Let’s keep going on our writing series. One of the biggest complaints from critics of fiction about flat, shallow characters is that they lack flaws. But what does that really mean? Well, in all honesty, they’re usually complaining about the execution of said flaw; obviously, not having it there in the first place is a …
Continuing on writing characters for fiction, (and having recently watched, “Murder on the Nile” with Kenneth Branagh), I thought it’d be fun to go over some of the basics of writing detectives in fiction. Keep in mind, these aren’t hard-and-fast rules, but they are some of the basic building blocks that can get you started! …
Let’s break this into two parts: the story/plot first, and then we’ll talk about the quality second. PART ONE: The Story (The Good) “The movies are about how Leia – I mean, who else is going to be the leader? – is trying to rebuild the Republic… Luke is trying to restart the Jedi.”[1] “Darth Maul trained a …
What exactly is a “broken” power in fiction? I’ve talked about this a bit when we talk about Mary Stu’s and Gary Stu’s, but I think it helps just to tackle this by itself, because sometimes, characters are thought to be “broken” due to their powers, but may have other limitations that keep them grounded …
Why would be choose to use a setting like a post-apocalyptic future, a depressing dystopia, or some form of apocalypse in the future to set our story in? Because you don’t know how good you have it till it’s gone. If this is what you know… … but this is suddenly your reality in the …
Well, that is The Question, isn’t it? (Sorry, I couldn’t help myself!) In our writing series, this is a good time to explore inner drive for a character if they don’t have some personal loss as the inciting incident to kick off their quest. Many super heroes and heroes in fiction DO, because it’s an …
“Where do I start? The Characters, The Plot, or the Setting?!“ There is no hard-and-fast rule here; typically, one of the three will spark your imagination as you daydream and then the other two follow. Nothing is tougher when you’re trying to write than knowing where to start. Where do the good ideas come from? …
Let’s look at some examples and I’ll explain. Aliens The Long Kiss Goodnight Point of No Return/La Femme Nikita The River Wild This is probably going to be the first of several essays on this topic, so we’re starting with the basics. Let’s work out the common threads here. All of the women in these …
I hear this discussed a lot and used in many YouTube Videos, articles, and reviews when talking about fiction, usually in conjunction with how “believable” either the story was or the character involved. So what exactly IS “Plot Armor”, and why is it so important to understand? Let’s start with some basics: At some point in …
Bad endings may show anything from a cautionary tale, a story of a villainous protagonist getting their just desserts, or an expression of a cynical writer/director’s vision of nihilism they are trying to express through their story. I’m not really a fan of ‘bad endings’, to be honest. By bad, I mean endings to stories …
There is absolutely a time and a place to have all your main characters in a story get along. However, just like in real life, human beings don’t always mesh right away: we typically call this, “friction”. This actually can become a powerful, (and FUN!) writing tool to use when creating your stories! Too many …
Three Simple Starter Steps: ground the character in the setting, have them know their place in the fiction, and don’t work backwards. GROUND THE CHARACTER IN THE SETTING: This is one of the first big mistakes for writers who end up making a Mary Sue: the character they make may end up ridiculously overpowered, or …
This drives me nuts in a lot of modern writing: people make broad assumptions or believe old stereotypes that end up hurting their writing. If your assumptions are based in stereotypes, then I’d say it will hamper your ability to write good fiction. And sadly, many people make assumptions all the time. ASSUMPTIONS IN WRITING: …
Let’s actually dissect a good character that has withstood the test of time, and examine why their live-action movie didn’t work. I’m going to use Green Lantern for this. The live action movie really stank up the theater, but Green Lanterns, as characters, are actually ridiculously cool. They are the Paladins of the DC Universe: …
The difference between “diverse” and “woke” in regards to Marvel.
“Nuance” is thrown around a lot in critiques, but do you actually know what it is? What it means? How it looks in characters? It’s something we all seem to say that we want, but do we really know what we’re asking for? Let’s dive in! For this, I’m using characters from “Star Trek: Deep …
As we talk more about writing, and we’ve spent so much time on developing characters, I think this is a good time to talk about bending the rules a bit. Do all characters have to be relatable in some way? – NO! Not at all! Especially your antagonists! You can create characters as fantastic, strange, …
Continuing our talk on writing, let’s talk a little about the fear of writing into a “trope”, which is typically a writing cliché. The ones people worry about the most typically have negative connotations, but to be a good writer, you have to understand all your tools in the toolbox, even the tropes. Are there …
Okay aspiring writers and critics! Like I said in my earlier blog, there is such a thing as objective quality, and being able to accurately judge what is good or bad is going to depend on your ability to understand and analyze what you are making or critiquing. To get the brain working a bit, …
Normally, I try to plan my blogs out in advance, but this time, I’m working on the fly. We’ll see how it goes. The biggest criticism I see all the time regarding the Mass Effect Trilogy‘s romances now that the Legendary edition came out is that, “Ashley is a racist, and who’d want to either …
