook. No Wikipedia/Youtube/Tumblr black holes. Walk away from whatever is on those screens and get BORED. Let your mind wander. You'd be amazed what you can come up with.
Another option?
Theft!
It worked for Shakespeare! Even Star Wars (the original trilogy) is largely stolen from The Seven Samurai (which itself is based loosely on Japanese folklore), which of course also spawned The Magnificent Seven and about a bajillion other stories. Retellings are EVERYWHERE, and how obvious they are all depends on how good of a job the writer performing the retelling does at filing off the serial numbers and making it their own.
Chuck Palahniuk claims that Fight Club (the book) is a retelling of The Great Gatsby, and as someone who's read both, I certainly couldn't tell.
The key point to stealing an idea is to make it your own. Steal just the idea, not the entire plot, or cast of characters, or setting. You can steal the nuances of all of them to one degree or another, but the more you twist the original into your own thing, the better it will be for both you as a writer, and for your audience. But that's getting into brainstorming.
The last suggestion?
What if?
Simply put, take a situation, or technology, or existing story and ask the question What if...? I LOVED Marvel's What If? comics growing up. They took my favourite superheroes and asked often ridiculous questions. What if Spider-Man was more spider than man? What if certain heroes had been villains? etc. Many of their "What if?" scenarios intrigued them so much that they eventually became Marvel canon (Bruce Banner's brain in the Hulk's body...).
There are a few ways to go about this yourself. A technique I'd recommend, is to ingest a lot of information about something. Whether it's by reading a bunch of books (fiction or non-fiction), digging into some articles about new tech, binge watching a TV series, or reading an entire comic book run.
Whatever you do, just pack in a bunch of something if you can. Then ask the question: What if?
What if the heroes lost?
What if this technology was exploited for the best possible reasons?
What if this technology was exploited for the worst possible reasons?
What if this technology/product/cure was extremely effective/ineffective cheap/expensive safe/dangerous?
What if the government had made this ruling?
What if Indiana Jones had been a woman?
What if the radioactive spider had bitten Gwen Stacey instead of Peter Parker?
What if the apes/spiders/cats/tree frogs tried to rise up and take over the world?
Some of the BEST stories come out of that simple question. And it's a question you should continue to ask throughout the writing and revision process.
These are by no means the ONLY methods of generating ideas. They're just a starting point. But, you get the idea...
What are your techniques for generating ideas? Let me know in the comments.
- Alex
This is the second entry in a series of posts about my evolving writing process.
That idea is like a piece of sand caught by a clam... except I don't want to be a clam... how about the piece of grit at the heart of a raindrop... no, again, starting with dirt. It's like a random beautiful word, found in the heart of a dictionary, or one of those "word of the day" calendars... wow... NERD ALERT!
Anyway, it nags at me and needs me to do SOMETHING about it. So I'll turn it over in my head until I can write it down (where or how I write it down is very dependant on where I am and what I have available, see The tools I (mis)use).
Ok, so not all ideas are like that, but after it's written down I have one of two choices, dig into it now, or shelve it for later. The deciding factor is supposed to be whether or not I'm in the middle of writing something else. What it often ends up actually being is whether or not I can find some way to fit it into what I'm writing.
That's a key thing for me with "the idea". It doesn't wait for a decent time to show up. It doesn't wait for me to be sitting idly, daydreaming and wondering "What should I do next?". No. The idea is the drunken friend that calls me in the middle of the night, or shows up wearing nothing but a bathrobe and 3 days of unshaven, unwashed growth on their face smelling of stale beer and old cheese. The idea is inconsiderate of what I'm doing. It doesn't care whether or not now is a good time.
Basically, ideas are bastards. But they're my bastards, and I'll take them whenever and wherever they show up. Which is to say, often. I'll take them often. Because they never stop coming.
I'm never one to want for ideas. Writers block as it's depicted in movies and TV will likely never be my problem. Staying on track and moving forward with a single project to completion is... and not getting too caught up on my own insecurities is... but those are other stories.
However, if you're someone who struggles with finding an idea, there are a number of solutions. Want some suggestions?
Boredom!
You'd be amazed what going unplugged or simply letting your mind wander can do. Go primitive for a bit. No Twitter. No Facebook. No Wikipedia/Youtube/Tumblr black holes. Walk away from whatever is on those screens and get BORED. Let your mind wander. You'd be amazed what you can come up with.
Another option?
Theft!
It worked for Shakespeare! Even Star Wars (the original trilogy) is largely stolen from The Seven Samurai (which itself is based loosely on Japanese folklore), which of course also spawned The Magnificent Seven and about a bajillion other stories. Retellings are EVERYWHERE, and how obvious they are all depends on how good of a job the writer performing the retelling does at filing off the serial numbers and making it their own.
Chuck Palahniuk claims that Fight Club (the book) is a retelling of The Great Gatsby, and as someone who's read both, I certainly couldn't tell.
The key point to stealing an idea is to make it your own. Steal just the idea, not the entire plot, or cast of characters, or setting. You can steal the nuances of all of them to one degree or another, but the more you twist the original into your own thing, the better it will be for both you as a writer, and for your audience. But that's getting into brainstorming.
The last suggestion?
What if?
Simply put, take a situation, or technology, or existing story and ask the question What if...? I LOVED Marvel's What If? comics growing up. They took my favourite superheroes and asked often ridiculous questions. What if Spider-Man was more spider than man? What if certain heroes had been villains? etc. Many of their "What if?" scenarios intrigued them so much that they eventually became Marvel canon (Bruce Banner's brain in the Hulk's body...).
There are a few ways to go about this yourself. A technique I'd recommend, is to ingest a lot of information about something. Whether it's by reading a bunch of books (fiction or non-fiction), digging into some articles about new tech, binge watching a TV series, or reading an entire comic book run.
Whatever you do, just pack in a bunch of something if you can. Then ask the question: What if?
What if the heroes lost?
What if this technology was exploited for the best possible reasons?
What if this technology was exploited for the worst possible reasons?
