This is a Rant. It will be less organized and more stream of thought than my other posts. You've been warned.
Over the past say ten years or so there's been a large argument in the video game world between the "hardcore" and the "casual," "dumbing down" and "accessibility."
On one side you have gamers who rightly or wrongly feel that they are being ignored by the developers, that in an interest for ever more money and higher profit margins they have been forsaken for the brain dead masses. On the other you have companies that quite frankly are trying to survive in a tough economy, stagnant gaming cycle and astronomical development cost. Now some of those cost are their own fault, but that's a rant for another day.
I've seen a lot of these arguments, both from friends and from game journalist and I think there's a lot to be said for both camps, but what really pisses me off, and the bases for this rant is when companies simply mistake what making a game more accessible means, and fundamentally alter their games to meet some unknown common denominator.
There were two games I played this past year that really brought that to bare. Splinter Cell: Conviction and Hitman: Absolution. I want to say right off the bat that I liked both these games. While neither is perfect, I think they were both solid, fun, enjoyable experiences. (At least for Hitman it has been so far, haven't gotten all the way through it yet.)
Both of these games task the player with sneaking around environments and stealthily taking out bad guys. Both come from beloved and long standing franchises. Both have always been middle of the pack popularity wise. Almost everyone knows of them, has played at least one in the series. But I can't ever recall a time when they sold hand over a fist or topped game of the year list. They're part of the B-list of gamedom, and that's okay.
But the companies need money, either to survive or please their shareholders. They want a bigger audience and to do that they have to round some of the sharp corners on their product. I get that. I'm okay with that. I think every gamer, no matter how hardcore they think they are, has put in a game, played for five minutes and then gave up because things were too confusing or the menus too dense.
This mostly happens to me in strategy games. I love me some strategy but I hate the long tutorials. Having played games since I was a toddler I can generally load up a game and figure it out as I go. But sometimes I see menu after menu and a hundred icons and all I want to do is buy some soldiers and fight somebody. I give up and move on to something else.
I understand why even though a game like Hitman or Halo or Skyrim may be second nature to me and an undecipherable mess to someone else. And I get why a company would want people to be able to get into their game, even without the money problem. Creators like people to see their stuff, shocking I know, but it's true.
Back to Hitman and Splinter Cell.
The older games in these series featured big open levels, especially the Hitman games. They were all about exploration, non-linear problem solving and experimentation. I have deeply loved that series since I first played Hitman 2. The amount of freedom it offered in finding clever ways to take out an enemy without being noticed or gunning everyone down. It was a unique experience I couldn't get anywhere else.
The first three game were never big on story, which is a shame, but they largely fixed that with Blood Money, the fourth entry in the series. Blood Money featured even bigger, more open environments with options upon options for play. The game could be hard, but you really felt a sense of tension and satisfaction from sneaking your way through its levels. They were even able to tie in a decent story without disrupting the flow of the game.
Now we have Absolution, which feels more like they wanted to make a Hitman movie than a Hitman game. The large open levels from the previous games have been split down into smaller, largely linear segments. Yes there are still the creative ways to kill someone, but they seem much smaller, more immediate than in previous games.
One of the best Hitman levels of any of the games and I think one of the best designed levels in any game is the opera house mission from Blood Money. Your tasked with infiltrating a building, killing the star of the opera and some fat cat who's there to see it. At each step your presented with challenges and tasked to over come them. How do you get inside? Steal a pass from a guest's coat? Take out the maintenance man when he goes for a leak and steal his clothes? Brute force?
You get inside. Now you have to get the actor. Break into his dressing room and choke him out between rehearsal or replace the blank in a prop gun with a real bullet? What about the fat cat in his protected balcony. Distract the guards to get him alone? Lure him out and sabotage a chandelier to crush him?
It was one massive level seemlessly broken into segments, true, but keeping it as one level gave it a weight and heft that the new missions lack. In the new game each section of the level is blocked off by doors. You go through one area, complete it, then move on to the next. The sense of openess and complexity is gone.
A few missions in and I've crept through hallways and rooms, passing goons only to get to an exit door and move on to the next section. Does it make the game easier, less painful to restart when everything goes horribly wrong? Sure. But I think it loses some of the magic in the process.
You see this in the newest splinter cell too. Instead of the multi-teired levels of previous games, and wide open environments you get walled gardens, separate and secure. Both games put a much larger emphases on storytelling and cenimatics. Which is nice, don't get me wrong. As a writer I tend to put story above all else. But in gaming, unlike other mediums, a lot of times the play, the interaction with the game is the story.
The story in a Hitman game has a lot less to do with whatever the hell Agent 47 is up to and lot more about how I sniped the Secret Service's star witness from a neighbor's tree house. Or dressed up as a clown for the target's birthday party and stabbed him in the face.
Good times.
These developers seem to think that easier gameplay and more linear storytelling is the key to the heart of the masses. Instead, by cutting off what makes their games great they end up with identical boxes giving me no reason as a consumer to spend money on the same experience over and over again.
They lose the things that make them so special, the very reasons we played them in the first place. They go from being a one of a kind experience to one I've had a dozen times over. They lose their niche and starve in the middle of two camps, unwanted by both.
Solutions
So what's the answer? How do you make games easier while retaining what makes them so special in the first place. How do you gain new markets and not alienate the one you already have?
To that I give a big, fat, shrug. I'm not a game developer. If I was though I'd start with save systems. In this newer, "more accesable" Hitman they have checkpoints. Why the hell wouldn't you give them the option to save anywhere?
How many of us have played an Elder Scrolls game, gotten to some guy that we thought we could take and then stopped, quick saved and then attacked. Knowing that if we were wrong and the wizard turned out to be a total badass we could reload the game to the same spot, having lost nothing. No experience, no in game currency, no time. What better way to promote experimentation than taking away its cost?
You want to put story in your games? Do it in the level design. Do it with the little things. All you need is a soft touch. One of my favorite parts of earlier Hitman games was the newspaper at the end of each level that would describe how well you did the previous mission. If you were a truly silent assassin there would be a small column about an accident. Go on a blood thirsty rampage and you would earn yourself a headline and gruesome cover shot.
Blood Money was able to weave a story in between missions without upsetting the flow of the game. There's no reason why they couldn't continue along this route.
Audience
The point is to know your audience. Your company may not set the records of a Grand Theft Auto or a Call of Duty by releasing quirky games that only a few like, but it will survive. The best way to go bankrupt is to ignore the people that bought your games in the first place.
They played and loved those early games for a reason, don't ignore that. It doesn't mean you have to sacrifice innovation or never do new things or go in new directions. By all means, do so. It helps keeps things fresh, prevents stagnation. But changing what you are, and what makes you great for an extra buck is never the way to go.
If you want a larger audience you have to show them why your thing is great, not pander to them and make your thing mediocre in the process.
Unique things are remembered. Mediocrity seldom is.
Sunday, January 13, 2013
Sunday, December 9, 2012
Thoughts On Battlestar Galactica
A brief confession. I never watched Battlestar when it was on. Never cared about it when it was on. I was one of the many who wrote BSG off as another over hyped, cliched ridden sci-fi show with a low budget and cheesy acting. A judgement I came to without ever having scene an episode. I ignored it along with all the other over hyped cult classics and went about my merry way.
With all the recent talk about how wonderful Blood and Chrome is and hearing the names of BSG's actors whispered in reference on too many times I decided to finally sit down and give this serious a fair shot.
I was wrong. I'll be the first to admit it. I was damn wrong. I'm not sure what exactly I had been expecting. A cheesy, Star Trek style space opera with weak writing, weak acting and overall coating of cheese perhaps. Maybe another Stargate Universe, a decent show that limped along. A show that had it's highs and lows and survived off its interesting concepts. Maybe a Doctor Who. A show that inspires a deep love as whole but fails utterly when broken down into it's various parts.
