Category: action

            Many thanks for all your patience while I was busy having my teeth drilled out .  Hope you enjoyed Thom’s rant last week and he didn’t hurt your feelings too much.  No matter how you felt it about, rest assured… you were having more fun.

            But enough of my whining…

            …whining like a high speed drill on enamel…

            This week I said we’d talk about Robocop.  The original, not the remake.  I haven’t seen the remake yet, so I can’t comment on it.  Well, not in a non-nerdy, non-whiny way…

            And we said enough whining…

            I wanted to talk to you about a common problem that can lead to a lot of issues in a story, no matter what the story is.  It doesn’t matter if I’m writing sci-fi (like Robocop), romance, horror, fantasy, or an intense little character piece—this can kill my story.  And, in a way, it’s something I’ve talked about here before.

            As it happens, this issue’s been summed up by a few people in one simple sentence.  These are the eight worst words a writer can hear.  There’s no way to put a positive spin on them.

            What are these deadly words…?

            You’ve probably heard that old chestnut about the tree falling in the forest.  If there’s no one there to hear it, does it still make a sound?  Let me ask you this—is Jason Voorhees still scary if no one’s in the forest for him to kill?  Is that candlelit dinner on the rooftop still romantic when it’s just sitting there?  Are explosions that action-packed if there’s no one running away from them?

            I’ve said many, many, many times that my story depends on my characters.  A good character has to be relatable, believable, and (on some level) likeable.  If my characters are just thin, undeveloped stereotypes, they’re just empty placeholders.  If spies are hunting Man #3, it doesn’t mean anything.  If I tell you they’re after Bob, it’s a little better, but not much.  Once you hear they’re after Jason Bourne, though, now this suddenly means something.

            This is the big problem with “starting with action.”  That was a storytelling mantra for years.  “Start with action—don’t make us wait to be interested.”  It didn’t help that some people misunderstood “action” to mean explosions rather than just “something happening”.  Thing is, like I was just saying, action is meaningless if I don’t know the stakes and I don’t care about the characters.  It might grab me for a moment, but I need someone to latch on to, to identify with, to care about. 

            Consider this.  I’m betting you’ve seen a commercial or headline for the news sometime in the past couple of days.  Odds are, with the extent of news coverage and the way it leans toward the sensationalist—you’ve probably seen something along the lines of “five dead in a house fire” or “two killed in shooting” or something like that.   Sound familiar?  You’ve probably seen at least a dozen variations on this  since  New Year’s, yes?

            How many of these stories stuck with you?  Can you name any specifics from any of them?  Can you even remember when you saw them?

            Odds are, the reason you can’t is because you weren’t connected to them in any way.  The news was starting with the events—the action—not with the people.  And it bored you. 

            It’s okay to admit it’s boring.  We can all be awful people together.
            There is no way I can make a story work if the reader doesn’t care about the characters.  None.  It doesn’t matter how amazing my futuristic predictions are, how clever my zombie origin is, how fantastic my descriptions are.  If there aren’t any fleshed-out characters, it’s just trees falling in the forest.

            Now, there are a few exceptions to this, but they’re finesse things.

            Many years back, I read an interview with Paul Verhoeven about the original Robocop(see, I told you we’d get back to it).  The journalist was questioning him about the extreme (at the time) levels of violence in the film—most notably when Murphy is blown apart little by little with shotguns until Clarence Boddiker gets bored and puts a bullet in his head.  How could Verhoeven justify this?

            It was pretty easy, actually.  As the director explained, he only had two scenes with Murphy to establish him as a character before killing him.  Not much at all.  And while he did good things with these scenes, he realized that the death scene could be used, too, to trick his audience a bit.  By giving Murphy a brutal, utterly nightmarish murder—the kind of death any decent person wouldn’t wish on anyone—he immediately built sympathy for him.  We don’t know much about Murphy when he dies, but we know he sure as hell didn’t deserve that.  It’s the same technique used by a lot of horror stories, especially slashers and torture porn.  We might not care about the specific character, but we can identify on a basic human level and know this is an awful thing.

            Again, though… it does take a little finesse.  I can maybe do this once or twice, tops. After that, my readers are going to be numbed to that shock. 

            And then they’re not going to care anymore.

            So remember to build great characters that your readers care about.

            And then do awful things to them.

            Next time, speaking of awful words… I wanted to rattle off a few more.

            Until then, go write.