What if this technology/product/cure was extremely effective/ineffective cheap/expensive safe/dangerous?
What if the government had made this ruling?
What if Indiana Jones had been a woman?
What if the radioactive spider had bitten Gwen Stacey instead of Peter Parker?
What if the apes/spiders/cats/tree frogs tried to rise up and take over the world?
Some of the BEST stories come out of that simple question. And it's a question you should continue to ask throughout the writing and revision process.
These are by no means the ONLY methods of generating ideas. They're just a starting point. But, you get the idea...
What are your techniques for generating ideas? Let me know in the comments.
- Alex
This is the second entry in a series of posts about my evolving writing process.
Wednesday, March 19, 2014
The Shatner Comma
As anyone who's ever read my writing pre-revision (or even after 3-4 passes of my own) can attest: I have a serious problem with Shatner Commas.
Let me explain first what a Shatner Comma is, and second, why I have such a problem with them.
Shatner Comma (n): Improperly placed commas that serve no grammatical purpose and thwart the rules of proper punctuation. They instruct the reader to take unnatural and illogical pauses, much in the way William Shatner so famously delivered his lines in Star Trek (TOS).
Why do I have such a problem with them? Because I was instructed (as were most people) to put commas where I would naturally pause in speech. That's right, I pause frequently and illogically in my regular everyday speech. In my case it isn't something I do to create a sense of drama. As best I can tell the problem traces back to my childhood stutter.
To be clear, my stutter wasn't as horrible as in The King's Speech, and I wasn't endlessly teased for it (though I was dreadfully self-conscious about it).
I reminisced about it recently with my grandmother and she recalled that even at the age of 7 I worked endlessly to eliminate it. I'd sit playing on her living room floor reciting and repeating any sentence or word that I'd stuttered on until I had it silky smooth, at least so far as the stutters were concerned.
In their place came the pauses. To give my brain time to work around the hitch I think I subconsciously inserted a pause. That pause lingers to this day.
I spent many a Saturday morning on that same floor at my grandmother's watching re-runs of Star Trek:TOS, so maybe a bit of Shatner's delayed speech and odd timing crept in as well. We'll never know.
With the help of my Critique Partners and a LOT of hard work I'm edging towardseliminating reducing the Shatner Comma from my writing, but I can make no guarantees. As for the pause in my speech? It lingers to this day though I'm working to lessen it now that I'm fully aware of it. And it wasn't a cure-all for my stutter, which can still be found in diminished capacity any time I get overly excited about something.
Let me explain first what a Shatner Comma is, and second, why I have such a problem with them.
Shatner Comma (n): Improperly placed commas that serve no grammatical purpose and thwart the rules of proper punctuation. They instruct the reader to take unnatural and illogical pauses, much in the way William Shatner so famously delivered his lines in Star Trek (TOS).
Why do I have such a problem with them? Because I was instructed (as were most people) to put commas where I would naturally pause in speech. That's right, I pause frequently and illogically in my regular everyday speech. In my case it isn't something I do to create a sense of drama. As best I can tell the problem traces back to my childhood stutter.
To be clear, my stutter wasn't as horrible as in The King's Speech, and I wasn't endlessly teased for it (though I was dreadfully self-conscious about it).
I reminisced about it recently with my grandmother and she recalled that even at the age of 7 I worked endlessly to eliminate it. I'd sit playing on her living room floor reciting and repeating any sentence or word that I'd stuttered on until I had it silky smooth, at least so far as the stutters were concerned.
In their place came the pauses. To give my brain time to work around the hitch I think I subconsciously inserted a pause. That pause lingers to this day.
I spent many a Saturday morning on that same floor at my grandmother's watching re-runs of Star Trek:TOS, so maybe a bit of Shatner's delayed speech and odd timing crept in as well. We'll never know.
With the help of my Critique Partners and a LOT of hard work I'm edging towards
Thursday, January 2, 2014
The Movie List (Updated)
I keep a movie list on the site, ranking theatrically released movies I've seen through a calendar year. 2013 is now locked in (and there are still 2013 movies I'd like to see) and 2014's list has begun.
Have a quick peek and let me know if I missed any major movies coming out in 2014 (that you think would fit my tastes based on the lists that are there).
A quick note on my number 1 movie of 2013: Pacific Rim
It wasn't the most plausible story. Giant physics defying robots fighting giant physics defying monsters. It required a good deal of suspension of disbelief, which is something I'm quite adept at (thank you Star Wars and Star Trek). There were plot holes (though not any showstoppers). There was some scenery chewing (looking at you Idris Elba and Max Martini) but it was AWESOME scenery chewing.
But here's the point: I had a BLAST watching it (IMAX 3D helped I'm sure). It was quite simply the most fun I've had watching a movie in theatres in a LONG time (and I see a LOT of movies in theatres that are good fun). I got invested in the characters and their struggles. That's what it takes to make #1.
Happy New Year, let's make 2014 fun.
Have a quick peek and let me know if I missed any major movies coming out in 2014 (that you think would fit my tastes based on the lists that are there).
A quick note on my number 1 movie of 2013: Pacific Rim
It wasn't the most plausible story. Giant physics defying robots fighting giant physics defying monsters. It required a good deal of suspension of disbelief, which is something I'm quite adept at (thank you Star Wars and Star Trek). There were plot holes (though not any showstoppers). There was some scenery chewing (looking at you Idris Elba and Max Martini) but it was AWESOME scenery chewing.
But here's the point: I had a BLAST watching it (IMAX 3D helped I'm sure). It was quite simply the most fun I've had watching a movie in theatres in a LONG time (and I see a LOT of movies in theatres that are good fun). I got invested in the characters and their struggles. That's what it takes to make #1.
Happy New Year, let's make 2014 fun.
Wednesday, November 14, 2012
Like a Madman!
Work has been driving me barmy lately. Between the nightmare of dealing with Windows platforms integrating with Linux NFS WatchFolders and other platforms integrating with those Windows platforms I could just about lose my mind.
