There was no Captain's Blog in 2009 when JJ Abrams infamously made the most popular, most successful, most star-studded and action packed Star Trek to hit the silver screen since... well, Star Wars. So popular in fact that my girlfriend even loved it and when it came out on DVD, after watching it that second time she insisted on watching it again the next day, with her roommates (all girls)! And they loved it! How was this possible? How did Abrams take the eleventh film in a forty-year-old franchise of dwindling movie returns and canceled TV shows that hadn't aired in years and make such a blockbuster runaway hit? And made our girlfriends finally like it?! It all goes back to the Universal Emotion.
0 Comments
National Novel Writing Month has come and gone and for the first time in the many years I have called myself a writer and known about this event, I actually took part. Did I succeed? Hell yeah, I kicked the shit out of NaNoWriMo and loved it from Day One! I wrote a novel in 35 days and with some polish and editing, it could be one of my best works. So for all you future fans out there reading my old blog archives, here is how I did it...
Star Trek Beyond came out almost a year ago and I liked it quite well. It was no Undiscovered Country or Wrath of Khan, but it was fun and enjoyable and sometimes that's all you can hope for with Star Trek. I never wrote a review because, quite frankly, there wasn't all that much to say. Fast and Furious director Justin Lin did a fine job remaining faithful to both the aesthetic established by JJ Abrams when he rebooted it a few years ago, as well as the characters themselves. But a few cleverly framed visual sequences aside, he didn't exactly push the story in any new directions or expand the mythology much. I finally got around to watching it again and this time I think I can put my finger on why this passable installment that had quite favorable reviews (in a summer movie schedule otherwise rife with disappointing duds) still somehow managed to be... only okay? It let spectacle and plot overwhelm the themes and characters. And this can kill your story too and leave it merely okay when it otherwise had the potential to be resonant. Or: How to write more indulgently.
A lot of people talk about writing honestly. For the record, I'm for that. And I'll talk about it another time. But I want to talk today about writing indulgently. Because as much as writing honestly can bring truly relatable and emotionally genuine content to your story, writing indulgently can bring, well, a little guilty pleasure. It can bring that addictive quality that keeps a reader coming back, or keeps a fan begging for the next installment. It can keep your story in the mind of your readers long after they've laid down for bed. It puts it in their dreams. When you write indulgently, you give people that guilty pleasure they have to get more of. Alright future fans, you got me.
That was a trick title. I implied that I had a solution to a writing problem and you clicked to see what it might be in the hopes that it would help jump-start your stalled out sci-fi short story. I don't have the secret answer, I'm sorry to admit. But I do think it's worth exploring the problem. And what is that problem, you ask? Well, it's not writer's block. Lots of people get writer's block and lots of people write about how they get writer's block (instead of just plain writing), and lots of people write about how to overcome writer's block (when they should be writing about just plain writing). So needless to say, I'm not jumping into that pool. But what do you do when it's not writer's block that's holding up your story? What makes a story? Easy. Once upon a time: A bunch of stuff happens. The end.
Anyone can tell that story. “Hey, I was driving down the road and saw this guy spin out on the ice and crash into the ditch along Route 5. It was crazy.” But what makes a story good? I used to think it was strong character motivation. Don't people say, "Character is King"? If you knew what a character wanted and why they wanted it, it would make the things that happen more interesting and entertaining. “That wasn’t just any guy. That was my roommate, Jeff! He’s always late for work and his boss told him if he’s late one more time, he’s fired.” |
Captain's Blog
|