Taven Moore's Blog, page 48

Promises, Promises

Promises

When you write, you’re making a promise to the reader.

In the case of most genre fiction, you’re promising the reader that you’re going to entertain them.

In the case of any book, you should be promising not to waste the reader’s time.

You are promising interesting characters and worlds and plots and all the things that a reader expects when they pick up a book.

That’s important, because half of your promise is in the mind of the reader and you can’t control that promise.

The character I despise may be beloved to another reader. The prose I love may be boring to another reader.

Thing is? You CAN control the other half of the promises, by making sure they meet YOUR requirements as a reader.

Types of Promises

There are multiple kinds of promises. Characters, plots, objects … too many to name.

It’s when you accidentally make a promise and don’t realize it that you start getting into deep trouble.

Jack let out a long breath as he ducked behind a vibrant purple cargo container whose contents hummed, a deep vibration that set Jack’s bones to thrumming. Nobody else seemed to notice, but the container glowed, just a bit, when all the lights were off.

Jack waited for the guard to complete his circuit. The guard, whose name was Silvester Von Peeblesmith, in no way lived up to the pitiful image of his name. Silver, as they called him, was broad, tall, muscular, and as like to shove a bayonet down your throat as wish you good morning and ask to see your papers. Jack had been dodging him for weeks now, but the ship was going to dock soon. He hadn’t been discovered as a stowaway yet, and he had no plans of losing that bet today.

What promises are in there? What things might a reader expect me to follow up on which might end up with some kind of disappointment if I don’t follow through?

1) The cargo container. I didn’t just say it was a container … I told you it was VIBRANT PURPLE and had humming contents and glowed at night. How would you feel if I never mentioned the containers or their possible cargo throughout the rest of the story? One hopes that the contents are actually CENTRAL to the story, given how much detail I gave you. Is it some illicit substance? A magical ore or perhaps even a creature contained against its will? Why is no one else noticing? Is it because there’s some connection between Jack and that cargo?

2) Silver, the guard who was more than just a nameless, faceless guard. I told you his name, I described him, and I gave you pretty good reason to dislike him. He’d better be at least a minor character for me to have given him so much face time.

3) Stowaway. I told you the main character is skulking around on a ship. This one’s more subtle than the others … but if he just merrily skips off the ship without any complications or being discovered, then that is also a broken promise.

4) “bet” — I mentioned that the character didn’t want to lose a bet. We’d better find out what kind of bet he made AND we’d better establish him as a betting man. Why would he make the wager? Is he desperate, or just thrill-seeking?

5) “bayonet” “ship” “dock” — I’ve given tiny hints of setting here. If the next chapter has modern-day guns and tanks, you’re probably going to wonder just what happened.

First Drafts

As a writer, it’s dead simple to make a dozen broken promises when you’re writing. You think it’ll be fun to have the character pull out a ceremonial knife, or detail the history of the mega-trailer parks that your character grew up in.

Great.

Fantastic.

But … if you never use that knife again, or if the trailer park info doesn’t come into play later, then you are wasting my time, breaking your promises to me.

You highlight something, shine a bright beam of focus with your adjectives and names and scream to me that I should PAY ATTENTION BECAUSE THIS MATTERS.

The first time I realize it doesn’t matter, I lose faith in your ability to keep your promises to me.

Revisions

Revisions are where you go through and ask yourself … what promises did I :

Intend to make?
Accidentally make?

Maybe I intended to use the purple boxes and completely forgot to follow-through on them. I should delete the descriptors of the box when I’m revising, to dial the importance of the cargo back to where it actually fits in the story.

Maybe I hadn’t intended it, but by the end of the novel, it became really important that Jack has a pet monkeybird that helps him out of scrapes. I need to go back and add the monkeybird here, at the beginning, so the importance makes sense.

Maybe I began writing with the idea that Silver would be the bulldog-guard-who-never-gives-up, but by the end, I realized that he’s going to swap sides and become Jack’s companion. I should maybe tone down his intro here so it doesn’t sound quite so unforgiving.

Remember

First drafts are for you. They’re playing, sketching, drafting, goofing off. Make as many promises as you like. Try them on for size, see how they feel.

Revisions are for your readers, and even if they’re not as much fun as fingerpainting, you’re not likely to sell your work if you can’t be arsed to go back through and clean up all the little loose ends and oopses.