I spend at a minimum 6 of my 8 hour workday up to my eyeballs in configurations, log files, xml traces, and metadata, then I spend at least 3 hours a day commuting to and from my job. It's a wonder I have any time to write at all.
The key is, I make time. In the evening, after my kids are in bed, and my wife is gently tucked into her Pandaren in World of Warcraft, or Facebook, or Pinterest, I shut down my browser, put on my headphones and write.
I started behind the 8-ball on NaNoWriMo but I'm slowly and steadily catching up. I even took a night off for Skyfall (go see it) and I'm still gaining ground.
Tonight I hit ~70K words on my draft. I started November at 50,000 words even on the draft. I went so far as to change a few wordings here and there to make it even out so I could do NaNo and keep on track with minimal math. I'm supposed to be at 73,333, putting me 3,333 behind, which is far better than the ~7K hole I've been climbing out of.
So anyone out there who's having trouble catching up on their NaNo. Sit your butt in the chair and shut down your browser. Disconnect your internet (turn off wi-fi or unplug it) if you must. If I can do it with only 2 hours a day, then you should be able to.
- Grimm
P.S. Natalie Bahm and her agent Sara Megibow are running a promotional contest on her book The Secret Underground with all the profits going to help a sick baby boy named Jayden. The contest is simple, comment on the contest blog post for a chance to win a 50 page critique by Sara Megibow (agent extraordinaire) on a finished or unfinished manuscript (yours or your friend's).
While you're at it, buy the book, the cause is most definitely worth it and from what I gather it's a damned good book (I haven't received my copy yet).
I spend at a minimum 6 of my 8 hour workday up to my eyeballs in configurations, log files, xml traces, and metadata, then I spend at least 3 hours a day commuting to and from my job. It's a wonder I have any time to write at all.
The key is, I make time. In the evening, after my kids are in bed, and my wife is gently tucked into her Pandaren in World of Warcraft, or Facebook, or Pinterest, I shut down my browser, put on my headphones and write.
I started behind the 8-ball on NaNoWriMo but I'm slowly and steadily catching up. I even took a night off for Skyfall (go see it) and I'm still gaining ground.
Tonight I hit ~70K words on my draft. I started November at 50,000 words even on the draft. I went so far as to change a few wordings here and there to make it even out so I could do NaNo and keep on track with minimal math. I'm supposed to be at 73,333, putting me 3,333 behind, which is far better than the ~7K hole I've been climbing out of.
So anyone out there who's having trouble catching up on their NaNo. Sit your butt in the chair and shut down your browser. Disconnect your internet (turn off wi-fi or unplug it) if you must. If I can do it with only 2 hours a day, then you should be able to.
- Grimm
P.S. Natalie Bahm and her agent Sara Megibow are running a promotional contest on her book The Secret Underground with all the profits going to help a sick baby boy named Jayden. The contest is simple, comment on the contest blog post for a chance to win a 50 page critique by Sara Megibow (agent extraordinaire) on a finished or unfinished manuscript (yours or your friend's).
While you're at it, buy the book, the cause is most definitely worth it and from what I gather it's a damned good book (I haven't received my copy yet).
Monday, November 12, 2012
Skyfall (and some writing)
I've been looking forward to Skyfall for over a year now. Pretty much as soon as I heard that Daniel Craig was in for Bond 23 I was all over it, watching for any tidbits of news. When Miramax ran into financial trouble I was seriously worried about whether or not it would even get made.
I've been a fan of the Bond films since my first encounter with 007 as a child at my grandparents. Sean Connery in Thunderball was on late night TV and I opted to watch that instead of getting a good night's sleep like I was supposed to. I had no idea that it was a "Bond" movie, or even what that was, or that there were so many more to see. Needless to say I loved it, and over the years I've seen every Bond film ever made, even the unofficial ones as bad as they are.
My favourite Bond for the majority of my life was Connery, whether it was because he was the first I'd seen (despite there being 4 bonds before I was born!) or because he was simply the best I couldn't say (though I'm going to go with the latter, even if his last 2 movies as Bond are some of my least favourite).
Brosnan was good fun, and I enjoyed Goldeneye and Tomorrow Never Dies immensely. I enjoyed watching Denise Richards in The World Is Not Enough, even if her acting was flat. I had a huge crush on her at the time. Die Another Day, however, almost made me quit the franchise. It was just too... goofy I guess.
When Daniel Craig stepped into the role for Casino Royale I had just finished devouring all of Fleming's books, and pulpy as they were, I was hoping for a Bond that could reach their potential. A cold-hearted, yet human 007. Craig delivered.
He was hard, yet not impervious, he was funny, without losing his edge, he was a lady killer, without looking like a pretty-boy. This was my Bond.
Quantum of Solace, yeah, I actually really liked it. So sue me! When you take into account that the whole thing was nearly improv because of the writer's strike, they actually managed to fit a lot of neat call-outs in there.
Skyfall (I know, I'm long winded, bear with me) is the penultimate Bond movie in my books. It's got everything a great movie needs. Action, Suspense, one HELL of a story, and my favourite Bond in his best performance.
I don't want to ruin anything, but some of the stuff that gets pulled out in this movie to tie it in with the past, add in Dame Judi Dench as M and the powerful relationship she's cultivated with Craig's Bond over the previous movies and this one, and it's all so far beyond amazing that I have every desire to rush back to the theatre, hand them my money and watch it again and again.
The pacing is perfect, the twists are just the right amount of "I saw that coming" and "OMG I never saw that coming" and Javier Bardem as the villain Silva is bloody awesome!
The chemistry between Silva and Bond and M on screen is simply electric. It blew me away.
So, as you can imagine, it's made #1 on The List, just edging out The Avengers. With only The Hobbit or Django Unchained left having the potential to unseat it this year. I don't know that that's going to happen.
Oh right, writing, about that. I busted out a nice run on words today (~2,600), after slumping the past few days between clipping the puppy's nails too close and having a veritable fount of blood in my kitchen (no really, who needs corn syrup and red food colouring for a horror movie? Just cut one of my puppy's toenails too close!) and a nice head cold (still have it, yay!).