            Probably one of the most common thing writers hear is people asking about turning ideas into stories.  “Oh, I’ve got a really great idea, I just need someone to help me turn it into a book.”  I get messages like this four or five times a year.  When it’s from friends, I try to be really polite and explain why it doesn’t make much sense for me to help with their idea when I’ve already got far too many of my own to work on.  When it’s someone I don’t even know…

          I usually just ignore those messages. 

          Still, the unspoken question there is a valid one.  How do you go from clever idea to full-fledged book or screenplay?  How does a writer go from “bugs in amber have dinosaur DNA in their bellies” to Jurassic Park?

            Let’s talk about that.

            Now, as usual, nothing I’m about to say is a hard-fast rule.  A lot of it comes from a talk I had a few Christmases back with writer/director Shane Black (best known for Lethal Weapon, The Long Kiss Goodnight, Kiss Kiss Bang Bang, the upcoming Iron Man 3, and a string of really awful dirty jokes in the movie Predator).  He had a few thoughts on how to assemble a story that I thought were very insightful, and I’m going to use his general framework to address this week’s topic.

            Having said that, just to make things less confusing, from here on in I’ll be referring to our collection of words as “a novel.”  It’ll be clear why as we move on.  Depending on what you want to write, feel free to swap “novel” out for screenplay, short story, epic poem, or whatever. 

            If I’ve got an idea for a novel, I want to look at it in terms of plot and story.  Can it expand into a full plot?  Does it lend itself to a strong story?

            Let’s go over each of these terms.

            Okay, first we need to understand what the plot is.  If I’m writing a book, the plot is what’s going to be on the back cover.  If I’m writing a screenplay, it’s going to be what they put on the back of the DVD.  Simply put, the plot is the chain of events that make up the novel.  It’s what makes readers need to turn the page so they can find out what happens next.

            It’s important to remember that one idea does not make a plot.  “There’s a haunted castle,” is not a plot.  “My partner is a robot,” is not a plot.  “I want to go to the prom with a cheerleader/ quarterback,” is not a plot.  A lone idea is just a plot point, and basic geometry tells us we need multiple points to make something worth looking at.  That something being a novel (or screenplay, epic poem, etc.).

            If I’m describing a plot, I’m going to use a lot of conjunctions.  I’ll be using and, but, and orto string all those plot points together.  Take a look at this example…

            Indiana Jones is an adventurer who finds ancient treasures and he’s a professor of archaeology at a university.  The government hires him to find the Ark of the Covenant before the Nazis, butthe Nazis have a head start.  Indy goes to find his old mentor, but finds out that Abner has died and his daughter has a grudge against Indy.  The Nazis show up and Indy and Marion fight them off.  They travel to Cairo and meet Indy’s old partner, Sallah, but learn the Nazis already have their excavation well under way.  The Nazis try to have Indy killed in the marketplace and he fights them off again, butMarion is killed when the getaway truck explodes.  Indy and Sallah get the medallion deciphered butit turns out there are two parts to the inscription and the Nazis only have half of it.

            See what I mean?  Lots of points, and I’ve barely written out half the movie.   It’s also worth re-noting then none of those ideas on its own is a novel.  It’s when they start joining up that we get something that interests us. 

            This is where a lot of people mess up the whole idea of “expanding an idea into a novel.”  Y’see, Timmy, an idea doesn’texpand.  The plot expands as more ideas are added into it.  It’s impossible to expand “Indy and Sallah get the medallion deciphered” without adding a new element to the mix.  Seriously, try it.  Any attempt is just going to be some artificial wordplay and padding until I bring “it turns out there are two parts to the inscription” into it.

            It’s also worth noting another key thing.   For most good novels, the plot is the attempt to do something.  Not necessarily succeeding at something, mind you, but attempting to do it.  Beat the Nazis, save the girl, beat the system, save the clock tower, and so on.  Plot is active.  In that little summary up above, ten of the eighteen points are characters physically doing things. 

            Listing these points out can also be a hint that my story is getting a little thin on plot.  If I’m really stretching to come up with individual points, or falling back on a lot of inactive, internal points, that could mean my novel is veering into more of an artsy-character range.  If a lot of my points don’t really tie back to the main thrust of the novel, that’s another good sign.  There’s nothing wrong with that, provided I knock the character stuff out of the park.  Which brings us to our next point.