Also, don’t revise until you FINISH. Until you put THE END at the capstone, you may not know for sure whether that purple box is important. Leave it alone, even if you’re pretty sure it needs to change. Make yourself a note if it makes you feel better, but DON’T TOUCH IT.

*swats your hand*

Your turn!

Anyone out there come across any broken promises in video games, movies, tv shows, or books you’ve read?

How about any super-incredibly-awesome fulfilled promises?

 

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[Perry] Not Everything Needs to Make Sense

Do you know that people often don’t make a lick of sense?

No, really, I’m not kidding.

It can be hard sometimes to write natural conversation between two characters and it’s important to understand at those times that almost nobody makes sense all the time.

Think of your day to day conversations and how many things you say that don’t really make sense…

…no? It’s just me?

Okay…

Anyway, they say that a picture’s worth a thousand words but I don’t have a picture that can demonstrate nonsensical conversational leaps so I’m going to tell you a story instead.

I was with my cousins one day and we were playing a party game, you know those games where you get a prompt and your partner needs to guess what it is based on what you say and act out?

I was partnered with my younger cousin and I got the prompt of “David Beckham,” and I remember thinking that I was screwed. I wasn’t sure that my cousin knew who the hell David Beckham was; hell, I barely knew who David Beckham was…but in the spirit of the game, I decided to give it my best shot.

I stood up and did a soccer kicking motion, from which he managed “soccer player!”

Now, I remember thinking very clearly to myself, “okay, all I need to do now is break out that English accent and I’ll be home free. C’mon brain, time to shine!”

And for SOME reason that I still can’t figure out, what happened instead was this bizarre, extremely enthusiastic saluting motion accompanied by, “G’day mate! G’day mate!”

I’d JUST started to think, “wait a minute…that doesn’t sound right…” when my cousin shot up in the air shouting, “David Beckham!”

I was excited because we won and me and my cousin high-fived but then I had to stop and wonder for a moment.

How DID he get that? There was nothing linking the second half of my clue to the right answer and yet…somehow his mind made the right intuitive leap, even though it didn’t seem to make any goddamn sense at all, and struck upon the correct answer.

From what I’ve seen, people do this sort of thing all the time in conversation. They make crazy intuitive leaps, they go on huge tangents for no reason and never return to their original topic or they just plain don’t make sense but think that they do.

Including a little bit of this into your own character dialogue wouldn’t be a very bad thing. Not every single line has to make sense all the time, you know? Go for that touch of realism and let things get a little nonsensical once in a while.

Just so long as your intuitive leap is not what solves the overall plot or is as crazy and convoluted as a certain, renowned Sicilian (please? Anybody?), you should be just fine.

Related posts:

[Perry] Write What You Know

[Perry] How to Scare People

Borderlands 2

So there’s this game out. Borderlands 2. Maybe you’ve heard of it.

I love it.

Borderlands 1

So Borderlands 1 was a great game. We came to it late (just a few weeks before Borderlands 2 came out) and thus got the package with all of the dlc at a bargain price.

I am SO glad we did.

First off, Borderlands 1 was fun. Granted, the scenery got a little monotonous (fixed in BL2) and the storyline, while interesting, wasn’t something to write home about.

But it was FANTASTIC split-screen local co-op, and even someone like myself who is not a huge fan of the first-person-shooter gameplay? I loved it.

I loved the humor. I loved the voice acting. I loved the ridiculous naming schemes (“Badmutha Skag”). I loved the gameplay and the gun upgrades and the weird art style.

In my opinion, the Dr. Ned’s Zombie Island DLC content was some of the most fun I’ve ever had gaming. Period.

Borderlands 2

Needless to say, I was excited about Borderlands 2.

From the very first moment, it completely blew away all of my expectations.

Handsome Jack? Hands-down the most entertaining villain I have ever interfaced with.

Voice acting is, if anything, even BETTER in this installment, and meeting all the old characters again was a real treat. Especially Tannis and her ceiling chairs.

Tiny Tina? Totally needs her own expansion content.

Bugs

There are a few bugs and rough bits, many of which we notice because we’re playing split screen, so things like not being able to see when we’re purchasing ammo (we have to listen to the sound because the “Purchased!” icon is too far down) or having the screen jump to the top when someone adds an item to the trade window … well, those are minor.

Dying for no reason while riding the crane box at the Wildlife Preserve is a little MORE troublesome, but we finally managed to get the achievement, so all’s well.

