SMC: Character Arcs

This fun panel was brought to us by Jordan McCollum who also made access to her Prezi (like Powerpoint but cooler) via her website. So if my notes don’t make any sense, you can always check out hers. Plus she’s got links and sources. Nothing but the best for all of you peeps.

CHARACTER ARCS

Your character needs to have made some change by the end of your story. This can be many different types of change. Examples:

• Mystery to truth
• Fear to courage
• Ambition to destruction
• Doubt to decision

The internal journey is a major part of the elixir—the process of fixing what’s wrong in his/her life. Sometimes this can be more compelling than the external prize he/she can gain.

What if you don’t know your characters well enough yet? Are you trying to find a good internal conflict, or you still can’t figure out how the external events of the plot are going to affect them internally?

Focus on what motivates your character. Is it her:

• Profession
• Hobbies
• Journey & changes in the story

What compels her to go on this journey with you? What are her values? What does she prize above all else?

PERSEVERER

Let’s pretend our MC is going on the show “Perserverer” (think Survivor, but since that’s copyrighted, we’re using this title instead). Why would our MC be going on the show? Money is the obvious reason, but it’s got to be more than that to be a compelling story.

The external events of the story directly influence the character’s emotional journey. A well-executed internal character journey is intertwined with the external plot. The events of the plot show the characters’ starting and ending points. But the external plot’s events also force the change and show the stages of the journey throughout.

When your writing the conflict, you’ve got to take it way back. The starting point 1) must be shown and 2) it must be bad. You must have it on screen. You can’t have people tell the reader about it nor can you just tell the reader about it.

Michael Hauge says there are plenty of ways to create the starting point. It can be:

• Longing
• Wound (something that’s really affected them)
• Belief (start wrong, lead them to assume a mask)
• Mask (not who they truly are)
• Essence

An example of this for character arcs can be Shrek. He believes that because he is an ogre everyone will run away from and fear him and so he wears that mask making it a self-fulfilling prophecy.

But when you’re writing these arcs, don’t forget character sympathy! If they just let life keep kicking them, it’s hard to sympathize with them. Make sure they have struggles AND strengths.

The emotional starting point must be BAD, so bad that the character must fix it. They’ve probably already learned how to cope with it, but when the story begins you must weave something in so that when they face it this time they have to do something more to overcome it. And the more ingrained this is the harder it is to change.

Go back to Shrek. He’s so convinced about his mask of being “the ogre” he’ll even travel to Lord Farquaad’s kingdom to have him order people away when secretly what he wants is acceptance. He’ll do everything he can to keep people away, to hide his vulnerability.

“Save the Cat” is a great book on story telling. Some pieces of advice from this book is to make sure you take a step back. We must show the audience everything, and sometimes you have to make it worse for your character.

Character-driven fiction is about internal change. -Alicia Rasley

THE SAGGING MIDDLE

Sometimes in between the starting point (or inciting incident) and the climax, our stories drag in the middle. Our character may retreat into the familiar and failure.

• link the external events and internal arc in stimulus/response units (I think you could also call it action/reaction).
• character should try to maintain their world view most of the story—doesn’t want to change.
• character is presented with real choices, stacked choices
• they may make a wrong choice, and slowly they’ll learn their old world view isn’t working.
• choices hurt him until he has no other choice or realizes he needs to make better choices.

TWO STEPS FORWARD, ONE STEP BACK

Make every response somehow different, and then assemble them in order of emotional risk. -Alicia Rasley

THE CLIMAX

In the ultimate moment of character change, show that the character has learned his lesson and can defeat the bad guy.

Set up the bad guy (internal, external, weather, whatever) the right way. Align the bad guy with the mask. Going back to Shrek: I’m a big scary ogre, the bad guy believes the same.

Show how the MC is (or has been) like the bad guy. Make the MC choose and affirm the choice.

TIMING

We want the internal and external climax to come as close together as possible. Readers will only believe the internal change if they see it on an external level. -Alicia Rasley

So how do you have a fulfilling ending, even if your character doesn’t achieve his/her external goal? (Hint: it’s the title of this notes post…)

CHARACTER ARCS IN RELATIONSHIP STORIES (NOT JUST ROMANCE, BUT OFTEN)

Each charcter in the main relationship needs their own arc, needs their own wound, and/or their own mask. The love interest must be able to see past the mask eventually to the character’s true essence. The MC will have problems with their love interest when they retreat behind their mask. The MC’s wound should somehow match the strength, personality, etc. something about the love interest/buddy. This trait helps heal the character’s wound. (Think Donkey and Shrek. Donkey is good at talking and relating to people. He helps Shrek gather the courage to share his true feelings with Fiona, something he wouldn’t have done before.)

