This is Story Fanatic, a collection of articles covering story structure and analysis for
creative writers. Published weekly.
Tragic are the ones who skip this series due to a lack of interest in wizardry or potion-making. Seen individually, the films play out as entertaining yet basic childrens tales. Yet viewed as one entire story, the saga resonates with an emotional clarity rarely found in popular cinema today. Those who avoid these films because of preconceptions towards fantasy cheat themselves of an experience unlike anything else.
Conviction misinterpreted as supremacism defines the plight of all those enthusiastic towards a better world. If there is a way stories can provide greater resonance for a hopeful audience, why not proclaim it? Fanaticism and passion. Equals in a world entrenched in outdated and outmoded techniques.
Characters need to have goals, right? If they don’t the Audience won’t know what the character is all about. At least, that is the common perception. Unfortunately, giving a character a goal without fully integrating it into the structure of a story leads a work of narrative fiction open to all sorts of tragic issues.
Stories provide a context for the seemingly pointless events that pass through time. Granting the audience an opportunity to step outside of themselves, a well-told complete story gives purpose and understanding to that which has happened. Sometimes, but not always, history has so much to say that it requires more than one story to make sense of it all.
To focus on the outward appearance of a Main Character is to give short shrift to the more important matter of how that character actually thinks. While it is always nice to see more “female” characters in lead roles, it is even nicer when those characters share the female gender’s base problem-solving process. Foreign to many, this concept of story structure helps determine who will embrace the Main Character and who will simply acknowledge their presence.
Whether you find yourself barreling down an intergalactic trench at top speeds, or you find yourself twirling around and around and around in again in the hopes of measuring up to the stiffest competition around, the problem at the heart of your struggle may turn out to be the very same thing. For Luke Skywalker and Nina Sayers this possibility becomes a certainty. Their stories at large may be vastly different, but their internal struggles are one and the same.
Is there anything more challenging then crafting an emotionally resonant film that centers around the believable growth of a fully-realized Main Character? That believability, that authenticity in character development, can be found within the concept of a clearly defined problem and solution within the psyche of this all important character.
In an attempt to understand the various machinations at work behind the scenes of a well-told story, many look to the Hero’s Journey, or various models thereof, as the answer. Unfortunately, the analysis that comes as a result is severely lacking in meaningful content and accuracy. The key is truly understanding what problems the Main Character of a story faces.
Stories of wacky families are usually less about wild personalities and more about the problems inherent with how the characters use their brains. The way each person in the group thinks clashes with the individual agendas of the others and brings about the inequity that clues an Audience in on the family’s source of dysfunction. Understanding how this imbalance works in concert with the Goal of a story gives an Author the opportunity to create a powerful and meaningful story.
Every writer has heard of bookends, or “framing devices”, but far fewer really understand the purpose behind them, or how they can be used to effectively tell a meaningful story. Beyond simply providing a wrapper for the story within, they can also be used to help an Author more effectively communicate the message of their work.