4 ms·
Maybe I am watching the wrong movies, reading the wrong books and playing the wrong games, but I followed the prompt to think about those and they don't match.
by aktenlage 4y ago
Maybe I am watching the wrong movies, reading the wrong books and playing the wrong games, but I followed the prompt to think about those and they don't match. It's not that the protagonist wants something, but something happens to them.
The pattern I found mostly is
- in comfort
- something bad happens
- try to get out of bad situation/get revenge
- overcome many difficulties
- maybe some plot twist
- overcome last difficulty
What are good examples of the story setup in the articles?
- watwut 4y agoThe article is about how to write boring predictable story when you are not a writer. Of course good art - books, games or movies are not like that. And of course comfort food kind of stories are different too, because those have different formulas.
- number6 4y agoReally? Even the good books or the great are all: Start from a relative calm position and get to know the Characters. Something happens or something lacks. Go down in the underworld or into danger and returns with something (sometimes knowledge), but is changed. Uses this something to save the world (whatever the world may be, could also be the universe or his family) and arrives again at relative calm.
- watwut 4y agoThis assumes that all the great books end well and that they are all adventure books. Also, fairly frequent ending is cliffhanger, where author intentionally ends in conflict and suspense to make you buy next one. Even the Homer Odyssey is more complex then this pattern (except for its most boring chapters).
- number6 4y agoI guess you can end a book somewhere before or after the circle completes to have a cliffhanger ending. So maybe the story hasn't ended yet, but the book has. And you are right; not all books are like that: I just finished “Catcher in the Rey”. The protagonist goes through his ordeal totally unchanged; it is infuriating. I wanted to scream: Dude, didn't you get any wiser! On the other hand: He goes from a safe place, in the underworld of NY, through the night, faces dangers, returns home; depressed and tired; having learned… nothing!
- wnkrshm 4y agoI think a lot of the confusion comes from people not separating story and plot. A plot can be the most boring thing ever, the entertainment is in the telling.
- tsimionescu 4y agoWhile I completely agree that many excellent books/stories follow this format (even some of the best in history, such as the Odyssey, or the Epic of Gilgamesh), this is certainly not a universal structure. Many excellent moving stories follow different conventions, or end the story on different notes. For example, sticking with ancient myths, the story of Orpheus and Eurydice ends with the hero's defeat, he fails his greatest challenge and returns empty-handed, nothing having been resolved, not even any wiser. You could say the story contains the first few elements, but it wildly diverges towards the end.
- krisoft 4y ago> Of course good art - books, games or movies are not like that. Tell us the title of a good story which does not at least resemble the pattern.
- watwut 4y agoLiterally anything "at least resemble" literally everything if you are super determine to twist the patterns. Anyway, other people described it well: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=34577173 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=34577173 Or, "the gods are thirsty" or the movie "memento". Any story that ends badly, so essentially every single tragedy and the majority of Russian literature (hello Dostoyevsky). Mystery genre and horrors, including notable Edgar Allen Poe. Majority of romantic literature. Surrealism and avantgarde also avoid these patterns. What is described here is super simple hero journey. Not everything is an adventure.
- svnt 4y agoInverting some of the key stages to subvert the audience’s expectations, overlapping arcs, and/or stopping or starting in the wrong place, seems to me to provide enough variability to cover those examples. But if it doesn’t have the tell-tale elements we have a hard time recognizing it as a story, and then we don’t have expectations to subvert.
- iopq 4y agoYes, it's exactly like the steps 1-7 but with five differences, only having steps 1 and 2
- wodenokoto 4y agoThe way I read it is that “want something” can be just wanting to live your ordinary life. Which will then become at odds with something extraordinary. Which films are you thinking of?
- bigiain 4y agoThat sounds a lot like some of my favourite Russian cinema. “I just wanted to live an ordinary life, then bad stuff happened, and I struggled against adversity and prevailed, then everyone dies.”
- aktenlage 4y agoOriginally, when I was trying to think about stories, the following came to mind - Revenge movies like John Wick (the first one), and video games like The Last of Us 2, where the protagonist originally just wants to go about his affairs, but bad things happen to them and they want revenge. - "Catastrophe" movies like Alien, Predator, Terminator 2, where the protagonist needs to act to stay alive From another commenter I understand that the revenge or will to survive becomes the want. But not sure if it really fits the presented scheme that well anymore.
