Tasks and Slams
I've been doing some thinking. Scary, I know, but bare with me for a minute.
A while back I posted about my so-called Recipe for Conflict. In it I talked about a Wordplay article by Terry Rossio titled "The Task". He describes the Goal as usually being general, positive and desirable and the Tasks being the specific, negative and undesirable things that must be done in order to achieve the Goal. This idea cleared a lot of things up for me, especially when you combine it with the idea that these Tasks should all lead to one specific Decisive Action. A final attempt by the Protagonist to reach the Goal. It's all or nothing. Everything is riding on this one action, the Final Task. The outcome determines if he wins or looses. This idea helped me to up with external things for the protagonist to do that were all related to the Goal. As helpful as it was though, it kept me in plot mode and didn't help me get inside the head of my character. So I set out to find an Internal equivalent.
I took all the information I already had about character flaws, needs, arcs, etc. And reorganized it in my head and looked at it from a different angle.
The protagonist should have a Flaw, a specific character need or defect that must be overcome. So overcoming the Flaw is sortof like the Internal Goal (even if the character doesn't know that's what they are aiming for).
In David Freeman's book, "Creating Emotion in Games: The Craft and Art of Emotioneering", he describes a Slam as an incident which forces the character to wrestle with his FLBW (Flaw, Limitation, Block or Wound). After many slams, the character will eventually overcome his FLBW and be pushed through the Character Arc. I suddenly saw Slams as the internal equivalent (or maybe the opposite) of the Task. Tasks being things the character does, and Slams being things that happen to the character.
The Character Arc is the moment in which the character overcomes his Flaw and becomes a different, better or stronger person because of it. Then I remembered reading somewhere that in Anti-hero or Tragic Hero stories it may be the moment the character decides NOT to overcome his Flaw. The word decides stuck in my head. If the character can decide NOT to overcome his Flaw then he should also make the decision TO overcome the flaw. I immediately saw the Charcter Arc as a more active process, not something that passively happens to the character, but something he actively chooses to do. I also saw it as the internal equivalent of the Decisive Action. (Or again, maybe the opposite, if the Decisive Action is deciding to act and the Character Arc is actively deciding.)
So for the External Story, we have:
#1 Goal - Beginning
#2 Tasks - Middle
#3 Decisive Action - End
For the Internal Story we have:
#1 Flaw - Beginning
#2 Slams - Middle
#3 Character Arc - End
It's funny, I now feel like I have a much better handle on the external and internal storylines. Even though I have read all of that information a hundred times before, just the act of rethinking it and reorganizing it in my head made it more accessible, more concrete. Also, with multiple Tasks and Multiple Slams all taking place in the middle of the story, my second act suddenly seems easier to fill. Well, it seems easier anyway. I guess we'll find out.
A quick plug for David Freeman (and I don't even know him). He gives a screenwriting workshop in L.A. and NewYork called Beyond Structure. I don't live close to either city and couldn't afford the workshop even if I did. I bought his book "Creating Emotion in Games" hoping it would cover some of the same material. I can't comment on the material covered in his workshops, but the book is a goldmine. It was written for people who write interactive games, but it's more about storytelling than game designing so much of what he writes can be applied to screenwriting as well. He even includes many examples from movies. Every screenwriting book will tell you that you need to write good dialogue, create characters we care about, create believable character relationships etc, etc, but David Freeman gives you specific techniques to do these things. It's not a step-by-step book, but more of a collection of techniques to be used however and whenever you please. It won't tell you how to write a story, but it will make the story you write better. This has become one of my most used "screenwriting" books. I refer to it often, and can recommend it without reservation.
Now, If I could just figure out how to write a story, I'd be set. ;-)
A while back I posted about my so-called Recipe for Conflict. In it I talked about a Wordplay article by Terry Rossio titled "The Task". He describes the Goal as usually being general, positive and desirable and the Tasks being the specific, negative and undesirable things that must be done in order to achieve the Goal. This idea cleared a lot of things up for me, especially when you combine it with the idea that these Tasks should all lead to one specific Decisive Action. A final attempt by the Protagonist to reach the Goal. It's all or nothing. Everything is riding on this one action, the Final Task. The outcome determines if he wins or looses. This idea helped me to up with external things for the protagonist to do that were all related to the Goal. As helpful as it was though, it kept me in plot mode and didn't help me get inside the head of my character. So I set out to find an Internal equivalent.