Whatever I was expecting, I got a show that starts off with interesting concepts and world building and escalates into a wonderful and fascinating study in human relationships and just how far a person can be pushed before they break. This is hands down on of the better shows I've seen in a long time, and one I've enjoyed immensely. Is it perfect? Not in the slightest. Is it great? Defiantly. Does it deserve it's spot in the revered pantheon of Nerdom? Yes, I think it does. While not a Zeus or a Hera, it certainly earns the spot of an Apollo, or Athena. (See what I did there?)
To better illustrate what makes this show work so well in spite of it's faults, I'm going to break it down and hopefully in the process you will gain some greater insights into your own writing. I'm going to go easy on specific examples as I wish for this to remain as spoiler free as possible.
The Bad
Melodrama - This show has drama. More drama than you can shake a stick at. The plot puts the entire human species at risk while adding in love triangles, espionage, betrayal, politics and religion. Most of the time it creates a tense atmosphere the reflects the trials and tribulations of everyday life. Most of the time it takes characters we care about and pushes them to the limit. It breaks their souls and allow us to watch as they struggle to pick up the pieces.
Drama is a tricky thing. Too little and we're bored. Too much and it rips us out of the moment. They go from heartbroken to whiny. We go from sympathetic to annoyed. The line is thin and subjective to the viewer. What may be heart wrenching to one, causes another eyes to roll.
The show is usually good about braving that type rope but falls enough to be noticed.
Plot - This show excels in plot for reasons I'll get into later. Here I wanted to address some of it's weaker points. This ties in to some of the point's about drama. A show this complex, with many different strands that intersect and intertwine can create a web that grabs a hold of the viewers attention and refuses to let go.
Go too far however, and the viewer's suspension of disbelieve vanishes amongst betrayals, reveals and plot twist. The viewer loses his trust in the writer's plans and wonders how many choices are being made for a cheap boost in the viewer's attention (or ratings.) This show has some excellent twist and turns, but towards the end I found myself wondering how much had been planned out from the beginning and how much the writer's were making up as they went along. You can normally get away with this, BSG however built it's entire premise around the plan of it's players. When you do that you have to be sure of where you're going, or the viewers will lose faith that you can find your way.
The show also has a strong reliance on flashbacks. Sometimes going so far to have an episode that is entirely a flashback, with further flashbacks within it. Most of the episodes use the to show background of a character and fill in their past. Others seem to use it fill in plot holes or other problems that might arise. I think I'm one of the few people who doesn't really mind flashbacks. They allow us to skip the boring parts while retaining the interesting. Others may not be so kind to the shows liberal use of them.
The Good
World Building - I'm a huge sucker for world-building when it's done right. Done wrong, world-buildings is a mess of granular details we have no reason to care about and exposition dumping that slows down the narrative. When done right it lures us into the world crumb by crumb until we're hopelessly lost in it's magical forest.
Battlestar Galactica uses it's world-building to a wonderful degree. It starts out with the twelve colonies, setting up that this is not our world or history. It tells us of servants that rose up in defiance and the war that resulted. It expands into not one, but two distinct and fleshed out religions with their own flaws, failures and successes.
More importantly while the religion gives us the central plot device in the search for Earth, they make sure to use it beyond that. The religious beliefs and lack thereof gives us an added layer of depth into the characters. It pops up in politics, episode plots and random stories. It permeates through every aspect of the world which gives it the weight needed with the viewer while helping to round out the world it exist within.
The Cylons begin as a faceless, emotionless enemy. By the end we see they have their own culture, believes, personalities. They evolve from a boogie man harassing the survivors, from a one dimensional wolf harassing sheep to a proper faction in their own right. More than villains, they are shown to be agents of their own fate, with their own hopes, dreams and fears.
Contrast this with Stargate Universe. A show I have no problem with going on the record of having liked, and was very sad with it's cancellation. The shows have a very similar core concept. That of survivors on their own, a long way from home. Or in BSG's case, without a home. While SGU has some world-building in terms of the Ancients and other artifacts, it never comes close to the comprehensive nature that BSG takes with the Cylons.
Stargate Universe was set in what is basically our own world, with some minor differences. The characters all came from Earth. Had our history, our religions. This limited in their options to use these for conflict. Far easier to poke fun at the false gods of fiction than religions who will boycott your show. In the end I think it gave SGU a shallowness of the world that BSG was able to lack. Battlestar was able to achieve not only depth but a truly impressive scale due to the effort and execution of its building.
And of course, who could forget frak. Frak is used as the de facto expletive in the show in place of another four lettered word that starts with F. Though it could also be interpreted as other expletives in certain context. It's a brilliant work around for television censorship. Anyone who's been in the military can tell you there is a lot of cussing involved, no matter what branch you're in. To have a show with people under stress driving them to betrayal and suicide holding in every cuss word would seem unrealistic, and bleeps distracting.
While the use of the word isn't perfect, things like mother fracker can seems forced, it's a wonderful dash of world-building that adds even more to the story. I also find it rather catchy.
Balance - The re-launch of Battlestar Galactica ran from 2004 to 2009. This was a time in America dominated by the Iraq and Afghanistan wars. A time of deep, bi-partisan political entrenchment and bias across seemingly every form of media. No matter what side your political beliefs fall on, it's undeniable that Bush Era saw a bias in both fiction and news media that boarder lined on Propaganda from both political ideologies.
In the middle of this we have a show about war. A show about government and religion in a time when the country in which is was made was deeply divided over the issues. At the heart of the shows first and second season were the questions of power in government. A careful balance between the military and the people, between civil liberties and national security.
It would have been easy, far to easy, for the show to take a stand for one or the other. For the show to stand up on it's soapbox week after week and denounce a tyrannical military establishment shoving aside the concerns of the people, or lament the weakness of soft-hearted liberals unable to stomach the realities of war.
While the show certainly has it's moment of over reaching military power, and a civilian government unable to make the tough calls, I think it walked a remarkable thin line when so many others in this country were unable to. Whenever one side or the other over stepped it's bounds in the show, they always had reason to do so, and their actions felt within their character.
Character Development - While on the subject of politics, this show has phenomenal character development. Two of the show's central characters, Commander Adama and President Roslin (played by Edward James Olmos and Mary McDonnell) show wonderful character growth throughout the series, along with others. Adama starts out as the old vet. Military man through and through who has no time for politicians. Roslin is a school teacher who finds herself in the role of President to a dying people. Not only to they evolve as individuals, learning and adapting to the situations they encounter, they evolve together as well. The Commander is softened through the lose of those under his command, as The President is hardened by an unforgiving world. They start out as rivals, gain each others respect and eventual friendship. Adama and Roslin are lesson in how you write a love story. There's no courting, no flirting. Their relationship evolves naturally over time, rising and falling with the circumstances that surround them. And no matter their feelings, they stay true to themselves and act accordingly. Their intertwining path is truly masterful.
As is the development of other characters. This show has a massive cast that grows and shrinks over the course of the show. Instead of relying on a few, small number of characters with which to grow and cultivate, the show continuously challenges itself to fully develop as many characters as possible. Branching out from Adama, Roslin, Lee and Starbuck we meet Chief Tyrol, Lt. Sharon Valerii, Dee, Karl 'Helo' Agathon, and on and on. The sheer amount of characters that not only are fully fleshed out in their own right but continue to evolve and change over the course of the show is staggering on the level of mind blowing. For those who have watched the show think of who Lt. Gaeta was at the start of the show and who he was at the end. Or Starbuck, who begins the show as butch, cigar chomping cliche evolves into well rounded character with real depth and conflict.
One great example of this, without spoilers, is the three pilots. Early on in the show there's an episode where some new pilots need to be trained. Three lucky recruits are sent to Starbuck to be trained as pilots. We see three young adults ready and eager. The minute I saw them I thought, hears a couple of red shirts. Expendable characters that will be dead within a few episodes. Of those three characters one has a long, multi-stage arc and another is always around, developing their own character. What in any other show could have been cannon fodder to be introduced and tossed away becomes an opportunity for growth and development and a chance to get the viewer invested.