            Now, if plot is what goes on around the characters, the story is what goes on inside the characters.  Plot is big and external.  Story is small and intimate and internal.  It’s the personal stuff that explains why the characters are interested in the plot.  And if it’s why the characters are interested, it’s also why the reader is interested.  Plot makes us need to turn the page, but story makes us want to turn the page because we’ve come to like these characters. 

            A great example of plot vs. story is Silence of the Lambs.  The plot is the search for a missing girl, and some of the desperate decisions and deals the FBI will make to find her.  The story is about Clarice Starling trying to make up for what she sees as an awful failure in her childhood, and how much of her life is shaped by the need to balance that failure.

            I’ve said a few times here that characters are key to a successful novel, and that’s because without good characters you can’t have a lot of story.  I can have a ton of plot, but not much else.

            Now, because of this, developing an idea into a novel is a little tougher from the story side, because it involves developing characters.  How the characters react to the idea depends on who they are and how this idea interacts with their personality and history.  Which means they need to have personalities and histories.  And a lot of this can just come down to asking and answering questions that relate back to that original idea.

            Let’s go with the one I mentioned up at the top—my partner is a robot.  Let’s say my character is Bob.  Did Bob know this partnership was coming or did it get sprung on him?  Does he like being partnered with a robot?  Does he like robots in general?  What kind of partnership do they have?  Is Bob the junior or senior partner?  Why?  Do they work well together?  Does Bob have weaknesses the robot will compensate for (or vice versa)?    

            The answers to all of these questions expand the story.  Odds are that some of the answers will lead to more questions, too.  And more questions means the plot is expanding.

            As above, this can also be a hint that my novel is a little weak on the story side of things.  If I just give quick, inconsistent answers to these sort of questions, my characters are going to end up pretty flat.  Character arcs are a big part of the story, so if my character never changes in any noticeable way, it probably means my novel is emphasizing plot over everything else.  There’s nothing wrong with that—there are plenty of fantastic plot-driven  books and movies—but it does mean I need to have a really solid, engaging plot.

            It’s important to notice that story is why so many novels can use the same plot but still be very different.  Alan Moore’s Watchmenhas the exact same plot as the classic Outer Limits episode “The Architects of Fear,” but they have different stories.  The same with Never Let Me Go and The Island.  While the basic idea is the same, the character tweaks make each of these into unique stories.

            Consider this—how much does the story of Raiders of the Lost Ark change if I just do a gender swap on Indy?  Start way back with her relationship with Ravenwood’s underage son.  Would this still cause a falling out between the two professors?  How would the son view this past relationship?  And in the late 1930s, what would it be like for a female professor?  The male students hitting on her in class is a very different image, and would the government men be as enthusiastic when they learn Dr. Jones is a woman?  Our basic plot wouldn’t need to change too much, but all these story elements become very different.

            So when you’re looking to take an idea all the way to a full blown novel—or screenplay, epic poem, opera, or whatever it is you write—start with the basics.  Consider your idea as part of a larger plot.  Think of how it could fit into a character’s story.

            This week was kind of long and rambling, so next week I might just do something quick.  Whatever pops into my head.

            Until then, go write.

            Of course, being active is just good advice in general, don’t you think?

            Active can mean two different things in writing.  We can be talking about my writing in and of itself.  We can also be talking about what’s happening in the story and who’s doing it.

            First things first.  You’ve probably heard the term “active voice” tossed around a lot by guru types.  It refers to how I’ve structured my sentence.  Simply put, active voice is when my characters are doing stuff.

–Yakko mixed the soup and added pepper.

–Dot lit up the room with a flashlight.

–Wakko eviscerated the minotaur with his sword

            If you want to be a bit more grammar-oriented, when I’m using the active voice my characters should be the subject of my sentence.  They’re the ones doing things and making things happen.  They’re the movers and the shakers.

            Passive voice, on the other hand, is when stuff is being made to happen by my characters.

–Pepper was added to the soup as it was mixed by Yakko

–The room was lit up by Dot with a flashlight.

–The minotaur was eviscerated by Wakko’s sword

Wakko celebrates his adjective status.

            See, all these sentences convey the same information, but my characters are all objects now.  The focus has shifted to the soup, the room, and the minotaur. Heck, to keep things simple, Wakko the character was effectively removed from that last sentence.  He’s just a possessive adjective describing the sword (the real object).

            Another advantage of active voice is that it tends to be clearer.  Passive voice is an element of purple prose, which sounds nice sometimes but often gets confusing with all of its twists and turns, breaking the flow of the story.  Active voice is also usually more concise, which is great for pacing and word counts.  It just feels more dynamic.