There’s stuff what needs fixin’, ain’t no bones about it.

Luffluff

Even so? Most entertaining game to date. Only game I’ve had more fun than this was WoW, and that was more because of the people in it than the game itself, necessarily.

Fantastic game.

Halo 4 came out recently (or something. Maybe it was Halo 7. I dunno). I’m not even a little tempted, even though it is also split-screen FPS local co-op.

Why?

Because Princess Fluffybutt has GAZONGAS like you would not believe, and Philippe was SO BRAVE, and Jack bought a pony made out of diamonds, and Brick likes to punch people into red mist, and one of the psychos has a three-minute monologue from Shakespeare.

I’m glad I played BL1 first, but I believe BL2 would be fun even without it.

I’d have regretted missing Dr. Ned and his ridiculous moustache, though. And Tannis might not have been quite as much fun if you hadn’t met her in BL1. I dunno.

Rating

Two controllers way, WAY up for Borderlands 2.

Sidenote

Do be aware, if you please, that I am not lauding the story of this game.

The plot is horrible. The loot system? Confusing at best, frustrating at worst.

This isn’t an amazing thinking game even as much as Bioshock was.

This? This is mindless, bloody, ridiculous fun.

Related posts:

Wii Game Reviews
Diablo 3 : Should You Play It?

Deus Ex Machina and the Final Plot Point

Definition

Deus Ex Machina – “god from the machine”, when a seemingly unsolvable plot point is suddenly and abruptly solved by the unexpected intervention of someone or something. Also translated as “God made it happen”, it’s often used when an author has painted themselves into a corner and doesn’t know how to solve the problem.

EXAMPLE A) The bad guy has the heroes standing at the gallows, their necks in the noose, and a spaceship falls out of the sky and lands right on the villain and his entire squadron of blindly-obedient death squad, a single laser shot from the explosion slicing directly through the perfect location of each noose rope, releasing our heroes.

(okay, that’s a SUPER AWFUL example. Let’s go for a borderline one that’ll be more useful for our discussion.)

EXAMPLE B) The bad guy has the heroes standing at the gallows, their necks in the noose, and the heroine TRIES REALLY HARD and realizes that her heretofore maligned magical ability to perfectly knit socks also allows her to UNRAVEL the strands in the rope, releasing them so that the hero can eloquently argue his case to the watching masses, turning public opinion against the bad guy and saving the day.

Why’s that bad?

I’m going to avoid the easy answer of “because it IS” and actually attempt to explain here.

It’s cheating.

(Oh, you want a longer explanation. I can do that.)

Most of you have probably been exposed to a mystery story, either a tv show, or a movie, or a book … or even the game Clue, it doesn’t matter. You know what a mystery is.

Something happened or someone died. You’ve got a house full of suspicious suspects, and your clever protagonist tries to hunt down the guilty party using their wits and the clues they can find. You’re avidly following along, wondering if the flour-dusted footprint means it was the cook, or if the lack of fingerprints points to the satin-gloved society dame.

… at the end of the book, if it was the gardener who got less than a paragraph’s page time, because of some clue that you’d never be able to guess, you’d probably not be happy.

It’s not SATISFYING.

When you cheat with a deus ex machina, you’re cheating your readers out of that satisfaction of a story well told.

Real Life

If you are using the “but stuff like that happens in real life” argument to justify a Deus Ex Machina, I’m probably not going to like your book.

We all know that fiction isn’t real. I tell you Darth Vader force chokes some guy and you buy it because you’re buying the fantasy. You don’t think there’s actually a Darth Vader buying Happy Meals for his twins in the back seat of his minivan-speeder.

We all know that crazy stuff happens in real life. In real life, people go through their entire lives, loving and hating and struggling and celebrating … only to get hit by a car and die a young and entirely unexpected death.

Especially if someone reads for escapism, you cannot cannot cannot use “but it happens in real life” as an argument.

I want to read something that makes SENSE of the world, that tries to bring meaning to what often feels like a horrifically accidental world. Otherwise I’d just read newspapers.

Okay, but that second example didn’t seem SO bad…

You’re right. EXAMPLE B wasn’t bad …

…. IF AND ONLY IF, we are treated to some indication that her sock-knitting ability was more than just socks.

If we see her struggling with her abilities, accidentally tangling other natural-fiber materials, or her presence causing a basket to … un-basket itself. Then sure.