Not only is the show not afraid to bring in side characters and give them full arcs of their own, the show isn't afraid to kill characters off. This is something that I miss dearly in a lot of shows, especially those that deal with war. The show is built on the premise that it's a dangerous life and people die and sometimes for shitty reasons. The show goes behind having this spouted by characters to show it in action. Characters die. Characters we've come to care about over dozens of episodes. Characters that had hope and dreams and plans for the future. Instead of pissing us off it makes us love the show even more. It makes us care about the characters that have survived, makes us carry some of the weight that they carry themselves.
Instead of fearing that the viewer would become lost and confused in a sea of characters, Battlestar Galactica gave us a reason to care about each and everyone. They used their cast to give a sense of realism to the world that many shows are missing.
Plot - TV is a tricky medium. In a movie, or a novel you generally have a strict linear progression. You have segments or chapters sure. And a novel is prone to being made up of several stories, tied into a larger whole. You might have the various kingdoms a party is traveling through, or several cases a detective must solve tying into a larger mystery, but the book is working toward a single tale, a single ending.
While TV shares similarities, it has a challenge all its own. Each week it must tell a self contained story strong enough to satisfy the viewer. It must also show the development of plots and characters toward a whole that not only makes the actual story, but compels the viewer to return week after week.
BSG has some wonderful episode plots that focus a specific section of the world, be it politics or religions, while juggling its many characters and plots. More impressively, the show is able to loosely defined goal of a destination and stretch it out without the viewer losing hope. They interweave so many plots, both global in terms of Cylon vs Human or Military vs Civilian bound together by dozens of relationships, rivalries and loyalties.
No matter the size of the conflict, from a worker's strike on a ship, to searching for food, to a love triangle the show boost it's plots through so many layers of worldbuilding, groups, relationships and character that you can't help but enjoy the ride.
One of things I found most impressive with show comes at the end of Season 2 and beginning of Season 3. I won't spoil anything, or at least I'll try not to. Season's one and two have their central focus on the fleet and it's drive to Earth. Far from stale at the end of Season Two, the writer's took the show in a radical direction. They changed up the dynamic completely. There's a decision within the show that is made, followed by a time jump. I found myself thinking it would be a few weeks, maybe a couple months in time. Nope. It's a year. A year. Let that sink in a minute. Something happens in the show, then we cut to a year later. A whole damn year. How many shows do that?
The world we find ourselves in a year later is quite different. The times have changed and relationships with it. People who an episode before where going on their first dates are now married or have kids. The whole time I was watching I kept expecting a retcon. Someone to hit the reset button and go back to the last save. It was a dream sequence or a vision or someone who find a wormhole and warn the others. Nope. They stick with it. They follow through and keep the changes and all of it's consequences. Whether you agree with the choices or not you have to admire the balls of the writers. I don't know of single other show that's done something like that and stuck with it.
Which brings me to another point. Flashbacks. The show has so many, and yet for the most part, they work. Flashbacks are one of those things you see on all these writer's list floating around the internet as an evil thing you should never do. BSG seems to have one every four episodes or some. Some episodes are nothing but flashbacks. Razor, a Battlestar Galactica TV movie is itself one long flashback that has other flashbacks within it. But it works.
Why? Because it allows us to see the good bits without getting bogged down in the boring. During the Season 2/Season 3 jump it skips over a lot of stuff. Most of it probably would have been boring or slow. So they skip it. A few episodes later we get an episode showing us only the most interesting bits that had happened. It allows us the best of both worlds. Along with everything else in the show, it's a fine line that BSG navigates well.
Conclusion
I've enjoyed Battlestar Galactica more than I have other shows in a very long time. It took a while for me to like it as much as I do. Like Stargate Universe it was a good seven episodes before I found myself really caring about what was going on. Maybe that's a problem with me, maybe it's one with the show. I am certaintly glad I stuck with it.
Battlestar manages to wade through countless minefields to come out with fists full of storytelling gold. It not only earns its spot in the Pantheon of Nerdom but is strong enough to defend that spot for decades to come. If you are at all interested in writing, TV, or sci-fi you owe it to yourself to seek this out (it's on Netflix) and give it a watch.
This article is by far the longest I've written for the site. I hope you enjoyed it. If you'd like to see me ramble on other shows, let me know in the comments below.
With all the recent talk about how wonderful Blood and Chrome is and hearing the names of BSG's actors whispered in reference on too many times I decided to finally sit down and give this serious a fair shot.
I was wrong. I'll be the first to admit it. I was damn wrong. I'm not sure what exactly I had been expecting. A cheesy, Star Trek style space opera with weak writing, weak acting and overall coating of cheese perhaps. Maybe another Stargate Universe, a decent show that limped along. A show that had it's highs and lows and survived off its interesting concepts. Maybe a Doctor Who. A show that inspires a deep love as whole but fails utterly when broken down into it's various parts.
Whatever I was expecting, I got a show that starts off with interesting concepts and world building and escalates into a wonderful and fascinating study in human relationships and just how far a person can be pushed before they break. This is hands down on of the better shows I've seen in a long time, and one I've enjoyed immensely. Is it perfect? Not in the slightest. Is it great? Defiantly. Does it deserve it's spot in the revered pantheon of Nerdom? Yes, I think it does. While not a Zeus or a Hera, it certainly earns the spot of an Apollo, or Athena. (See what I did there?)
To better illustrate what makes this show work so well in spite of it's faults, I'm going to break it down and hopefully in the process you will gain some greater insights into your own writing. I'm going to go easy on specific examples as I wish for this to remain as spoiler free as possible.
The Bad
Melodrama - This show has drama. More drama than you can shake a stick at. The plot puts the entire human species at risk while adding in love triangles, espionage, betrayal, politics and religion. Most of the time it creates a tense atmosphere the reflects the trials and tribulations of everyday life. Most of the time it takes characters we care about and pushes them to the limit. It breaks their souls and allow us to watch as they struggle to pick up the pieces.
Drama is a tricky thing. Too little and we're bored. Too much and it rips us out of the moment. They go from heartbroken to whiny. We go from sympathetic to annoyed. The line is thin and subjective to the viewer. What may be heart wrenching to one, causes another eyes to roll.
The show is usually good about braving that type rope but falls enough to be noticed.
Plot - This show excels in plot for reasons I'll get into later. Here I wanted to address some of it's weaker points. This ties in to some of the point's about drama. A show this complex, with many different strands that intersect and intertwine can create a web that grabs a hold of the viewers attention and refuses to let go.
Go too far however, and the viewer's suspension of disbelieve vanishes amongst betrayals, reveals and plot twist. The viewer loses his trust in the writer's plans and wonders how many choices are being made for a cheap boost in the viewer's attention (or ratings.) This show has some excellent twist and turns, but towards the end I found myself wondering how much had been planned out from the beginning and how much the writer's were making up as they went along. You can normally get away with this, BSG however built it's entire premise around the plan of it's players. When you do that you have to be sure of where you're going, or the viewers will lose faith that you can find your way.
The show also has a strong reliance on flashbacks. Sometimes going so far to have an episode that is entirely a flashback, with further flashbacks within it. Most of the episodes use the to show background of a character and fill in their past. Others seem to use it fill in plot holes or other problems that might arise. I think I'm one of the few people who doesn't really mind flashbacks. They allow us to skip the boring parts while retaining the interesting. Others may not be so kind to the shows liberal use of them.
The Good
World Building - I'm a huge sucker for world-building when it's done right. Done wrong, world-buildings is a mess of granular details we have no reason to care about and exposition dumping that slows down the narrative. When done right it lures us into the world crumb by crumb until we're hopelessly lost in it's magical forest.
Battlestar Galactica uses it's world-building to a wonderful degree. It starts out with the twelve colonies, setting up that this is not our world or history. It tells us of servants that rose up in defiance and the war that resulted. It expands into not one, but two distinct and fleshed out religions with their own flaws, failures and successes.
More importantly while the religion gives us the central plot device in the search for Earth, they make sure to use it beyond that. The religious beliefs and lack thereof gives us an added layer of depth into the characters. It pops up in politics, episode plots and random stories. It permeates through every aspect of the world which gives it the weight needed with the viewer while helping to round out the world it exist within.