I've been a fan of the Bond films since my first encounter with 007 as a child at my grandparents. Sean Connery in Thunderball was on late night TV and I opted to watch that instead of getting a good night's sleep like I was supposed to. I had no idea that it was a "Bond" movie, or even what that was, or that there were so many more to see. Needless to say I loved it, and over the years I've seen every Bond film ever made, even the unofficial ones as bad as they are.
My favourite Bond for the majority of my life was Connery, whether it was because he was the first I'd seen (despite there being 4 bonds before I was born!) or because he was simply the best I couldn't say (though I'm going to go with the latter, even if his last 2 movies as Bond are some of my least favourite).
Brosnan was good fun, and I enjoyed Goldeneye and Tomorrow Never Dies immensely. I enjoyed watching Denise Richards in The World Is Not Enough, even if her acting was flat. I had a huge crush on her at the time. Die Another Day, however, almost made me quit the franchise. It was just too... goofy I guess.
When Daniel Craig stepped into the role for Casino Royale I had just finished devouring all of Fleming's books, and pulpy as they were, I was hoping for a Bond that could reach their potential. A cold-hearted, yet human 007. Craig delivered.
He was hard, yet not impervious, he was funny, without losing his edge, he was a lady killer, without looking like a pretty-boy. This was my Bond.
Quantum of Solace, yeah, I actually really liked it. So sue me! When you take into account that the whole thing was nearly improv because of the writer's strike, they actually managed to fit a lot of neat call-outs in there.
Skyfall (I know, I'm long winded, bear with me) is the penultimate Bond movie in my books. It's got everything a great movie needs. Action, Suspense, one HELL of a story, and my favourite Bond in his best performance.
I don't want to ruin anything, but some of the stuff that gets pulled out in this movie to tie it in with the past, add in Dame Judi Dench as M and the powerful relationship she's cultivated with Craig's Bond over the previous movies and this one, and it's all so far beyond amazing that I have every desire to rush back to the theatre, hand them my money and watch it again and again.
The pacing is perfect, the twists are just the right amount of "I saw that coming" and "OMG I never saw that coming" and Javier Bardem as the villain Silva is bloody awesome!
The chemistry between Silva and Bond and M on screen is simply electric. It blew me away.
So, as you can imagine, it's made #1 on The List, just edging out The Avengers. With only The Hobbit or Django Unchained left having the potential to unseat it this year. I don't know that that's going to happen.
Oh right, writing, about that. I busted out a nice run on words today (~2,600), after slumping the past few days between clipping the puppy's nails too close and having a veritable fount of blood in my kitchen (no really, who needs corn syrup and red food colouring for a horror movie? Just cut one of my puppy's toenails too close!) and a nice head cold (still have it, yay!).
Tuesday, November 6, 2012
Secondary vs Tertiary Characters and the Princess Bride
I spent what time I had for writing this evening getting out half a scene with a secondary character. This character will only show up twice in the entire book, but I think she's going to be pretty memorable, and I really like how she's turning out.
That's the thing with secondary characters, they can't be a cardboard cut-outs or props. To me that's a Tertiary character, the type that doesn't have anything to say, or any motivations beyond ,"Hot dogs, get your red-hots." as far as the plot is concerned. There's certainly a place for that sort of character, the stand-in.
But in my not nearly as humble as it should be opinion, secondary characters should be fully realized and if not necessarily memorable, at the very least believable.
Think Miracle Max in The Princess Bride (we'll go with the movie). William Goldman could have easily written a throw away scene of someone performing CPR on Westley after the Pit of Despair, or Billy Crystal could technically have phoned that character in and gotten away with it. It would have made for a much less memorable part in a much less memorable film (or book if you want to discuss the book).
Instead, Goldman opted for a truly memorable secondary character, and not just with Miracle Max, but every secondary character, from the torturer, to the old King are all wonderfully realized (with a good bit of camp, but it fit the story perfectly).
That's how I want my secondary characters to be (albeit with less light-heartedness in this particular book). I want them to be memorable and true to the story, and I really didn't feel that was 100% necessary until I was working on this one. Of course that means I'll have to pick up some slack on the next pass and figure out exactly which characters fit secondary vs tertiary, but that's what revisions are for.
What are your thoughts on secondary characters? Do you like to flesh out as many as you can or do you leave them as stand-ins/tertiary characters unless they're truly needed?
- Grimm
P.S. Surpassed my #NaNoWriMo/#NaNoFiMo word quote for the second night running. Shouldn't have too much trouble catching up to where I'm supposed to be.
That's the thing with secondary characters, they can't be a cardboard cut-outs or props. To me that's a Tertiary character, the type that doesn't have anything to say, or any motivations beyond ,"Hot dogs, get your red-hots." as far as the plot is concerned. There's certainly a place for that sort of character, the stand-in.
But in my not nearly as humble as it should be opinion, secondary characters should be fully realized and if not necessarily memorable, at the very least believable.
Think Miracle Max in The Princess Bride (we'll go with the movie). William Goldman could have easily written a throw away scene of someone performing CPR on Westley after the Pit of Despair, or Billy Crystal could technically have phoned that character in and gotten away with it. It would have made for a much less memorable part in a much less memorable film (or book if you want to discuss the book).
Instead, Goldman opted for a truly memorable secondary character, and not just with Miracle Max, but every secondary character, from the torturer, to the old King are all wonderfully realized (with a good bit of camp, but it fit the story perfectly).
That's how I want my secondary characters to be (albeit with less light-heartedness in this particular book). I want them to be memorable and true to the story, and I really didn't feel that was 100% necessary until I was working on this one. Of course that means I'll have to pick up some slack on the next pass and figure out exactly which characters fit secondary vs tertiary, but that's what revisions are for.
What are your thoughts on secondary characters? Do you like to flesh out as many as you can or do you leave them as stand-ins/tertiary characters unless they're truly needed?
- Grimm
P.S. Surpassed my #NaNoWriMo/#NaNoFiMo word quote for the second night running. Shouldn't have too much trouble catching up to where I'm supposed to be.