ARE THERE CHARACTERS THAT DON’T ARC?

Yes. They are often seen in series. They already have larger than life qualities and often go on larger-than-life adventures. (James Bond, Indiana Jones) This isn’t as common as it used to be with readers. Most these days like being with a character that arcs. You know, like Harry Potter.

Or this guy:

 

Character arcs in fiction show the power of transformative experiences. Watching that tranformation, rooting for it, and growing the character are the major reasons we read fiction.

What do you think? Do you plan character arcs into your stories? What tips do you have for those trying to figure out their character arcs? Do you miss David Tennant? Anything else you would add?

May the 4th

Happy Star Wars Day everyone!

Since it’s May and since I feel like it, all of May will have Star Wars references, pics, memes—whatever it is, it’ll have some Star Wars reference guaranteed.

There’s so much awesome Star Wars fan art, videos, cool stuff out there. And I think most of that is due to George Lucas being a bit lax with his copyrights. Say what you will about the man and his botching the prequels, but he doesn’t sue and the fans keep the culture alive. Some people with big media assets could learn a lesson from him.

It’s interesting, isn’t it, that there’s not really a geeky fan name for Star Wars fans? Not like Whovians, Trekkies, and Browncoats. I guess we could be Star Warriors. I don’t know. Maybe it’s because we want the name Star Wars to say out there.

Anyways, I just wanted to let you all know on this May the 4th that Star Wars will be honored. Look forward to things you may have seen, new things you may not have, and a whole lot of hoopla. I’ll figure some way to tie it all into writing. Enjoy!

Friday Flix: Roswell

Welcome to another edition of Friday Flix. Since the BFF and I recently visited New Mexico, interesting in watching Roswell spiked, and as it’s available on Netflix, I gave it a go. I knew what this show was going into it (teen drama) but I’d watched Dawson’s Creek back in the day, so I figured it would probably be something like that.

For those that don’t know, here’s the Roswell description from Netflix:

In Roswell, New Mexico, human/alien hybrids Max, Isabel and Michael closely guard their true identities from enemies while forging romances with classmates and gradually discovering their destiny to save their home planet.

Seems like the perfect formula for a teen drama right? Girl meets boy who’s not human, and he’s the forbidden fruit, but he can’t stay away from her and no one can know their secret. (Sounds like a few other familiar plots out there, right?)

ROSWELL THE CITY

Having been to Roswell in person, they didn’t do a bad job pretending the part of California they filmed in was New Mexico. But I did notice the mountains in the background a lot (not really the case in Roswell), and sometimes the city looked way bigger than it actually was. But for those that have been dying to know, no, there isn’t a Crashdown Cafe in the real Roswell. Not even anything close. In fact, the real Roswell could take lessons from the show on how to promote tourism when it comes to restaurants. Not that I’m complaining too much. Big D’s Downtown Dive is still calling my name with those ridiculous Monte Cristo sandwiches.

Mmm… I still love you!

Anyways, I’d be willing to let these details go if the rest of the story was more interesting. And it was… for awhile. I made it 10 whole episodes before I decided lits (life is too short).

LEADING MAN

“I’m boring… so boring…” via Wiki

Roswell was out right in the height of major WB (now called the CW) popularity. We had Dawson’s Creek, Buffy the Vampire Slayer, and Smallville for that matter. So a lot of these characters feel the same across the teenage drama-verse. Which is interesting to note a lot of this stuff is almost formulaic, but in the right hands can be fantastic, and in the wrong, boring.

Okay, if we’re being honest, I probably couldn’t stand a re-watch of Dawson’s Creek for the same reasons. The leading man. He had mysterious going for him, but once we realize he’s an alien pretending like he knows anything about what’s going on, blaaaah… He’s got that too perfect character vibe. He could be a robot and show the same amount of emotion. By episode ten I’m already ready for Liz to break up with his “yes-let’s-get-together-no-wait-I’m-an-alien-so-we-can’t” attitude.