The Cylons begin as a faceless, emotionless enemy. By the end we see they have their own culture, believes, personalities. They evolve from a boogie man harassing the survivors, from a one dimensional wolf harassing sheep to a proper faction in their own right. More than villains, they are shown to be agents of their own fate, with their own hopes, dreams and fears.
Contrast this with Stargate Universe. A show I have no problem with going on the record of having liked, and was very sad with it's cancellation. The shows have a very similar core concept. That of survivors on their own, a long way from home. Or in BSG's case, without a home. While SGU has some world-building in terms of the Ancients and other artifacts, it never comes close to the comprehensive nature that BSG takes with the Cylons.
Stargate Universe was set in what is basically our own world, with some minor differences. The characters all came from Earth. Had our history, our religions. This limited in their options to use these for conflict. Far easier to poke fun at the false gods of fiction than religions who will boycott your show. In the end I think it gave SGU a shallowness of the world that BSG was able to lack. Battlestar was able to achieve not only depth but a truly impressive scale due to the effort and execution of its building.
And of course, who could forget frak. Frak is used as the de facto expletive in the show in place of another four lettered word that starts with F. Though it could also be interpreted as other expletives in certain context. It's a brilliant work around for television censorship. Anyone who's been in the military can tell you there is a lot of cussing involved, no matter what branch you're in. To have a show with people under stress driving them to betrayal and suicide holding in every cuss word would seem unrealistic, and bleeps distracting.
While the use of the word isn't perfect, things like mother fracker can seems forced, it's a wonderful dash of world-building that adds even more to the story. I also find it rather catchy.
Balance - The re-launch of Battlestar Galactica ran from 2004 to 2009. This was a time in America dominated by the Iraq and Afghanistan wars. A time of deep, bi-partisan political entrenchment and bias across seemingly every form of media. No matter what side your political beliefs fall on, it's undeniable that Bush Era saw a bias in both fiction and news media that boarder lined on Propaganda from both political ideologies.
In the middle of this we have a show about war. A show about government and religion in a time when the country in which is was made was deeply divided over the issues. At the heart of the shows first and second season were the questions of power in government. A careful balance between the military and the people, between civil liberties and national security.
It would have been easy, far to easy, for the show to take a stand for one or the other. For the show to stand up on it's soapbox week after week and denounce a tyrannical military establishment shoving aside the concerns of the people, or lament the weakness of soft-hearted liberals unable to stomach the realities of war.
While the show certainly has it's moment of over reaching military power, and a civilian government unable to make the tough calls, I think it walked a remarkable thin line when so many others in this country were unable to. Whenever one side or the other over stepped it's bounds in the show, they always had reason to do so, and their actions felt within their character.
Character Development - While on the subject of politics, this show has phenomenal character development. Two of the show's central characters, Commander Adama and President Roslin (played by Edward James Olmos and Mary McDonnell) show wonderful character growth throughout the series, along with others. Adama starts out as the old vet. Military man through and through who has no time for politicians. Roslin is a school teacher who finds herself in the role of President to a dying people. Not only to they evolve as individuals, learning and adapting to the situations they encounter, they evolve together as well. The Commander is softened through the lose of those under his command, as The President is hardened by an unforgiving world. They start out as rivals, gain each others respect and eventual friendship. Adama and Roslin are lesson in how you write a love story. There's no courting, no flirting. Their relationship evolves naturally over time, rising and falling with the circumstances that surround them. And no matter their feelings, they stay true to themselves and act accordingly. Their intertwining path is truly masterful.
As is the development of other characters. This show has a massive cast that grows and shrinks over the course of the show. Instead of relying on a few, small number of characters with which to grow and cultivate, the show continuously challenges itself to fully develop as many characters as possible. Branching out from Adama, Roslin, Lee and Starbuck we meet Chief Tyrol, Lt. Sharon Valerii, Dee, Karl 'Helo' Agathon, and on and on. The sheer amount of characters that not only are fully fleshed out in their own right but continue to evolve and change over the course of the show is staggering on the level of mind blowing. For those who have watched the show think of who Lt. Gaeta was at the start of the show and who he was at the end. Or Starbuck, who begins the show as butch, cigar chomping cliche evolves into well rounded character with real depth and conflict.
One great example of this, without spoilers, is the three pilots. Early on in the show there's an episode where some new pilots need to be trained. Three lucky recruits are sent to Starbuck to be trained as pilots. We see three young adults ready and eager. The minute I saw them I thought, hears a couple of red shirts. Expendable characters that will be dead within a few episodes. Of those three characters one has a long, multi-stage arc and another is always around, developing their own character. What in any other show could have been cannon fodder to be introduced and tossed away becomes an opportunity for growth and development and a chance to get the viewer invested.
Not only is the show not afraid to bring in side characters and give them full arcs of their own, the show isn't afraid to kill characters off. This is something that I miss dearly in a lot of shows, especially those that deal with war. The show is built on the premise that it's a dangerous life and people die and sometimes for shitty reasons. The show goes behind having this spouted by characters to show it in action. Characters die. Characters we've come to care about over dozens of episodes. Characters that had hope and dreams and plans for the future. Instead of pissing us off it makes us love the show even more. It makes us care about the characters that have survived, makes us carry some of the weight that they carry themselves.
Instead of fearing that the viewer would become lost and confused in a sea of characters, Battlestar Galactica gave us a reason to care about each and everyone. They used their cast to give a sense of realism to the world that many shows are missing.
Plot - TV is a tricky medium. In a movie, or a novel you generally have a strict linear progression. You have segments or chapters sure. And a novel is prone to being made up of several stories, tied into a larger whole. You might have the various kingdoms a party is traveling through, or several cases a detective must solve tying into a larger mystery, but the book is working toward a single tale, a single ending.
While TV shares similarities, it has a challenge all its own. Each week it must tell a self contained story strong enough to satisfy the viewer. It must also show the development of plots and characters toward a whole that not only makes the actual story, but compels the viewer to return week after week.
BSG has some wonderful episode plots that focus a specific section of the world, be it politics or religions, while juggling its many characters and plots. More impressively, the show is able to loosely defined goal of a destination and stretch it out without the viewer losing hope. They interweave so many plots, both global in terms of Cylon vs Human or Military vs Civilian bound together by dozens of relationships, rivalries and loyalties.
No matter the size of the conflict, from a worker's strike on a ship, to searching for food, to a love triangle the show boost it's plots through so many layers of worldbuilding, groups, relationships and character that you can't help but enjoy the ride.
One of things I found most impressive with show comes at the end of Season 2 and beginning of Season 3. I won't spoil anything, or at least I'll try not to. Season's one and two have their central focus on the fleet and it's drive to Earth. Far from stale at the end of Season Two, the writer's took the show in a radical direction. They changed up the dynamic completely. There's a decision within the show that is made, followed by a time jump. I found myself thinking it would be a few weeks, maybe a couple months in time. Nope. It's a year. A year. Let that sink in a minute. Something happens in the show, then we cut to a year later. A whole damn year. How many shows do that?
The world we find ourselves in a year later is quite different. The times have changed and relationships with it. People who an episode before where going on their first dates are now married or have kids. The whole time I was watching I kept expecting a retcon. Someone to hit the reset button and go back to the last save. It was a dream sequence or a vision or someone who find a wormhole and warn the others. Nope. They stick with it. They follow through and keep the changes and all of it's consequences. Whether you agree with the choices or not you have to admire the balls of the writers. I don't know of single other show that's done something like that and stuck with it.
Which brings me to another point. Flashbacks. The show has so many, and yet for the most part, they work. Flashbacks are one of those things you see on all these writer's list floating around the internet as an evil thing you should never do. BSG seems to have one every four episodes or some. Some episodes are nothing but flashbacks. Razor, a Battlestar Galactica TV movie is itself one long flashback that has other flashbacks within it. But it works.
Why? Because it allows us to see the good bits without getting bogged down in the boring. During the Season 2/Season 3 jump it skips over a lot of stuff. Most of it probably would have been boring or slow. So they skip it. A few episodes later we get an episode showing us only the most interesting bits that had happened. It allows us the best of both worlds. Along with everything else in the show, it's a fine line that BSG navigates well.