That’s the trick, see?

It’s not about how EPIC the reveal is.

… it’s about the timing of the last clue you reveal to the reader.

Timing?

Yup. Timing.

Basically, your final plot point (plot-revealing clue or event that changes the way the characters see the problem) should happen at aboooooout the 3/4 mark.

The closer you push that last reveal toward the end of the book, the more cheated the reader feels. The less satisfying the solution is.

You can even turn EXAMPLE A into a valid ending if you show our heroes communicating with a spaceship ahead of time.

Got Any Real Stinkers?

Any readers out there remember some truly awful Deus Ex Machina examples from any media (tv, movies, books)?

 

 

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NaNo2010 > Plot Scavenging
My Rough Story Outline Blueprint
En Media Res - Explained

[Perry] Be Careful What You Leave Out

I’ve been playing a game called Guild Wars 2 in recent months.

While it’s a very online oriented game, it’s actually lauded on the topic of its ‘personal story’ and the impact that you, as a character, have on the world of the game.

At the beginning, it works pretty well. Depending on the race you choose to play as, you meet with a hero from your race who sort of shows you the ropes and begins to guide you down the path to being a hero.

Somewhere near the middle/end though, there’s a curious development.

A character is introduced, Traeherne. He’s a sylvari (plant/elf person) and he’s introduced to you as a fairly prominent scholar in the nature of the greater threat the world is facing.

Very shortly after that, he’s suddenly appointed as the grand marshal of the armies of the world.

…I kind of feel like I missed a step.

Apparently, if you play as a sylvari yourself, you’re introduced to the character of Traeherne a little earlier so his character arc with you develops a little, so that when he suddenly hops into the limelight as savior of the world, it’s a little more understandable.

Apparently, if you read the supplemental novels that were released with the game, you’re introduced to the character of Traeherne there as well, and you learn his character history and qualifications.

But if you play as any other race and you haven’t read the books? This random plant man shows up out of nowhere and appoints himself a war general, despite his admission that he’s more of a researcher than a tactician or a fighter. Somehow, this guy becomes the most important person in the story…and you have very little idea who he is.

Here’s the thing.

You have to be very careful of what you decide is safe to leave outside the bounds of your story. While it can be argued that all of this information WAS in the story, if not necessarily in the game itself, it has to be understood that for those just playing the game, all of this information about this character is something that exists outside of the boundaries of the story itself.

Think of an example from Harry Potter. After the books were done, Rowling admitted in an interview that the character of Dumbledore was gay.

Now, while this knowledge lay outside the bounds of the novels, and technically, has no proof, it’s knowledge regarding the character that doesn’t influence the story in any major way. While there may have been some connections to be made regarding his interpersonal relationships, in the course of the story, this is knowledge about the character that’s safe to leave out because it doesn’t influence anything.

Going back to the example of Traeherne, there are large aspects of his character that were left out of the story completely for the majority of the player-base (those that had not read the novels and those that did not choose to play as a sylvari) and those exclusions gutted the story they were trying to tell.

We should have had a nicely paced story, gradually building up to a climax with characters you’d grown to care for. Instead, we have what feels like a slapdash, bandage solution in the form of a character we know nothing about, had never met before with no qualifications suddenly becoming something like the next Messiah.

Not everything needs to be included within the bounds of the covers. Many will attest that in the vast majority of cases, less truly is more and leaving your audience wanting is better when it comes to leaving a lasting impression, but we need to be very careful with the details that we leave out.

Details that don’t influence the story in large strokes can be inserted or left in at the author’s discretion.

But the bigger pieces, or any aspect of a character that changes the path of the story in any big way, really should be included in the text instead of left to the reader’s investigative discretion.

Related posts:

[Perry] Write What You Know
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En Media Res - Explained

Definition

En Media Res (more properly “IN media res”) - “In the middle of things”.

A very valuable tool for writers, but one that’s often misused (in my opinion).

Let’s take, for example, a simple scene somewhere in a novel. We know where the characters enter the scene, but we’re not entirely sure where we should start writing.