Monday, October 22, 2012
A nice day for writing.
Ah, I got to sleep in today, which was nice.
We dropped the kids off at my in-laws last night and went to see Seven Psychopaths. It was a fantastic movie and made #2 on my Movie List for the year. If you saw and liked In Bruges (and you really really should), then you'll love Seven Psychopaths. Conversely, if you've seen Seven Psychopaths and liked it, check out In Bruges. Colin Ferrel plays a screenwriter suffering from writers block, and the character is written and acted superbly.
After the kids got home we went to hockey practice, where I backed my car into someone's van and left a note. They seemed reasonably pleasant when they called me, hopefully it doesn't cost a small fortune to repaint a bumper. Still, there was no screaming or swearing on the phone.
I spent my first hour of writing time helping my oldest daughter with homework (computer problems were slowing her down), then sent her off to bed.
Needless to say, when I sat down to write with my cup of tea it was nice and relaxing and exactly what I needed. I've written just over 3000 words in 2 hours.
Tonight I pushed this draft into the Third Act, crossing that barrier in the space of roughly a chapter and a half where my protagonist goes from constantly reacting to the world around him to being proactive. It'll need some cleaning for sure, but I think I've pulled it off convincingly where character motivation is concerned.
Hook Line and Sinker enters into its Third Round tomorrow morning, I can't wait to see how the YA section goes. I've been following it closely and it's getting down to the most thrilling part (for me anyway). I hope to see some fantastic "I found an Agent through #HLandS" stories in the coming weeks. I always love to read those. It gives me hope.
Well, it's past midnight here, and I have to commute to work in the morning, so I should trundle off to bed. Yes, I trundle when I'm tired.
- Grimm
We dropped the kids off at my in-laws last night and went to see Seven Psychopaths. It was a fantastic movie and made #2 on my Movie List for the year. If you saw and liked In Bruges (and you really really should), then you'll love Seven Psychopaths. Conversely, if you've seen Seven Psychopaths and liked it, check out In Bruges. Colin Ferrel plays a screenwriter suffering from writers block, and the character is written and acted superbly.
After the kids got home we went to hockey practice, where I backed my car into someone's van and left a note. They seemed reasonably pleasant when they called me, hopefully it doesn't cost a small fortune to repaint a bumper. Still, there was no screaming or swearing on the phone.
I spent my first hour of writing time helping my oldest daughter with homework (computer problems were slowing her down), then sent her off to bed.
Needless to say, when I sat down to write with my cup of tea it was nice and relaxing and exactly what I needed. I've written just over 3000 words in 2 hours.
Tonight I pushed this draft into the Third Act, crossing that barrier in the space of roughly a chapter and a half where my protagonist goes from constantly reacting to the world around him to being proactive. It'll need some cleaning for sure, but I think I've pulled it off convincingly where character motivation is concerned.
Hook Line and Sinker enters into its Third Round tomorrow morning, I can't wait to see how the YA section goes. I've been following it closely and it's getting down to the most thrilling part (for me anyway). I hope to see some fantastic "I found an Agent through #HLandS" stories in the coming weeks. I always love to read those. It gives me hope.
Well, it's past midnight here, and I have to commute to work in the morning, so I should trundle off to bed. Yes, I trundle when I'm tired.
- Grimm
Monday, October 8, 2012
Lessons worth learning, and Looper.
There's a blog post on another blog that I've started to follow recently, and it says some things I've taken to heart on this revision perfectly. I won't repeat them fully here, just go read them there.
Hook Line and Sinker is kicking off, and it looks like a fantastic opportunity for some new writers. I'm not eligible currently because I don't have a complete manuscript, but I applaud the efforts of Kat Ellis and Dee to get new writers and agents looking for writers pointed squarely at each other in such an entertaining manner. I intend to follow the full proceedings.
My work on BookB is coming along quite well, put a full chapter to bed tonight, despite a later start (of course, that means I've got a late finish too). This blog post isn't putting me to bed any earlier either, and it's my morning to get up and make breakfast on this fine long weekend. Besides, I think my wife is catching this nasty sinus cold that's just starting to go away on me, and since I gave it to her, I might let her sleep in tomorrow.
One thing that keeps nagging at me is that I don't know if my chapters are standard chapter length, if such a thing exists, or a little on the short side. Granted, Douglas Adams had a single sentence chapter in HHGTTG, but the man was a genius and could get away with damned near anything by making you laugh about it. Never having taken any actual writing courses or spoken with an editor on the subject, I don't know what the unspoken "chapter length" rules are. I guess I'll look into it.
Looper.
So after a misfire in trying to see it last week, we got out to see it last night. I enjoyed it a great deal in the theatre, I'm a fan of Rian Johnson's other movie Brick, and though I've yet to see The Brothers Bloom it is on my "must watch" list.
I came out of it with some confusing issues with some of its use of time travel (spoiler it's a time travel movie...). I think it stands as a testament to the movie, its cast, cinematography, and overall plot that my brain simply won't let go of those issues and keeps trying to argue and find solutions for them. I've almost convinced myself that all of the "issues" I had with the time travel, were in fact not issues at all and perhaps I was just too thick to catch onto the "why" of things at the time. Perhaps I have only begun to work it all out in hindsight.
Yeah, that must be it.
Regardless, critics are raving about it, my friends are raving about it, I'm raving about it and I'm arguing with my wife and myself about it. Go see it, it's a fantastic movie!
Hook Line and Sinker is kicking off, and it looks like a fantastic opportunity for some new writers. I'm not eligible currently because I don't have a complete manuscript, but I applaud the efforts of Kat Ellis and Dee to get new writers and agents looking for writers pointed squarely at each other in such an entertaining manner. I intend to follow the full proceedings.
My work on BookB is coming along quite well, put a full chapter to bed tonight, despite a later start (of course, that means I've got a late finish too). This blog post isn't putting me to bed any earlier either, and it's my morning to get up and make breakfast on this fine long weekend. Besides, I think my wife is catching this nasty sinus cold that's just starting to go away on me, and since I gave it to her, I might let her sleep in tomorrow.