Conclusion
I've enjoyed Battlestar Galactica more than I have other shows in a very long time. It took a while for me to like it as much as I do. Like Stargate Universe it was a good seven episodes before I found myself really caring about what was going on. Maybe that's a problem with me, maybe it's one with the show. I am certaintly glad I stuck with it.
Battlestar manages to wade through countless minefields to come out with fists full of storytelling gold. It not only earns its spot in the Pantheon of Nerdom but is strong enough to defend that spot for decades to come. If you are at all interested in writing, TV, or sci-fi you owe it to yourself to seek this out (it's on Netflix) and give it a watch.
This article is by far the longest I've written for the site. I hope you enjoyed it. If you'd like to see me ramble on other shows, let me know in the comments below.
Wednesday, November 21, 2012
The Art of the Slow Story
In becoming one of the many subscribers to Netflix, I finally got around to watching Freeks and Geeks. For those who don't know Freeks and Geeks was an NBC show back in 1999 about high school kids in 1980. It was produced by Judd Apatow and stars many, many people before they were house hold names including James Franco, Jason Segel and Seth Rogen.
The show is a beloved cult classic amongst the United Kingdoms of Nerdom and has been recommended to me by more people they I can remember. I had watched Undeclared, a kind of pseudo sequel in spirit (also by Apatow) and really enjoyed it, but for whatever reason took my time in finally checking out Freeks and Geeks.
I'm glad I did. The show is well written, had great characters, outstanding acting, and amazing music and above all retains a nostalgic sweetness about it that it makes it comforting to watch. Another peciluar thing about the show, and the impetus for this article is one of its stylistic choices. While the show is essentially a sitcom, it's an hour long as opposed to the half hour standard. Some may argue the show is actually trying to be a teen drama, but the style and writing of the show is much closer to the feel and tropes associated with the sit-com genre.
Some may think that a longer show would make it slow and boreing. After all if you watch a modern sit-com there's a punch line every twenty seconds out of fear that the audiance will get bored and turn their attention elsewhere. That's the conventional wisdom these days, grab your viewer and never let go. If you let them turn away for even a second they'll abandon you forever. I've talked before about how ridiculas I think this is, and I think Freeks and Geeks shows a good example as to why.
Unlike other sit-coms of today the show doesn't pressure it self to be constantly funny. Some of the most hilarious moments are throw away lines at the end of a scene or seemingly random choices by the actors. The dialog remains snappy and quick without taking on the rush, caffeinated tempo that every actor seems to have these days.
It goes beyond merely comedy and dialog though. The longer episode length gives the time to see through an actual episode arc. In most sitcoms things happen so quickly and are resolved so rapidly they rarely feel to have any weight. We see a problem introduced in the first five minutes of a normal sit-com, watch it get resolved in the next ten and then have a five minute resolution. We see so little of the problem's impact that it's hard for it to matter to us as the viewer.
Lastly, it's a matter of character. By having a full hour for the comedy the writers and directors are able to have shots of the characters standing in the hall or sitting around a table. It gives a realism and weight to their lives while giving the actors a chance to show the more subtle workings of their character dynamics. Franco's character showing affection for his girlfriend, or Rogen's awkward aloofness as the one on the outside of the group's circle.
We see full arcs not only of Lindsey (played by the beautiful Linda Cardellini) and her friends but also of her younger brother Sam and his friends in addition to their parents, teachers and others in their lives. All of these peaces come together to create the feeling of a world that is far more real and alive than the simulated realities of today's sitcoms. I think it's one of the reasons this show has remained so loved by so many. By spending an hour with these characters each episode we really got a chance to know them and their struggles, even if the show only did go for one season.
My point is that you don't have to always be in such a rush. You can show your characters standing around to build character and show their dynamics. You can linger in a shot to show the characters awkwardly standing around. Yes, your audience may flee for the entertainment hills off their phones or computers. But they also might stick around and fall in love with your characters because you took the time to show them who they are and why they should care.
The show is a beloved cult classic amongst the United Kingdoms of Nerdom and has been recommended to me by more people they I can remember. I had watched Undeclared, a kind of pseudo sequel in spirit (also by Apatow) and really enjoyed it, but for whatever reason took my time in finally checking out Freeks and Geeks.
I'm glad I did. The show is well written, had great characters, outstanding acting, and amazing music and above all retains a nostalgic sweetness about it that it makes it comforting to watch. Another peciluar thing about the show, and the impetus for this article is one of its stylistic choices. While the show is essentially a sitcom, it's an hour long as opposed to the half hour standard. Some may argue the show is actually trying to be a teen drama, but the style and writing of the show is much closer to the feel and tropes associated with the sit-com genre.
Some may think that a longer show would make it slow and boreing. After all if you watch a modern sit-com there's a punch line every twenty seconds out of fear that the audiance will get bored and turn their attention elsewhere. That's the conventional wisdom these days, grab your viewer and never let go. If you let them turn away for even a second they'll abandon you forever. I've talked before about how ridiculas I think this is, and I think Freeks and Geeks shows a good example as to why.
Unlike other sit-coms of today the show doesn't pressure it self to be constantly funny. Some of the most hilarious moments are throw away lines at the end of a scene or seemingly random choices by the actors. The dialog remains snappy and quick without taking on the rush, caffeinated tempo that every actor seems to have these days.
It goes beyond merely comedy and dialog though. The longer episode length gives the time to see through an actual episode arc. In most sitcoms things happen so quickly and are resolved so rapidly they rarely feel to have any weight. We see a problem introduced in the first five minutes of a normal sit-com, watch it get resolved in the next ten and then have a five minute resolution. We see so little of the problem's impact that it's hard for it to matter to us as the viewer.
Lastly, it's a matter of character. By having a full hour for the comedy the writers and directors are able to have shots of the characters standing in the hall or sitting around a table. It gives a realism and weight to their lives while giving the actors a chance to show the more subtle workings of their character dynamics. Franco's character showing affection for his girlfriend, or Rogen's awkward aloofness as the one on the outside of the group's circle.
We see full arcs not only of Lindsey (played by the beautiful Linda Cardellini) and her friends but also of her younger brother Sam and his friends in addition to their parents, teachers and others in their lives. All of these peaces come together to create the feeling of a world that is far more real and alive than the simulated realities of today's sitcoms. I think it's one of the reasons this show has remained so loved by so many. By spending an hour with these characters each episode we really got a chance to know them and their struggles, even if the show only did go for one season.
My point is that you don't have to always be in such a rush. You can show your characters standing around to build character and show their dynamics. You can linger in a shot to show the characters awkwardly standing around. Yes, your audience may flee for the entertainment hills off their phones or computers. But they also might stick around and fall in love with your characters because you took the time to show them who they are and why they should care.
Wednesday, October 31, 2012
Off Topic - Halloween
Halloween has always been my favorite holiday. Even when I was too young to trick or treat and had to watch as my brother got ready in his costume, having to be placated with thoughts of next year when it would finally be my turn.
I think a lot of people give Christmas all the love. A supposed time of charity and giving, when we forget our differences and come together as a family. But this is not the case. Sure we give to charity, put a dollar in the jar, mostly out of guilt. We exchange gifts, but do so with family and friends and perhaps the occasional co-worker.
Halloween is the true holiday of charity and community. The underlying principle is that families by candy and then everyone can go around and get a bit here and bit there. However families often buy twice as much as would satisfy their kids for a few days. You have a holiday built on mutual effort for a greater hole. People spend even more money on costumes and decorations to sell the mood for the holiday.
And that's where the true magic of Halloween comes in. Where it proves itself over Christmas. On Halloween even those with out kids take part, handing out candy and decorating their homes. Poor families that can't afford to hand out candy are allowed to take part with out any social stigma or being looked down upon. Rich families too, heading off to their parties or other activites hand out candy or leave some on the front step for the kids eagerly making their way through the neighbor hood.
At any other time kids, wandering around in the anonymity of costume would be cautioned against all the dangers, and yet we come together to keep watch over the village. Worrying about each other instead of our selves.