The Scene Outline

Character enters bar, which is nearly empty because it’s early afternoon, so it’s really only filled with the hard-core drinkers, who huddle at the bar like ticks in a coon dog’s ear, morosely daring character to make something of it. Description of ambiance goes here, including the smoggy cigarette atmosphere and the sound of the kitchen help arguing in rapid-fire Spanish when the kitchen doors swing open.
Character walks to the bar, sits down, and orders a screwdriver without the screw.  Possibly thinks about Important Plot Point while waiting impatiently for PlotPants the Snitch to arrive and reveal important Plot Information.
PlotPants arrives, wearing a tattered newsboy cap pulled low over his brow, as if that didn’t make him look even more suspicious than if he’d walked up confidently.
PlotPants sits down next to Character and orders a drink. The most expensive whiskey on the menu, because he knows Character will pick up the tab.
PlotPants and Character chat a little, with PlotPants being cagey about his information. Just as he reaches into his jacket to pull out a manila envelope (the real reason Character even puts up with him), a neat hole appears in his forehead, and a much less neat hole appears on the back of his head.
PlotPants falls backward off his chair and starts ruining  a very expensive rug.
Character grabs the envelope and makes a break for it, exiting the scene through the kitchen door and apologizing in fluent Spanish to the workers for interrupting their work.

The Beginning

A lot of beginner writers start at the beginning because it makes sense. These are the things that happened in their imagination as they worked through the character and scene.

However…

That scene (like most scenes) is frontloaded with what I call “puppetry and set”. Start writing there, and it takes you halfway through the scene before anything INTERESTING and IMPORTANT happens!

I may need to know what the set looks like … but I don’t need to know every detail, and I certainly don’t need to be treated to paragraphs-worth of set up for a bar I spend all of one scene in.

Starting at the beginning is a great way to bore the heck out of me.

Okay, So, The Gunshot!

Right! I complained about the beginning because it wasn’t the interesting bit, right? That gunshot sure was interesting! Maybe we should start there!

Hold your horses, pardner.

That gunshot? That’s the CLIMAX of this scene. Much like every book has a tension arc, every chapter and scene should ALSO have a tension arc. You don’t start the book with the hero facing down the villain in their evil lair, do you? Of course not. The reader doesn’t have a reason to care what’s happening.

A lot of novels start “en media res” in the middle of a battle or gunfight or chase scene or argument. This is a great way to start “with a bang” so to speak, and removes the “puppetry and set” that gets so tiring to read … but it’s also a pretty tricky thing to pull off because without ANY kind of lead-in to the giant action, you’ve removed the chance for your readers to really CARE about those characters.

Start this scene with the gunshot, and I don’t really care about the victim, and I”m not entirely sure what’s going on for the rest of the scene or why I should care.

You started too late.

So WHERE then, Miss Smartypants?!

This, I’d actually love it if you’d give me your opinions in the comments, because there are multiple places that you could start the scene “en media res” (in the middle of things) while still maintaining the tension arc.

Me?

I’d start with PlotPants ordering his drink, especially if I was writing in first person. Why? I dunno. That’s where my inner author/artist is sniffing out the best timing. That gives me just enough time to note the surroundings and react to the slimy PlotPants character without wasting a lot of time detailing my character’s stroll across the carpet and ordering of a drink.

En Media Res

That’s the “trick” to using en media res. You skip the stuff everybody skims anyway, and find the right place to drop us into a scene.

Edit: Before this posted but after I scheduled the draft, Chuck Wendig (he of the inspiration and potty-mouth) did a fantastic piece on basically the same concept. Language warning as always, but definitely worth a read if you’ve got the time.

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Mary Sues, The Dirty Truth

Mary Sue

You can click here for the full Wikipedia definition (and it’s a good one) but in general, the term is used to describe any character who epitome-fies.

That’s not a real word, but bear with me. The Mary Sue is the epitome of all things that people strive to be.

The PERFECT Mary Sue would be the most beautiful, kindest, modest, trendiest, most talented person ever. When they walked into the room, girls would rush to be their friend and all the boys would immediately fall in love. Also (in a magical setting) they would be the most ASTOUNDING and talented magic-user. Ever. In the history of ever.

Most characters fall short of that particular portrait, but savvy readers can sniff out a Mary Sue even if they don’t perfectly fit the mold.

As a Reader

As a reader, Mary Sues are bad because there’s never any real conflict. Of COURSE she’s going to get the boy of her dreams and OF COURSE she’s going to defeat the bad guy. She’s perfect. There’s not even a chance that she’ll fail.

(Mary Sues can be boys as well. There’s another term for them, but “Mary Sue” is the most common in use, regardless of gender.)