I took all the information I already had about character flaws, needs, arcs, etc. And reorganized it in my head and looked at it from a different angle.
The protagonist should have a Flaw, a specific character need or defect that must be overcome. So overcoming the Flaw is sortof like the Internal Goal (even if the character doesn't know that's what they are aiming for).
In David Freeman's book, "Creating Emotion in Games: The Craft and Art of Emotioneering", he describes a Slam as an incident which forces the character to wrestle with his FLBW (Flaw, Limitation, Block or Wound). After many slams, the character will eventually overcome his FLBW and be pushed through the Character Arc. I suddenly saw Slams as the internal equivalent (or maybe the opposite) of the Task. Tasks being things the character does, and Slams being things that happen to the character.
The Character Arc is the moment in which the character overcomes his Flaw and becomes a different, better or stronger person because of it. Then I remembered reading somewhere that in Anti-hero or Tragic Hero stories it may be the moment the character decides NOT to overcome his Flaw. The word decides stuck in my head. If the character can decide NOT to overcome his Flaw then he should also make the decision TO overcome the flaw. I immediately saw the Charcter Arc as a more active process, not something that passively happens to the character, but something he actively chooses to do. I also saw it as the internal equivalent of the Decisive Action. (Or again, maybe the opposite, if the Decisive Action is deciding to act and the Character Arc is actively deciding.)
So for the External Story, we have:
#1 Goal - Beginning
#2 Tasks - Middle
#3 Decisive Action - End
For the Internal Story we have:
#1 Flaw - Beginning
#2 Slams - Middle
#3 Character Arc - End
It's funny, I now feel like I have a much better handle on the external and internal storylines. Even though I have read all of that information a hundred times before, just the act of rethinking it and reorganizing it in my head made it more accessible, more concrete. Also, with multiple Tasks and Multiple Slams all taking place in the middle of the story, my second act suddenly seems easier to fill. Well, it seems easier anyway. I guess we'll find out.
A quick plug for David Freeman (and I don't even know him). He gives a screenwriting workshop in L.A. and NewYork called Beyond Structure. I don't live close to either city and couldn't afford the workshop even if I did. I bought his book "Creating Emotion in Games" hoping it would cover some of the same material. I can't comment on the material covered in his workshops, but the book is a goldmine. It was written for people who write interactive games, but it's more about storytelling than game designing so much of what he writes can be applied to screenwriting as well. He even includes many examples from movies. Every screenwriting book will tell you that you need to write good dialogue, create characters we care about, create believable character relationships etc, etc, but David Freeman gives you specific techniques to do these things. It's not a step-by-step book, but more of a collection of techniques to be used however and whenever you please. It won't tell you how to write a story, but it will make the story you write better. This has become one of my most used "screenwriting" books. I refer to it often, and can recommend it without reservation.
Now, If I could just figure out how to write a story, I'd be set. ;-)
posted by Jeri at 6:14 AM
2 Comments:
Just a note to let you know that I read your post. Now I just hope that you don't "Slam" my "Flaws"!
Sounds like you are getting things into a perspective that you can understand and deal with. That is the important thing. Sometimes books are written for the writer to understand and it takes some doing to translate it into a "lanquage" that the reader is comfortable with. I think that is the distillation process you are going through. Good luck.
Neal
Neal, you're right. I read books and articles and it all makes perfect sense... in theory. Actually knowing how to apply it to a story I'm writing is something entirely different. I always feel like I'm missing something.
It's funny how I can read something a hundred times then I read it one more time, or I read the same thing from yet another guru, and it clicks in a whole new way. Then I get that forehead slappin', "oh, of course" thing going on. These little moments of insight seem to be coming bit by tiny bit. As long as they keep coming I'll be happy.
Thanks for your encouragement. It truly means a lot to me.
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