Halloween, with it's costumes and make up personifies the breaking down of all barriers, social and economic for a common community celebration. It is the one holiday where we get to forget our troubles, pretend to be someone else and work together for a global enjoyment.
Halloween has always been my favorite holiday, and will continue to be, perhaps, forever. So remember next Halloween when you're wondering if it's worth the effort, if it's worth the money and time to sit out front and hand out candy. This is the one holiday that shows the true virtue and companionship of humanity.
I think a lot of people give Christmas all the love. A supposed time of charity and giving, when we forget our differences and come together as a family. But this is not the case. Sure we give to charity, put a dollar in the jar, mostly out of guilt. We exchange gifts, but do so with family and friends and perhaps the occasional co-worker.
Halloween is the true holiday of charity and community. The underlying principle is that families by candy and then everyone can go around and get a bit here and bit there. However families often buy twice as much as would satisfy their kids for a few days. You have a holiday built on mutual effort for a greater hole. People spend even more money on costumes and decorations to sell the mood for the holiday.
And that's where the true magic of Halloween comes in. Where it proves itself over Christmas. On Halloween even those with out kids take part, handing out candy and decorating their homes. Poor families that can't afford to hand out candy are allowed to take part with out any social stigma or being looked down upon. Rich families too, heading off to their parties or other activites hand out candy or leave some on the front step for the kids eagerly making their way through the neighbor hood.
At any other time kids, wandering around in the anonymity of costume would be cautioned against all the dangers, and yet we come together to keep watch over the village. Worrying about each other instead of our selves.
Halloween, with it's costumes and make up personifies the breaking down of all barriers, social and economic for a common community celebration. It is the one holiday where we get to forget our troubles, pretend to be someone else and work together for a global enjoyment.
Halloween has always been my favorite holiday, and will continue to be, perhaps, forever. So remember next Halloween when you're wondering if it's worth the effort, if it's worth the money and time to sit out front and hand out candy. This is the one holiday that shows the true virtue and companionship of humanity.
Monday, October 22, 2012
Climbing The Mountain
On last week's episode of the AtT Podcast Tyler asked me about my
writing. I gave a muddled answer, due in large part to the drunks
yelling in the background. Since then I've thought about it a little bit more. I'm not going to talk about my process so much as my evolution as a writer. Though I am still young in this passion of mine, maybe my perspective can help others out there.
I started writing a few years back. Around the end of 2007. I took a stab at it. Played around with it for month or so and then didn't write much of anything over the next year. After that I got a little more serious about it. I started learning about it and tried to practice it more often. There were still periods where I didn't write anything for months at a time. Seasons alternating between being knee deep in it and forgetting about entirely.
Over those years I tired to get myself to write more and more frequently. I eventually got it to where I was writing one a week at least. I had studied it in depth, read countless articles and listened to countless interviews. I had thought about the craft from every angle I could think of. I finally started to feel like I got it. Like I was a writer.
I was of course wrong. My writing was still terrible. I cringe to even think of going back and reading some of that stuff. Around the winter of 2010/2011 something strange happened. Out of nowhere I took a break from writing that lasted almost two months. It wasn't intentional. I had gotten promoted to a supervisory position at my crappy retail job. I flew back home for the birth of my niece. Life seemed to have gotten in the way, and my writing fell by the wayside.
However, something else came out of that time. Something that would forever change me as a writer. That was the period when I came up with Icarus. That sci-fi project of my started as an exercise. I'm interested in all mediums and genres and try to experiment with them whenever I can. Especially if I'm in a period where I don't have an idea I'm super excited to work on. That was more of a problem then, not as much these days.
I sat down one day with the thought of "If I were to do a sci-fi story, what would it be?" That was it. A simple lowly thought, on par with a writing prompt. Nothing special about it. But it was in chasing that question down it's impossibly long rabbit hole that I came up with Icarus. Before Icarus, I never worried about Worldbuilding. Most of what I wrote was either modern or so close to it as to not warrent much thought. I never thought about characters, most of them were normal people with normal backgrounds.
Icarus changed all of that. The political and economic landscape of the world required that I knew where my characters stood on the important issues, and therefore, was backgrounds informed those beliefs. Icarus forced me to think of worlds and peoples and technologies, of details that I would have never bothered to think of. It elevated me to a new level of writing.
Over the last year, I challenged myself to write every single day. I don't always meet the challenge. I seem to still miss a handful of days a month. Most often when I've just finished a draft and we have a podcast to record and edit.
I find and interesting pattern in other writers, and in myself. It seems that when we fist start out we know how bad our writing is. We stumble in the dark, attempting to learn the trade and hope that someday will get better. We might sit with a grin on our face as we pound the keys or as the pen scrawls across the page, but in the cold hard light of editing we realize how bad it is.
Then we reach a level of comfort. We know writing. We've settled in for its challenges, for its ebbs and flows. We eagerly look forward to the day when we will be battle hardened vets of it's corpse strewn fields.
I've found though, that at certain points I reach an entirely new stratosphere, a new league where it seem like I'm back on the bottom. Like I am once more the rookie learning the ropes. Sure I have all my lessons and experience from before, but up here, in these new realms it doesn't seem as important, as powerful as it did before.
I'm talking about when you see other writers who are better. No matter how good you get there's always a writer you look at and curse your own inability, wishing you could be better. I had that recently with Rian Johnson and Looper. Or Nolan and Inception, or Whedon and the Firefly pilot. Things that are so masterful, you wonder if you will ever get as good as them.
No, I mean with yourself, with your own assesment of your skill. You reach a point where you realize of far you've come and how far you have yet to go.
I was thinking about it in terms of hiking up a mountain. In the beginning you're lost in the woods, the sun blocked by the leaves overhead. Distracted by the chirping of birds and rustling of rabbits. You walk for what feels like forever. Eventually you become one with the woods. You know the animals and the sounds they make. You deftly step over fallen branches and gnarled roots. Nothing on the forest floors can trip you up.
Then there comes this moment, when you exit the woods. You find yourself on a plateau of rock. Stretched out in the valley beneath you is and endless forest. You can see a wide river snaking it's way between the trees.
The entire time you had been walking you failed to notice the subtle incline, failed to notice how high up you were getting. Yet here you stand. Seeing the miles and miles in which you traveled. You feel a huge since of achievement, seeing the distance you covered, knowing you've done on your own power. The advice of those who had made the journey before you echoing within your mind.
You turn away from the valley, eying the summit of the mountain stretching up into the clouds. You think of the masters that await you there, and the long journey still ahead.
This is the life that awaits us as writers. This is joy that we get to feel as we create worlds and twist lives. We stride alone in the valley of the gods, comforted by the whispers of those that had traveled there before us.
I took my first steps on that journey a few years ago. I didn't intend to take my last for a very, very long time.
I started writing a few years back. Around the end of 2007. I took a stab at it. Played around with it for month or so and then didn't write much of anything over the next year. After that I got a little more serious about it. I started learning about it and tried to practice it more often. There were still periods where I didn't write anything for months at a time. Seasons alternating between being knee deep in it and forgetting about entirely.
Over those years I tired to get myself to write more and more frequently. I eventually got it to where I was writing one a week at least. I had studied it in depth, read countless articles and listened to countless interviews. I had thought about the craft from every angle I could think of. I finally started to feel like I got it. Like I was a writer.
I was of course wrong. My writing was still terrible. I cringe to even think of going back and reading some of that stuff. Around the winter of 2010/2011 something strange happened. Out of nowhere I took a break from writing that lasted almost two months. It wasn't intentional. I had gotten promoted to a supervisory position at my crappy retail job. I flew back home for the birth of my niece. Life seemed to have gotten in the way, and my writing fell by the wayside.
However, something else came out of that time. Something that would forever change me as a writer. That was the period when I came up with Icarus. That sci-fi project of my started as an exercise. I'm interested in all mediums and genres and try to experiment with them whenever I can. Especially if I'm in a period where I don't have an idea I'm super excited to work on. That was more of a problem then, not as much these days.