Full-on Mary Sues are boring.

As a Writer

As a writer, Mary Sues are usually what we write when we first get started, particularly in fanfiction, where self-insertion is rampant. You daydream about having superpowers and getting the boy/girl of your dreams.

It’s normal.

However, once you get PAST that point, the problem becomes writing a character who is INTERESTING without crossing that invisible-and-yet-uncrossable “Mary Sue” line.

Give your characters faults. Make them fail, and make bad decisions. No human being on this planet is universally sexy.

My Favorite Mary Sue

I was hooked on Anita Blake books for a very, very long time. I love the writing style and I pretend no shame in that. Laurell K. Hamilton does characters in a way that I love.

Except, of course, that her characters cross the Mary Sue line AND HOW.

The woman who started out as a zombie raiser (by trade) had become (by the time I gave up on the series as a lost cause) a sexual powerhouse with DROVES of men in love with her, given unbelievable necromancer abilities which she could wield over not just zombies, but also vampires (and somehow a lot of were-creatures as well).  Also? The author had gone from “powerful master vampire” as the villain to “MOTHER OF ALL DARKNESS”, which is a helluvan escalation.

Let’s not even get started on her Merry Gentry series.

The Dirty Truth

The dirty truth is that we LIKE Mary Sues.

We do.

They appeal to our inner daydreamer, and we all want to believe that we could have those amazing powers and have the romance and defeat the bad guy.

I write fantasy. We’re into escapism. I get that.

I have heard people scoff at picking up a new book, saying “well, of COURSE she’s the most powerful magic-user they’ve seen!” and I have to wonder … would they even be interested in the book if she was mediocre at magic?

It’s a painful thing, to try and figure out where that line is, because you have to dance as close to it as you possibly can without crossing over — and every reader puts the line in a different place.

So What’s the Solution?

1. Read

Read widely in your genre. Find out what’s working and what isn’t. You cannot cannot cannot see a trope you’re not looking for. They’re like those magic eye pictures, where all the sudden a bunch of purple geometry turns into a ship.

“He opened the door and then he stopped.”
“She dropped her eyes to the table.”
“He looked deeply into her eyes as he leaned in for a kiss.”
“She felt her face flush as he cupped her cheek.”
“It was storming as the car was driving down the road.”

This is a tiny (tiny tiny) list of things that bug me when I see them in writing. Why do they bug me? Because I’ve trained myself to notice the problems with them and the ways they could be rewritten to be stronger.

Character tropes (and all the other kinds of overused writing devices) are the same way.

Bonus points if you find all my little pet peeves in there. *wink*

2. Write it Anyway

This one’s painful, because you might “waste time” on a character that is a Mary Sue and not even know it.

Let me lay it out for you straight, my bunnies.

WRITE WHAT YOU LOVE.

Write the book YOU want to read.

Write the characters that make your soul cry out to give them a voice.

If you end up writing Mary Sues then WRITE THE HELL out of them, do you hear me? Love them, love everything about them, and infuse that love in your work and don’t you DARE look back.

There are precious few things in this life you can control so utterly as your first draft, and if you don’t love it, nobody will.

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The First Quarter Of The Book
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[Perry] The Power of a Rousing Speech

Quite a while ago now, we talked a little bit about how much a good threat can add that precious bit of “oomph” that your story might need.

There are a few other solid factors that can provide that same effect. A solid, inspirational speech before a battle is a pretty good one.

Yes, there are many factors that go into it.

The set up to the speech is pretty important. It’s hard to have a rousing speech just before nothing happens and the situation needs to fit the words. I’m sure we can all agree that typically, an upcoming battle against overwhelming odds is the best set up to a big speech.

The music always plays a pretty big part in the emotional impact as well. The soft swell during the light parts of the speech and then rising and crashing over you like a wave when the main character starts shouting about freedom, liberty and honor? Oh that’ll do wonders…

But the speech itself, that’s the meat of it, don’t you think?

I’ve heard speeches in stories that get goosebumps rising all up and down my arms. I’ve heard speeches that send shivers right down my spine and I’ve heard some that really do a lot to get you pumped up, to make you feel that a serious ass-kicking is right around the corner.

They come in all different varieties and flavors too, don’t you fret. I’m sure there’s something for everybody.

How about some William Wallace?