- powersnail 4y ago> It's not that the protagonist wants something, but something happens to them. Both have to happen, most of the time. I think most story starts with the protagonist in some sort of _status quo_, where change is resisted, either because the protagonist doesn't want to change, or because the protagonist is incapable of change. Then, a catalyst happens (doesn't have to be something bad, though, for instance, in Harry Potter, the letter from Hogwarts is a good thing that kicks Harry out of the status quo), and the protagonist now wants or needs something so much that they has to enter and deal with unfamiliar situations. Without "something happens to them", it's just strange that the protagonist suddenly decides to do something different without any reason. But ultimately, it has to be their choice to react to the catalyst. Making a decision is one of the most empathizeable elements of a story. It lets the reader step into the character's shoes and feel their inner debate.
- krisoft 4y ago> It's not that the protagonist wants something, but something happens to them. It usually is both. If the protagonist doesn’t want anything then they (and the story) feels directionless. If there is no bad thing happening to them then the audience is left wondering why the protagonist deciced to go on a crazy adventure now, instead of some other time. Let me illustrate this with the start of Star Wars a New Hope. Luke clearly wants to leave his podunk life and seek adventure. Also and independently of this the Empire swoops in and kills the people who has raised him. If the bad thing doesn’t happen he would finish his chores and then pick up some power converters. If he wouldn’t have the want of an adventure he would hand over the droids, and grieve his uncle and aunt. He also probably would go and pick up some power converters. For the story to happen you needed both, the want and the bad thing. Otherwise the farmer boy would have remained a farmer boy. > What are good examples of the story setup in the articles? How about you pick a story and if we also know it we can try to see if the pattern fits? It really is kinda universal. Not saying that all stories will fit but it is harder to find exceptions than examples.
- macco 4y agoI would also add the mentor in there. It seems to me that most heros have a mentor that guides them on their way.
- aktenlage 4y agoYes, Star Wars seems to be a good fit. The first Harry Potter is also a good example of both "preconditions" being there. Originally, when I was trying to think about stories, the following came to mind - Revenge movies like John Wick (the first one), and video games like The Last of Us 2, where the protagonist originally just wants to go about his affairs, but bad things happen to them and they want revenge. - "Catastrophe" movies like Alien, Predator, Terminator 2, where the protagonist needs to act to stay alive.
- nvrspyx 4y agoFor revenge/catastrophe movies, the transition from 1 to 2 is changing what the character "wants". That original desire isn't the actual desire that drives the actions of the story. For example, John Wick wants to grieve the death of his wife, but a series of events changes his desire from grief to revenge. It's that want for revenge that the rest of the story relies upon. An argument can also be made that his desire to grieve in peace is still the ultimate desire, but he can't do so emotionally until he gets his revenge. The circle described by Harmon are just the overarching story beats, but there's plenty liberty to be had when moving from one beat to the next. There's also liberty in whether steps overlap or are combined, such as where the desire is defined/reshaped at the same time that they enter an unfamiliar situation (e.g., desire changes to one of survival at the same time as a catastrophe beginning). In other words, the points on the circle may still exist regardless of what happens between them or if they happen simultaneously. Even acknowledging the liberty to be had, there's always exceptions to this heuristic and not every story will follow this structure.
- PhileasNietzche 4y agoThe very basics of storytelling. By definition, you need to be following the "very vague" definition here. Don't read too much into it and don't overthink it, because it's the opposite of what the author (a stellar creator of stories, himself) intended. Most stories, when looked at from a very high level, generally follow this formula. You are suffering from "can't see the forest for the trees" syndrome, old chap.
- tsimionescu 4y agoA lot of stories do, but definitely not most. For one thing, this only really applies to stories with a single protagonist. But lots of stories don't have a protagonist, and thus rarely fit this mold at all.
- citizenkeen 4y agoThe circle is cyclic. Game of Thrones follows the story circle, but each book is made of about twenty circles. Don't confuse a story for the text.
- tsimionescu 4y agoWhile Game of Thrones / ASOIAF have many separate interconnected stories and might indeed simply have multiple circles, one for each point of view character*, there are many stories that have a cast of characters and no protagonist. For example, you could, in principle, analyze the story of each individual character in the Iliad, but that would be missing the story. The story of the Iliad encompasses all of these different characters doing to their part to advance or retard their cause. Different characters are more important in different parts, but there is a single cohesive story being told. * though even here I would say that the stories of many of the characters don't match the circle model - notably, Ned doesn't return to anything.
- throwaway4aday 4y agoThat's because the author slapped some different and ill-fitting labels onto the classic Hero's Journey[0] cycle. I can't tell why they would do this, maybe they wanted it to appeal to modern audiences or perhaps they wanted to put their own unique daub of paint on it, but it seems they have simply confused the reader or turned them off completely. [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hero%27s_journey https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hero%27s_journey