I sat down one day with the thought of "If I were to do a sci-fi story, what would it be?" That was it. A simple lowly thought, on par with a writing prompt. Nothing special about it. But it was in chasing that question down it's impossibly long rabbit hole that I came up with Icarus. Before Icarus, I never worried about Worldbuilding. Most of what I wrote was either modern or so close to it as to not warrent much thought. I never thought about characters, most of them were normal people with normal backgrounds.
Icarus changed all of that. The political and economic landscape of the world required that I knew where my characters stood on the important issues, and therefore, was backgrounds informed those beliefs. Icarus forced me to think of worlds and peoples and technologies, of details that I would have never bothered to think of. It elevated me to a new level of writing.
Over the last year, I challenged myself to write every single day. I don't always meet the challenge. I seem to still miss a handful of days a month. Most often when I've just finished a draft and we have a podcast to record and edit.
The Mountain
I find and interesting pattern in other writers, and in myself. It seems that when we fist start out we know how bad our writing is. We stumble in the dark, attempting to learn the trade and hope that someday will get better. We might sit with a grin on our face as we pound the keys or as the pen scrawls across the page, but in the cold hard light of editing we realize how bad it is.
Then we reach a level of comfort. We know writing. We've settled in for its challenges, for its ebbs and flows. We eagerly look forward to the day when we will be battle hardened vets of it's corpse strewn fields.
I've found though, that at certain points I reach an entirely new stratosphere, a new league where it seem like I'm back on the bottom. Like I am once more the rookie learning the ropes. Sure I have all my lessons and experience from before, but up here, in these new realms it doesn't seem as important, as powerful as it did before.
I'm talking about when you see other writers who are better. No matter how good you get there's always a writer you look at and curse your own inability, wishing you could be better. I had that recently with Rian Johnson and Looper. Or Nolan and Inception, or Whedon and the Firefly pilot. Things that are so masterful, you wonder if you will ever get as good as them.
No, I mean with yourself, with your own assesment of your skill. You reach a point where you realize of far you've come and how far you have yet to go.
I was thinking about it in terms of hiking up a mountain. In the beginning you're lost in the woods, the sun blocked by the leaves overhead. Distracted by the chirping of birds and rustling of rabbits. You walk for what feels like forever. Eventually you become one with the woods. You know the animals and the sounds they make. You deftly step over fallen branches and gnarled roots. Nothing on the forest floors can trip you up.
Then there comes this moment, when you exit the woods. You find yourself on a plateau of rock. Stretched out in the valley beneath you is and endless forest. You can see a wide river snaking it's way between the trees.
The entire time you had been walking you failed to notice the subtle incline, failed to notice how high up you were getting. Yet here you stand. Seeing the miles and miles in which you traveled. You feel a huge since of achievement, seeing the distance you covered, knowing you've done on your own power. The advice of those who had made the journey before you echoing within your mind.
You turn away from the valley, eying the summit of the mountain stretching up into the clouds. You think of the masters that await you there, and the long journey still ahead.
This is the life that awaits us as writers. This is joy that we get to feel as we create worlds and twist lives. We stride alone in the valley of the gods, comforted by the whispers of those that had traveled there before us.
I took my first steps on that journey a few years ago. I didn't intend to take my last for a very, very long time.
Friday, October 19, 2012
Refilling the Well
I haven't talked about writing for a couple of post, so let's get back to the important stuff.
The well. That thing within us from which draw inspiration. For some it's an aqueduct that once built effortlessly delivers fresh water at a constant pace. For others it take the from of a strip mine. A hole they bore into the earth with metal tools and explosives. A place where they rip out anything and everything that looks valuable to refine and shape later into useful material.
Sometimes that source of inspiration begins to run dry. We glance around the soot covered walls off are mine and see few glints of the precious metals that once lived there. If your a writer who works on their craft every day, it can be discouraging to look down at the paper with no ideas. I think new writers have this problem a lot, mainly because they haven't learned to document and cultivate their ideas. They haven't learned to listen to themselves. But to writers who have been at it a while, writers who have been through periods where they have so many ideas they don't have the time to write them all down. Writers who will fling themselves across a room and empty drawers onto the floor like a wild tornado to get down that great idea on paper. Writers who thought they would be bathing in the heavy downpour of ideas forever.
And then you find yourself staring down at a blank page, pen tapping against your desk with nothing. Cue cliche tumble weed across desolate wasteland. Empty cupboards. River beds of dried, cracked mud. You struggle to come up with the simplest ideas and fail.
Wait. Yep that's it. Bask in the glory of my infinite wisdom. Do Nothing.
Some of the time our wells running dry is from simple exhaustion. I ran into this early this month with my sci-fi/tv project. I had been writing episode after episode and pulling long hours at work,. When it came time to think of another one I had nothing. I slammed my head against that wall for a couple of hours and nothing came out of it. I dug further into the mountain desperate to find another vein of gold only to find worthless rock.
Eventually I gave up, and took two days off from writing. On day three the ideas started flowing again. First a trickle, then a flood. The problem wasn't that the mine had run out of gold, it was that I was too tired to see it. My eyes had become weary and caked in dirt. What little flecks I did see I dismissed as not worth the effort. All I needed was little break to recharge.
I find I don't consume media in a regular fashion. I don't have my regular TV shows that I watch, and intersperse it with movies and books throughout the week. Instead I have lists of things I want to eventually watch or read. A whole list of movies recommended to me by other people, another list for books, yet another for comic books, video games and so on.
Then when i find myself in the mood for a particular something, let's say anime, I'll shotgun entire series in a row. I'll spend two weeks watching nothing but anime for my entertainment and get through entire series in a couple of days. I did this when I caught up with Doctor Who and finally saw Firefly a few years back.
I find it works well in the case of movies, because you get the entire story, concepts, arcs and all in a couple hours. In one weekend you can get through twenty different stories, all exhibiting different genres, characters and plot elements.
The best thing about binge consuming is you get really, really fat with ideas. All those times where you saw the writer take the concept in direction A, but you can take it direction B, stack up and mix in your brain. You rush back to your laptop eager to type because you have so many new ideas to get out there.
Friends can be a fantastic source of ideas, not only in the conversations you have with them and the perspectives they bring to the table, but in simply helping you articulate your own writings and ideas. Friends who are also writers are great for this, as they know what questions to ask when you get stuck. Earlier this month I was talking to Chris of The Archatype about how I was running low on episode ideas. He knew to ask if I had fleshed out my plot lines enough, if there were side characters or sub plots that needed more screen time or fleshing out. While the conversation itself didn't spark any ideas, when the ideas came back and I was ready to write again it spawned ideas on what to focus on.
Those are some of the tricks I have when you find yourself running low on ideas. Also try jumping genres and types of stories. If you're a sci-fi guy try fantasy. Of if you like dark, brooding romances try comedies.
What are some of your tricks for getting ideas? Let me know in the comments below. I'm always looking out for new tips and tricks.
And be sure to check out our Around the Trunk podcast this week when talk Static and Dynamic Characters.
The well. That thing within us from which draw inspiration. For some it's an aqueduct that once built effortlessly delivers fresh water at a constant pace. For others it take the from of a strip mine. A hole they bore into the earth with metal tools and explosives. A place where they rip out anything and everything that looks valuable to refine and shape later into useful material.
Sometimes that source of inspiration begins to run dry. We glance around the soot covered walls off are mine and see few glints of the precious metals that once lived there. If your a writer who works on their craft every day, it can be discouraging to look down at the paper with no ideas. I think new writers have this problem a lot, mainly because they haven't learned to document and cultivate their ideas. They haven't learned to listen to themselves. But to writers who have been at it a while, writers who have been through periods where they have so many ideas they don't have the time to write them all down. Writers who will fling themselves across a room and empty drawers onto the floor like a wild tornado to get down that great idea on paper. Writers who thought they would be bathing in the heavy downpour of ideas forever.
And then you find yourself staring down at a blank page, pen tapping against your desk with nothing. Cue cliche tumble weed across desolate wasteland. Empty cupboards. River beds of dried, cracked mud. You struggle to come up with the simplest ideas and fail.