“Fight and you will die. Run and you’ll live…at least a while. And dying in your beds, many years from now, would you be willing to trade all the days from this day to that for one chance, just one chance to come back here and tell our enemies that they may take our lives…but they’ll never take OUR FREEDOM!”

Man, you’d have to be heartless not to feel at least a little bit of a rush.

If that’s a little to calm and quiet for you, how about a speech with some balls? 

Leonidas, full of rage at the Persians, pride in his men and more than anything, filled with the surety and conviction that what he and his men are doing is the right and only thing to do:

“A new age has begun. An age of freedom. And all will know that 300 spartans gave their last breath to defend it!”

There are somber ones too. You don’t have to have a hugely muscled man shouting about honor to get your point across. All you need is Russel Crowe and give him that fantastic line about what you do in life echoing in eternity and you can get people to that state of mind you need. You can get people ready and raring to go.

Here’s the funny thing though. You don’t need a good story to make an inspirational speech work. The characters can be pretty flat and the inspirational moment can still work so long as it’s set up the right way.

Hell, you don’t even need to be serious to make inspirational speeches work.

You can find a guy with an overdone accent, give him lines cheesier than a stuffed crust pizza and it’ll still have to power to roil your blood when he tells you that he’s going to go upriver to kick some ass.

A part of me thinks that it might just be the crowd mentality. A part of me thinks that just seeing a big crowd of people cheering at the same thing has the power to reach out and fold you into their ranks, giving you just a bit of a visceral thrill and a desire to see them succeed.

…The other part of me is ready to go and kick some ass >.>

So inspirational speeches…

What’re some of your favorites?

 

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Power

BBC's Sherlock, My Naughty Secret

So … I kind of love BBC’s Sherlock.

The acting is top shelf, the directing is fantastic, and I just adore details like the text indicating what Sherlock is seeing when he’s focused.

And no, it’s not just Benedict Cumberbatch’s cut-your-hand-if-you-slap-him cheekbones that I’m hooked on.

Not that there’s anything wrong with his cheekbones, mind you.

Rawr.

Wait, wait!

Right, no wait, I actually had a post planned.

And unfortunately, it’s about the things I DON’T like about Sherlock. Some of which, by the way, I expect to hear a bit of disagreement in the comments about.

That’s the beauty of opinions.

That’s also my secret. It’s not often you see folks bad-mouthing something as popular as Sherlock. I can love it … while still not-so-secretly seething about the things that bother me.

Spoilers Ahoy

Some things I want to discuss will naturally include spoilers. Warning delivered. Don’t say I didn’t warn you. Because I did. In italics, even, so you know I mean it.

Moriarty

Number one problem? Moriarty.

I didn’t like the way he was written or portrayed.

To back up — I don’t think that the actor did a poor job. As a matter of fact, I’d say he did a stellar job.

Professor Moriarty (traditional Moriarty) was a brilliant mathematician and a criminal mastermind. He hid in the shadows and orchestrated the efforts of lesser criminals, though he did not eschew personally chasing Holmes when necessary.

An excerpt:

But in calling Moriarty a criminal you are uttering libel in the eyes of the law — and there lie the glory and the wonder of it! The greatest schemer of all time, the organizer of every deviltry, the controlling brain of the underworld, a brain which might have made or marred the destiny of nations — that’s the man! But so aloof is he from general suspicion, so immune from criticism, so admirable in his management and self-effacement, that for those very words that you have uttered he could hale you to a court and emerge with your year’s pension as a solatium for his wounded character. Is he not the celebrated author of The Dynamics of an Asteroid, a book which ascends to such rarefied heights of pure mathematics that it is said that there was no man in the scientific press capable of criticizing it? Is this a man to traduce? Foulmouthed doctor and slandered professor — such would be your respective roles! That’s genius, Watson.
—Holmes, The Valley of Fear

The Moriarty from the TV show, on the other hand?

Oh, we were TOLD he was a mastermind. By Holmes himself, no less. He even had a lovely set-up, with being named as the brain behind the pill-and-cabbie trick (which was FANTASTIC). However, in subsequent episodes, it becomes clear that everyone tells the viewer how brilliant he is, but his actual activities are little more than those of a clever, bullying madman.

Emphasis on the “bullying”, and wrinkled nose at the “madman”.

He’s behind The Woman, we’re told … and yet we see him on the phone, threatening to turn someone into shoes (I laughed) and the next thing we see, he’s using Sherlock to decode a message (in 8 seconds) that Moriarty couldn’t decode for months?