One thing that keeps nagging at me is that I don't know if my chapters are standard chapter length, if such a thing exists, or a little on the short side. Granted, Douglas Adams had a single sentence chapter in HHGTTG, but the man was a genius and could get away with damned near anything by making you laugh about it. Never having taken any actual writing courses or spoken with an editor on the subject, I don't know what the unspoken "chapter length" rules are. I guess I'll look into it.
Looper.
So after a misfire in trying to see it last week, we got out to see it last night. I enjoyed it a great deal in the theatre, I'm a fan of Rian Johnson's other movie Brick, and though I've yet to see The Brothers Bloom it is on my "must watch" list.
I came out of it with some confusing issues with some of its use of time travel (spoiler it's a time travel movie...). I think it stands as a testament to the movie, its cast, cinematography, and overall plot that my brain simply won't let go of those issues and keeps trying to argue and find solutions for them. I've almost convinced myself that all of the "issues" I had with the time travel, were in fact not issues at all and perhaps I was just too thick to catch onto the "why" of things at the time. Perhaps I have only begun to work it all out in hindsight.
Yeah, that must be it.
Regardless, critics are raving about it, my friends are raving about it, I'm raving about it and I'm arguing with my wife and myself about it. Go see it, it's a fantastic movie!
Thursday, September 27, 2012
Coming along nicely, nicely, nicely, whoops!
I've wrapped up a few chapters in the last two nights. As I closed off this last one I realized that my outline from here on isn't anywhere near as detailed as it was leading up to this point until I get to the finale. The balance of time between the viewpoint characters is terribly lopsided, and I have a LOT (and I really mean a LOT) of the Third Act to flesh out.
About that. The Three Act Structure, it's a common theme used in movies and books, and generally iterates between separate levels of story. In a trilogy, that pinnacle of modern story-telling you end up with a Twelve Act Structure. Look, it works, follow me on the math here:
Book 1 = 3 Acts. Book 2 = 3 Acts. Book 3 = 3 Acts. Therefore Book 1 + Book 2 + Book 3 = 9 Acts correct?
Now consider that there's a larger structure. Book 1 = Act 1, Book 2 = Act 2, Book 3 = Act 3. Those Three Acts added onto the previous Nine gives you a Twelve Act structure.
Alright, now that I'm done boosting word count on my blog with pointless mathematics, here's my take on the Three Act Structure.
Act 1: The Setup (A New Hope). This is where you set the overall stage. You can build characters backgrounds and competence and set the overall story up. They may even try to resolve the main problem, but they will fail, which leads into...
Act 2: Where Everything Goes to 11 (Empire Strikes Back). This is where you ramp up the tension and start picking up steam. Your characters start learning some lessons, picking themselves up off the floor a bit and making some progress only to have it all come crashing down at the end and driving straight into...
Act 3: The Ceiling Comes In (Return of the Jedi). This is the final Act, the crescendo if you will. This is where everything goes catastrophically wrong and forces the characters to take the initiative and go beyond. If your characters have been passive up until this point, this is where the rubber meets the road, and just about any other metaphor you can throw out there for that ultimate last push that wins the day.
To summarize, I think Howard Taylor said it best on Writing Excuses:
Act 1: Chase the heroes up the tree.
Act 2: Throw stones at them.
Act 3: Cut down the tree.
So, I need to flesh out my outline for the Third Act as it was the part most devastated by this revision. I spent about an hour getting started on that this evening. My mindmap has enough cross-node links on it at this point that it's starting to resemble a fractal. I can only hope I'm not tearing any new holes in my plot that I'll have to clean up in the next pass. I'm sure I'll let you know!
Alpha Readers: I don't have anything too new for you just yet. I want to finish this run on the main viewpoint character then I'll make some selections for you all to go over that won't give too much away just yet. I have a choice scene in mind right now that I think you'll either enjoy or roll your eyes at.
- Grimm
About that. The Three Act Structure, it's a common theme used in movies and books, and generally iterates between separate levels of story. In a trilogy, that pinnacle of modern story-telling you end up with a Twelve Act Structure. Look, it works, follow me on the math here:
Book 1 = 3 Acts. Book 2 = 3 Acts. Book 3 = 3 Acts. Therefore Book 1 + Book 2 + Book 3 = 9 Acts correct?
Now consider that there's a larger structure. Book 1 = Act 1, Book 2 = Act 2, Book 3 = Act 3. Those Three Acts added onto the previous Nine gives you a Twelve Act structure.
Alright, now that I'm done boosting word count on my blog with pointless mathematics, here's my take on the Three Act Structure.
Act 1: The Setup (A New Hope). This is where you set the overall stage. You can build characters backgrounds and competence and set the overall story up. They may even try to resolve the main problem, but they will fail, which leads into...
Act 2: Where Everything Goes to 11 (Empire Strikes Back). This is where you ramp up the tension and start picking up steam. Your characters start learning some lessons, picking themselves up off the floor a bit and making some progress only to have it all come crashing down at the end and driving straight into...
Act 3: The Ceiling Comes In (Return of the Jedi). This is the final Act, the crescendo if you will. This is where everything goes catastrophically wrong and forces the characters to take the initiative and go beyond. If your characters have been passive up until this point, this is where the rubber meets the road, and just about any other metaphor you can throw out there for that ultimate last push that wins the day.
To summarize, I think Howard Taylor said it best on Writing Excuses:
Act 1: Chase the heroes up the tree.
Act 2: Throw stones at them.
Act 3: Cut down the tree.
So, I need to flesh out my outline for the Third Act as it was the part most devastated by this revision. I spent about an hour getting started on that this evening. My mindmap has enough cross-node links on it at this point that it's starting to resemble a fractal. I can only hope I'm not tearing any new holes in my plot that I'll have to clean up in the next pass. I'm sure I'll let you know!