Supposedly the leading man, Max, has loved Liz his whole life and risked everything saving her life, but risking a romance is too dangerous. Why? It worked out all right for Superman. Geez, it even worked out for Edward and Bella. I guess Max’s excuse is, well, I want to protect you from the difficulty being with me could be. *eye roll* *gag* I know, it’s all for drama, but Max is a robot who probably likes feeling like he has to suffer. *yawn*

“Did someone call my name?”

Let’s take Clark Kent from Smallville in the almost exact same situation. You know more than anything he wants to be with Lana (then Lois). And he’ll take whatever risks necessary, even to his own detriment. He’s a character of action. And when he can’t have Lana, he tries dating other girls in the meantime to see if she’s really the one.

Maybe that’s the problem. Roswell is too much about their relationship while Smallville is more about the superpowers and the relationship is a subplot. I don’t know. Feel free to disagree with me in the comments. Max is just dry, boring toast. Period.

Friday Flix: Adventure Time

What time is it? Adventure Time! Not that I need to convince many of you to watch Adventure Time. But since I got the first season on DVD and it’s what I’ve been watching, here we go.

I remember way back in the day when Adventure Time was nothing more than a sample Nicktoon of 7 minutes or so. Yep, that’s right, Adventure Time was originally a Nickelodeon product. But because the execs at Nick were a bunch of patoots and couldn’t see the potential in the short, it was Cartoon Network that gobbled the goodness up.

And is anyone really surprised it’s Cartoon Network that took a chance on Adventure Time? If there’s one thing I really miss not having cable, it’s the Food Network. But an almost tie would have to be Cartoon Network. Shoot, I remember when CN was just a fledgling network too. Good times…

Anyway, back to Adventure Time. What is it about? From IMDB.com

A human boy and his brother – a magical dog – set out to become righteous adventurers in the Land of Ooo.

To be honest, this show is very absurdist in its approach to plot—a bit like the Simpsons. But having been a film school kiddie, the thing is you start to feel like you’ve seen everything, so something like Adventure Time comes as a breath of fresh air. I like the absurdism because life generally doesn’t make much sense either, at least while you’re in the middle of living it.

To give you another reference, it’s kind of like the kiddie version of Napoleon Dynamite style humor. Stuff just happens, often in strange or unexpected ways. Of course for Finn and Jake, it’s far more adventurous.

Weekend Struggles

This weekend was all about Pitch Wars, or more specifically, making needed changes to SHADE to get it ready for the final round of Pitch Wars. But good gracious, was SHADE frustrating the jujubes out of me!

I had lots of ideas, but was lacking in the rights ones for the first chapter. I know I could work on other parts of the book in the meantime to give myself a rest (and I did do a little outlining) but here’s the thing for me: I have to have at least scaffolding up in the beginning so I can see where the story is going in later chapters. Editing is like time traveling, alter one thing and the future may be completely different.

A lot of changes hinged on the first chapter, hence the frustration. Something I like to do when I need to change up a scene, is outline a bunch of different possibilities and see where they lead. It’s kind of like pantsing before the writing. I follow the path until I hit a roadblock, something that must be altered in the future to make sense. Then I have to decide if I want the story to head in that direction or not.

Now this isn’t my first fight with a story. This is usually what happens and certainly what happened over the summer. So I knew eventually something good would come of it. But it was getting frustrating, I think, because Saturday was my big free day for writing and as the evening wore on and I realized I probably wouldn’t get beyond Chapter One, my frustration level rose as well.

The trouble is it’s hard to ask for any kind of advice on these sorts of things. Who knows your story better than you?

Needless to say, after more than 12 hours of struggle, I pulled something out, some scaffolding I’m fairly satisfied with. It was odd, because it was a direction I’d wanted to implement over the summer, but it never quite came out, so I didn’t go with it. This time I think it may work better and will make my MC’s reactions a little more logical.

So the struggle, in the end, was worth it.

Fortunately I have the day off work tomorrow for New Year’s, so hopefully I can move forward in more significant ways—at least significant in writing vs. plotting. There may be another struggle ahead, but the nice thing about overcoming one challenge is you know it’s possible to defeat the next one.

Have you had any struggles in your writing lately that frustrated you to the max? What do you do when you have a challenge you need to overcome? If you ask friends for advice, what do you find is the best way to ask for it?