Consider the final episode.

Fantastic build-up, and oh-so-theatrical … but we find out that his artistry was nonexistent. He never wrote “the code” (which, as a programmer, I scoffed at from the start). He simply bribed people to do his bidding, then threatened an entire jury. Then? He simply points guns at Sherlock’s friends and laughs as he gabbles about how bored he is before he offs himself.

This is a criminal mastermind?

I was SEVERELY underwhelmed.

(on the flip side, the bit with Sherlock finding the kids? BRILLIANT.)

The closest thing to “mastermind” I saw was the bit about pretending to be an actor hired by Sherlock … and there were so many holes in THAT particular plot point, it made me want to cry.

“How could he come up with this identity, with so much detail?” Um. Criminal. They do that. Especially on TV, where it’s apparently as easy as microwave burritos. You just hit the “passport” button on your local paper man and DING!
“He gleaned all of this information out of Mycroft!” really? Really. They brought him in to question him about … nothing. Tortured him a bit. Somehow found out that childhood stories about Sherlock got him to open up. Got NOTHING OUT OF HIM. Released him back into the wild despite obvious crazyman “Sherlock” scribbles all over his cell. This is your big plan. (Side note? Mycroft is the saddest character on the show. I want to hug him, but I know he’d find the entire “hugging” experience to be dreadful.)
Crazy reporter lady got a full-on taste of Sherlock’s abilities in the bathroom, yet still buys the actor story and believes that Sherlock isn’t brilliant. Okay, this one COULD get a pass, assuming I am to believe she’s 100% ugly on the inside. I wanted to buy that she was just driven. She’d have made a good bad/good guy character.
EVERYONE is willing to believe that Sherlock isn’t brilliant enough to do the things THEY HAVE SEEN HIM DO (I’m looking at you, police force), yet they’re perfectly happy believing he’s brilliant enough to have invented Moriarty and all of the crimes he “pretends” to have solved. Really?

The Problem

The problem is that everyone TOLD us how delightfully wicked and fantastic Moriarty was, but every time he was on screen, his actions told a different story.

As writers, we need to avoid this.

As a writer, it scares the bejeebus out of me that I might one day need to write characters far more intelligent and clever than I am.

This is a PROBLEM, and a very real one. How, one wonders, do you write a criminal mastermind if you yourself can’t think of criminals existing outside a tidy little box labeled “Thug”?

Write a clever character solving a charming puzzle with pizzazz … and then have a reader write in and point out a perfectly logical thing — which your super-smart character would never in a million years have missed! — and suddenly the whole thing crumbles.

My favorite example kind of ruins the movie Inception. Click at your own risk.

New Can Be New

Don’t get me wrong. Just because Professor Moriarty was a cultured gentleman scholar, there’s no reason Sherlock’s Moriarty needed to be cut from the same cloth.

Take The Woman, for example. Gorgeous re-definition of the Irene Adler character.

That being said, they TOLD us how devious Moriarty was, yet very few of his ploys rose above “bully” and his final scene just screamed “mental problems”.

Aside from that? You’re building the arch-villain for Sherlock Holmes here.

You take Holmes and you either flip him upside down, or you put him in a mirror and change little bits of him. You build your villain to suit your hero. You can make a villain that represents everything a hero hates about himself, or who has none of the hero’s “weaknesses” or … whatever. There are thousands of great recipes for villains.

Sherlock seems to have chosen “Crazy” and that makes me a sad panda because it doesn’t highlight anything in Sherlock’s character.

Your thoughts

Now that I”ve nattered on for ages about the subject … any Sherlock fans out there? Anyone with me?

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Do It Anyway

People are illogical, unreasonable, and self-centered.

Love them anyway.

If you do good, people will accuse you of selfish ulterior motives.

Do good anyway.

If you are successful, you will win false friends and true enemies.

Succeed anyway.

The good you do today will be forgotten tomorrow.

Do good anyway.

Honesty and frankness make you vulnerable.

Be honest and frank anyway.

The biggest men and women with the biggest ideas can be shot down by the smallest men and women with the smallest minds.

Think big anyway.

What you spend years building may be destroyed overnight.

Build anyway.

Give the world the best you have and you’ll get kicked in the teeth.

Give the world the best you have anyway.

From The Paradoxical Commandments, by Dr. Kent M. Keith

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