Alpha Readers: I don't have anything too new for you just yet. I want to finish this run on the main viewpoint character then I'll make some selections for you all to go over that won't give too much away just yet. I have a choice scene in mind right now that I think you'll either enjoy or roll your eyes at.
- Grimm
Saturday, September 22, 2012
Dredd
Saw Dredd tonight, so I haven't gotten a whole lot of writing done. Still working on that character building scene. I'm trying to make sure it stays clean and fluid while still doing it's job, it may take a few good hard edits to make it right, but it's getting written.
As for Dredd. Now this is the Judge Dredd movie I've been waiting for! Not that I was explicitly waiting for a Judge Dredd movie after the Stallone mess, after that I would have been happy if Hollywood never touched the property again. This Judge Dredd movie? I'll take a few more thanks!
Karl Urban knows Judge Dredd, you can tell by his delivery of the character and the insistance that he keeps the helmet on throughout. He plays on Dredd's one note, black and white moral code perfectly. There is no middle ground, there is no room for negotiations, or plea bargains, or mercy. There is right, and wrong, and if you're in the wrong, you get served justice. It was perfectly in line with what the comic book Dredd was when he was at his best.
The movie is gritty, gory, a little melodramatic, and has just the right amount of good cheese (and not of the "groan" Rob Schneider variety either). No one phoned in a performance, and no one overacted, which was a HUGE problem with the Stallone version.
Best of all, they did what so many said they couldn't: They pulled off the sheer scale of Mega City One. Every exterior shot brought the point home that this was a sprawling hot mess of an ultra-megalopolis (take that Sim City!).
I would happily pay to see a sequel.
Anyway, tomorrow should be a good writing night. I've updated my word count with what I did tonight (about 800 words give or take).
- Grimm
As for Dredd. Now this is the Judge Dredd movie I've been waiting for! Not that I was explicitly waiting for a Judge Dredd movie after the Stallone mess, after that I would have been happy if Hollywood never touched the property again. This Judge Dredd movie? I'll take a few more thanks!
Karl Urban knows Judge Dredd, you can tell by his delivery of the character and the insistance that he keeps the helmet on throughout. He plays on Dredd's one note, black and white moral code perfectly. There is no middle ground, there is no room for negotiations, or plea bargains, or mercy. There is right, and wrong, and if you're in the wrong, you get served justice. It was perfectly in line with what the comic book Dredd was when he was at his best.
The movie is gritty, gory, a little melodramatic, and has just the right amount of good cheese (and not of the "groan" Rob Schneider variety either). No one phoned in a performance, and no one overacted, which was a HUGE problem with the Stallone version.
Best of all, they did what so many said they couldn't: They pulled off the sheer scale of Mega City One. Every exterior shot brought the point home that this was a sprawling hot mess of an ultra-megalopolis (take that Sim City!).
I would happily pay to see a sequel.
Anyway, tomorrow should be a good writing night. I've updated my word count with what I did tonight (about 800 words give or take).
- Grimm
Sunday, August 12, 2012
Back at it.
Ok, so I'm working to kick off the blues that have been troubling my writing and just getting in there and doing it.
Tonight went fairly well, I've given my Alpha Readers two new(ish) chapters to dig into, completed a quick pass on another chapter, and written a third of another chapter, all in about an hour and a half. See, even if I have limited time, I can get something done.
I had to tweak a bit of my outline as well since the piece I'm writing through now is a little different from when I first outlined it (hey, I can get away with that!), I'm considering it part of the iterative process, which will hopefully settle a bit as I get this thing closer to submission shape. I don't want to be performing full re-writes on every pass :)
Something that helped me kick the blues was the company of good friends and my Wonderful Wife over this past weekend. They did a great job distracting me and hanging out with me at the movies yesterday for Total Recall and The Bourne Legacy.
You see, movies and books are kinda my thing, they're my favourite way to spend money and time besides my kids and my writing. I'd easily pass up a party or a night playing video games to go to a movie or read a good book. It's all about gathering stories, I love them in any form (even in my video games, my favourite games of all time are all very heavy on story, even if they're not great ones).
That said, when it comes to movies, I can be pretty forgiving of many things that would bother me to no end in a book, so I can completely love a movie that others would find appalling.
I've seen reviews for Total Recall on the web, and a lot of people just don't seem to like it, which I just don't get. I enjoyed it thoroughly, start to finish it was a fun ride. I have to ask myself, what were people expecting when they went to see it? Good science?!?! A deep and engaging plot?!?! Have they seen the original?
I thought it was brilliantly done, with just the right amount of subtle (and not so subtle) call outs to fans of the original. It was a theme by theme reboot, while still keeping me engaged and thoroughly happy. They even managed to surprise me in a few places, which was a nice touch.
As for Bourne Legacy, it was perfect for the first two acts, lots of pseudo-science with just enough believability to suck me in, and some great character moments and fun fight scenes. Renner and Weisz played their roles perfectly, Ed Norton was actually a bit of a disappointment at times, but nothing too distracting.
My issues with the third act, without giving any spoilers, was the flatness of the big bad. I mean, most stories (in movies and in books) can easily suffer from the villain being a stronger character than the hero, well, I think they solved that problem in this movie. They could have just as easily (though possibly not as plausibly) pulled in one of the police bots from Total Recall to fill the role of the big bad and kept the same level of character.
Previous movies had Clive Owen and Karl Urban to play the big bads, and they were rich and deep, even within their limited roles. You believed they were people outside of the scenes you saw them in. It's something I believe to be important in all stories, that the characters feel like they have something outside of their small piece to play.
It was a bit of a let down, but I didn't feel like I'd been robbed of my money, it was still worth the price of admission.
I'm going to find a way to get a "Top 10" list of movies for the year posted on this blog, and I'll update it as I see movies, more for the self satisfaction of having a list with rankings than because I think anyone will care.
Yeah, I'll do that. At some point.
- Grimm
Tonight went fairly well, I've given my Alpha Readers two new(ish) chapters to dig into, completed a quick pass on another chapter, and written a third of another chapter, all in about an hour and a half. See, even if I have limited time, I can get something done.
