EXERCISE: A Tweet in Time?

[mbarker.livejournal.com]

Original Posting 15 July 2012

Howard Tayler (of Schlock Mercenary fame -- http://www.schlockmercenary.com/ -- yes, it's a webcomic with enormous archives) tweets... and one of his recent ones caught my attention:

Overheard: "We all came in a little bit late because of the sheep. Oh, and the chipmunk."

Now, imagine a setting. Diner, perhaps a hotel lobby, what would you like? And some characters. And one of them comes in and tosses down that line of dialogue.

What happens next? And, of course, what exactly is that backstory of sheep and chipmunk and delay?

Go ahead, write a bit.

TECH: Do you have a villain problem?

[mbarker.livejournal.com]

Original posting 18 July 2012

Over here, at http://www.writingexcuses.com/2012/07/15/writing-excuses-7-29-the-villain-problem/ the writing excuses crew talks about a problem that many writers run into -- their villains are more interesting than their heroes. Basically, the heroes are just reacting, trying to keep up with or beat the bad guys, and it's just not that interesting.

In the meantime, the villain wants to take over the world, and has this great plan, is busily building and working towards it, and everyone loves what they're doing! Whoops.

So the writing excuses group suggest some antidotes. Make your hero passionate. Look for a call to action, and let your hero step up to it and start swinging. Make sure your hero has a character arc, that they're developing. Make your hero competent and smart, so that when they fail it's because of things that they could not have expected or that are beyond their control or abilities. We don't expect anyone to beat an avalanche -- so your hero can be a strong man and still lose. Give your hero a sense of humor. Oh, and make sure that your hero has a life outside the conflict.

All right? Think about what the hero wants. It should be more than just beating the guys in the black hats. And when the hero is working towards their own goals, doing their own planning and doing the best they can to achieve what they want, they are going to be interesting.

What do you think? Are there books or movies where the villain is more interesting than the hero? Why? How do you make your protagonist interesting to the audience?

What about some great heroes? What made them interesting, what made them exciting to read about or to watch?

Kind of fun to think about. And of course, if you really want to, you can either write about it, or just plain write a story -- with some exciting heroes and some really bad villains.