Solutions
I think every writer has found themselves in this place at some point. And I think many of them find themselves here more often than they'd like to admit. Fear not writers of the world, there are easy ways to fix this.
1. Time Heals All Wounds
Wait. Yep that's it. Bask in the glory of my infinite wisdom. Do Nothing.
Some of the time our wells running dry is from simple exhaustion. I ran into this early this month with my sci-fi/tv project. I had been writing episode after episode and pulling long hours at work,. When it came time to think of another one I had nothing. I slammed my head against that wall for a couple of hours and nothing came out of it. I dug further into the mountain desperate to find another vein of gold only to find worthless rock.
Eventually I gave up, and took two days off from writing. On day three the ideas started flowing again. First a trickle, then a flood. The problem wasn't that the mine had run out of gold, it was that I was too tired to see it. My eyes had become weary and caked in dirt. What little flecks I did see I dismissed as not worth the effort. All I needed was little break to recharge.
2. Binge Consumption
This is one of my favorite methods for finding new ideas. Mostly because it involves avoiding work,.
I find I don't consume media in a regular fashion. I don't have my regular TV shows that I watch, and intersperse it with movies and books throughout the week. Instead I have lists of things I want to eventually watch or read. A whole list of movies recommended to me by other people, another list for books, yet another for comic books, video games and so on.
Then when i find myself in the mood for a particular something, let's say anime, I'll shotgun entire series in a row. I'll spend two weeks watching nothing but anime for my entertainment and get through entire series in a couple of days. I did this when I caught up with Doctor Who and finally saw Firefly a few years back.
I find it works well in the case of movies, because you get the entire story, concepts, arcs and all in a couple hours. In one weekend you can get through twenty different stories, all exhibiting different genres, characters and plot elements.
The best thing about binge consuming is you get really, really fat with ideas. All those times where you saw the writer take the concept in direction A, but you can take it direction B, stack up and mix in your brain. You rush back to your laptop eager to type because you have so many new ideas to get out there.
3. Friends
Yes, they are actually useful for something. I know, I know, I was surprised to. Turns out they aren't useless sacks of meat flesh that live only to get in your way.
Friends can be a fantastic source of ideas, not only in the conversations you have with them and the perspectives they bring to the table, but in simply helping you articulate your own writings and ideas. Friends who are also writers are great for this, as they know what questions to ask when you get stuck. Earlier this month I was talking to Chris of The Archatype about how I was running low on episode ideas. He knew to ask if I had fleshed out my plot lines enough, if there were side characters or sub plots that needed more screen time or fleshing out. While the conversation itself didn't spark any ideas, when the ideas came back and I was ready to write again it spawned ideas on what to focus on.
Yeah, I Thought The List Was Going To Be Longer
Those are some of the tricks I have when you find yourself running low on ideas. Also try jumping genres and types of stories. If you're a sci-fi guy try fantasy. Of if you like dark, brooding romances try comedies.
What are some of your tricks for getting ideas? Let me know in the comments below. I'm always looking out for new tips and tricks.
And be sure to check out our Around the Trunk podcast this week when talk Static and Dynamic Characters.
Thursday, October 18, 2012
Charity Idea, I know it's Not Writing, Hear Me Out
I posted this to reddit and twitter earlier. I came up with this around three am last night, trying to get some feedback on the idea, see if it's worth pursuing.
Imagine a crowd sourcing
site like Kickstarter, only instead of launching projects it would be
for charity, and the draw would be celebrities agreeing to do nude photo
shoots. Just hear me out.
It would work like this. Any celebrity could be submitted to the site, male or female. Their name and photo of them would appear with a grayed out donate button.
If the celebrity was interested they could contact the admins, and set an amount and a charity. So let's say celebrity "A" sets 1,000,000 and the red cross. The amount and charity would go up and people could click the donate button and donate any amount they want. When the goal is reached, the celebrity chooses a photographer of their choice, takes the nudes and posts them online to their own site, reddit, twitter whatever or a partner site to the main one.
That's the base idea, here are some of the finer details.
The celeb could set whatever amount they want. Unlike Kickstarter which works off a pledge system, the donations would be immediate, ensuring the amount is collected before the celeb delivers. If the goal is not met, the money is donated to the charity anyway. If the celeb backs out, the money is refunded to the donors.
Like Kickstarter, they could set tiers, both in terms of goals and donations. For instance, for 100k they do a lingerie shoot, for 250k they do topless and for 500k they do full nudity (or whatever amounts they decide). If a specific donor gives a certain amount they could get an autographed print or request a position or body part or something.
The site would not take any percentage of the money, it would all go to charity. The photographers could either donate their time or be payed for out of the donation fund. All charities and organizations chosen by the celebrity would be vetted to guard against fraud.
The idea is that while many actresses would never pose in playboy for self gain, they might do so for charity, and while it's hard to get people to put a dollar in the salvation army bucket, they would give a dollar without hesitation to see their favorite actress nude.
The celebs could state up from what they would do for the goal, so no one feels mislead. They would state the types of posses or body parts they'd be willing to show and could even do video shoots.
I think this could raise a lot of money, it would need a reputable backer, maybe like kickstarter, and someone to co-ordinate with the charities and at least one celeb to be the first to volunteer.
Anyway, let me know what you think, and if there are any obvious holes/faults I've missed. Don't forget to upvote, if we could this thing some visibility it might take off.
Added Later:
Was thinking some more about this.
The celebs name would on a bar in list format, when clicked it would drop down and show what the celeb has agreed to and the benchmarks, or information about the charity with links.
Also you could add in a thumbs up system or similar for celebs who have not yet agreed to show their popularity and demand and help show them the potential good they could do.
You can join the discussion at: http://www.reddit.com/r/ideas/comments/11ogd7/charity_crowdsourcing_with_celeb_nudity_sfw_hear/
It would work like this. Any celebrity could be submitted to the site, male or female. Their name and photo of them would appear with a grayed out donate button.
If the celebrity was interested they could contact the admins, and set an amount and a charity. So let's say celebrity "A" sets 1,000,000 and the red cross. The amount and charity would go up and people could click the donate button and donate any amount they want. When the goal is reached, the celebrity chooses a photographer of their choice, takes the nudes and posts them online to their own site, reddit, twitter whatever or a partner site to the main one.
That's the base idea, here are some of the finer details.
The celeb could set whatever amount they want. Unlike Kickstarter which works off a pledge system, the donations would be immediate, ensuring the amount is collected before the celeb delivers. If the goal is not met, the money is donated to the charity anyway. If the celeb backs out, the money is refunded to the donors.
Like Kickstarter, they could set tiers, both in terms of goals and donations. For instance, for 100k they do a lingerie shoot, for 250k they do topless and for 500k they do full nudity (or whatever amounts they decide). If a specific donor gives a certain amount they could get an autographed print or request a position or body part or something.
The site would not take any percentage of the money, it would all go to charity. The photographers could either donate their time or be payed for out of the donation fund. All charities and organizations chosen by the celebrity would be vetted to guard against fraud.
The idea is that while many actresses would never pose in playboy for self gain, they might do so for charity, and while it's hard to get people to put a dollar in the salvation army bucket, they would give a dollar without hesitation to see their favorite actress nude.
The celebs could state up from what they would do for the goal, so no one feels mislead. They would state the types of posses or body parts they'd be willing to show and could even do video shoots.
I think this could raise a lot of money, it would need a reputable backer, maybe like kickstarter, and someone to co-ordinate with the charities and at least one celeb to be the first to volunteer.
Anyway, let me know what you think, and if there are any obvious holes/faults I've missed. Don't forget to upvote, if we could this thing some visibility it might take off.
Added Later:
Was thinking some more about this.
The celebs name would on a bar in list format, when clicked it would drop down and show what the celeb has agreed to and the benchmarks, or information about the charity with links.
Also you could add in a thumbs up system or similar for celebs who have not yet agreed to show their popularity and demand and help show them the potential good they could do.
You can join the discussion at: http://www.reddit.com/r/ideas/comments/11ogd7/charity_crowdsourcing_with_celeb_nudity_sfw_hear/
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