I had to tweak a bit of my outline as well since the piece I'm writing through now is a little different from when I first outlined it (hey, I can get away with that!), I'm considering it part of the iterative process, which will hopefully settle a bit as I get this thing closer to submission shape. I don't want to be performing full re-writes on every pass :)
Something that helped me kick the blues was the company of good friends and my Wonderful Wife over this past weekend. They did a great job distracting me and hanging out with me at the movies yesterday for Total Recall and The Bourne Legacy.
You see, movies and books are kinda my thing, they're my favourite way to spend money and time besides my kids and my writing. I'd easily pass up a party or a night playing video games to go to a movie or read a good book. It's all about gathering stories, I love them in any form (even in my video games, my favourite games of all time are all very heavy on story, even if they're not great ones).
That said, when it comes to movies, I can be pretty forgiving of many things that would bother me to no end in a book, so I can completely love a movie that others would find appalling.
I've seen reviews for Total Recall on the web, and a lot of people just don't seem to like it, which I just don't get. I enjoyed it thoroughly, start to finish it was a fun ride. I have to ask myself, what were people expecting when they went to see it? Good science?!?! A deep and engaging plot?!?! Have they seen the original?
I thought it was brilliantly done, with just the right amount of subtle (and not so subtle) call outs to fans of the original. It was a theme by theme reboot, while still keeping me engaged and thoroughly happy. They even managed to surprise me in a few places, which was a nice touch.
As for Bourne Legacy, it was perfect for the first two acts, lots of pseudo-science with just enough believability to suck me in, and some great character moments and fun fight scenes. Renner and Weisz played their roles perfectly, Ed Norton was actually a bit of a disappointment at times, but nothing too distracting.
My issues with the third act, without giving any spoilers, was the flatness of the big bad. I mean, most stories (in movies and in books) can easily suffer from the villain being a stronger character than the hero, well, I think they solved that problem in this movie. They could have just as easily (though possibly not as plausibly) pulled in one of the police bots from Total Recall to fill the role of the big bad and kept the same level of character.
Previous movies had Clive Owen and Karl Urban to play the big bads, and they were rich and deep, even within their limited roles. You believed they were people outside of the scenes you saw them in. It's something I believe to be important in all stories, that the characters feel like they have something outside of their small piece to play.
It was a bit of a let down, but I didn't feel like I'd been robbed of my money, it was still worth the price of admission.
I'm going to find a way to get a "Top 10" list of movies for the year posted on this blog, and I'll update it as I see movies, more for the self satisfaction of having a list with rankings than because I think anyone will care.
Yeah, I'll do that. At some point.
- Grimm
Tuesday, March 6, 2012
Plots! They're not just for evil masterminds!
I've got about 60,000 words, which works out to some 235 pages or so in a trade paperback, and it's a mess of epic proportions. The plot is broken, and I'm trying desperately to fix it, a gargantuan task let me assure you. Characters are being cut, combined, split apart, I'm ditching entire scenes, re-ordering things, and creating all sorts of new scenes to fill in gaps.
The goal?
To create a cohesive, well-paced, page-turner worthy of letting someone anyone read.
I think it's going to make me lose my mind, which should improve my writing significantly. I've spent most of the past few evenings bridge-of-my-nose deep in a mind-map where I'm sketching out a plot that I hope is good enough to see me through a full redraft.
I do have some concerns though, mostly to do with working out the timing of some of the events in the book, as so far my characters aren't going to have enough time to really develop the way I want them to, so as I add some detail to the outline I hope to stretch some events out a bit, without making the space between boring or disjointed. We'll see how that goes.
The main point of all this blather? I'm not going to give up on this story until it's done at least to a first full cohesive draft start to finish. Then I'll have some people act as Alpha readers who are willing to throw me to the ground and give me a good kicking (metaphorically), then I'll see what I can do with this one and go from there.
In a somewhat related note, both Game of Thrones: Season 1 and Mass Effect 3 come out tomorrow, and I've ordered both. Game of Thrones I might get to dig into in an effort to refresh some of the differences from the books before Season 2 airs April 1st. Despite how much I really want to play ME:3, I know it will be a black hole where my time is concerned once I get into it, so I'll be holding off, holding it in reserve as a reward for actually achieving a working plot and some serious work on the rewrite.
Tuesday, August 3, 2010
My Achilles Heel
"Alright!", Grimm says. "Time to let you in on my weakest writing skill.", he pauses dramatically, "Dialog." Grimm gauged the reaction of his readers. "I know, you'd never know it, but, I, the great talker, have trouble with dialog."
Bleh, enough of that, that little tidbit up there was painful and disgusting to write, as I'm sure it is to read. Somewhere between writing a conversation such as a blog post, and fleshing out dialog for characters in a story, I put on stilts. It's a bad habit, it's one I know, and one I'm going to have to work on at great length to straighten out.
Bleh, enough of that, that little tidbit up there was painful and disgusting to write, as I'm sure it is to read. Somewhere between writing a conversation such as a blog post, and fleshing out dialog for characters in a story, I put on stilts. It's a bad habit, it's one I know, and one I'm going to have to work on at great length to straighten out.
I have absolutely no issue setting a scene, describing action, reeling out plot lines. I can paint a pretty damned good picture with words if I do say so myself, let alone what I used to be capable of with a brush and some paints. Somehow, my delivery on dialog just throws a cat in the works; An angry, claws-fully-intact 200 pound cat, with great big jagged teeth... and bad breath.
I know the voice of my characters, and can generally speak their conversations out quite nicely, roleplay them if you will. Yet somehow, when it comes to writing it out, it doesn't quite work, especially trying to intertwine it with action and reaction. I've requested some writing exercises and been directed to writing excuses which turns out to be a wonderful website of exactly what I need.
Does this mean I'm stopping writing? Hell no! I'm just going to do point form conversation with key turns of phrase while I hammer out my issues with dialog. Maybe I can get Tarantino to ghost write my dialog... it'd only add about 9-bazillion words to the document.
-Grimm
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)