            Now, you’ve probably heard a lot of gurus rant on about how you’ve always got to use the active voice.  Always, always, always, no exceptions.  Never use the passive voice for anything..

            This is wrong, of course.  There are plenty of times it’s fine to use passive voice.  It’s the same with having non-stop action or focusing exclusively on my main characters and ignoring the secondary ones.  It’s a way to alter the tempo or tone a bit in a story.

            The passive voice could be a quirk of a particular character’s way of speaking, especially in first person.  It could be used to “step back” in a moment of drama or mystery.  In screenwriting, it’s a clever way to change the visual of a moment without including camera angles or stage directions.  Done right, passive voice can even be used to increase horror—what could be worse than a character getting reduced to an object in all ways?

            So while  there are some good reasons to phrase things in the active voice, you don’t need to avoid the passive voice like the plague.

            However…

            It’s not just enough to phrase things in an active way.  My characters actually have to be active.  They need to make choices.  They have to face challenges.  They must take action.  Not in a gun-slinging, sword-fighting, car-chasing way.  Just in the simple sense of doing something.  On one level or another, my characters need to be the ones making things happen in a story.

            I honestly couldn’t tell you the number of stories or scripts I’ve read where the main character doesn’t do anything.  They just sit there as the story flows around them.  Other people tell them what to do and make their decisions for them.  They don’t take any action unless they’re dragged/ kicked/ forced into it.  A lot of them are little character-study “indie” things, but I’ve seen action movies done this way and horror novels, too.  Heck, I saw the film adaptation of a Harry Potter-esque book and it was almost halfway through the movie before the title character did a single active thing.  Up until then he was just a sock monkey getting handed off to different characters.

            Keep tabs on the voice of your story and make sure you’re not being too passive with your writing. And by the same token, you don’t want to have a lot of active writing about a character who doesn’t do anything.

            Next time I’d like to share a little idea I had about reverse-engineering.

            Until then, go write.

            I’m also counting the minutes until John Carter comes out, but that’s another story entirely.

            You know who else counts minutes?  Script supervisors.  It’s one of those credits you see in film and television that a lot of non-industry people don’t really know what it means.

            Very simply put, the script supervisor (often called the scripty)  keeps track of things.  He or she’s the one who notes exactly what’s been filmed (what shots and sizes and angles and lines) from each scene.  Like lots of other key folks on set, the script supervisor does their own breakdown of the script.  And the scripty’s breakdown is all about time.

            The standard estimate for a screenplay is a page a minute  If you talk to most script supervisors, they’ll tell you it’s actually closer to fifty-odd seconds (I want to say fifty-three), but a page a minute is a solid estimate.  There’s always going to be some wiggle room, of course, especially when you’re dealing with action.  As I’ve mentioned here before, the lobby scene in The Matrix is less than half a page.  According to Hollywood legend, the chariot race in Ben Hur was just one line in the script.

            This is why most professional readers groan when they get a screenplay that’s 140 or 150 pages long.  That’s two and a half hours.  Any script that long has a major strike against it before the reader’s looked at page one.  I read two scripts this year that the writer had “squashed” to make them shorter, but I could tell they were both over 200 pages, easy.  That’s close to three and a half hours.  Possibly even more if they’d had action sequences in them.  Which they did.

            If you’re a screenwriter, look at your script.  If you’ve got a solid page of dialogue, that’s a minute of talking heads.  A minute is a brutally long time in a movie.

            Don’t believe me?  Try this.  Look up at the ceiling and count off ten Mississippis.  Don’t cheat, don’t rush… just look up and count them out in your head nice and steady like you’re supposed to.  Go on.  I’ll wait.

            That was ten seconds.  Oscar-winning screenwriter Bruce Joel Rubin pointed out once that ten seconds can be an eternity on screen. 

            So think about how long some of those character monologues are.  It may be brilliant on the page, but there’s a good chance it’ll be torturous to watch.  It’s important to understand the distinction between how long something takes on the page and how long these actions and conversations will actually need (or not need).

            This goes for prose writers too (just so you don’t feel left out).  I’ve mentioned the pacing issues that can happen if action gets stretched out too long.  Certain things happen at certain speeds, and if they get slowed down with dialogue, descriptions, or excessive action they’re just going to look silly.  Not in the good way.

            And when something reads silly, people put your manuscript down in the big pile on the left.

            Next time, I wanted to tell you a story about telling you a different story.

            Until then, go write.