Saturday 7 November 2015

5 Familiar Plotlines That Need to Go Away in Spec Scripts

It has become scarily apparent to me that scriptwriters around the world must all be linked to some sort of neural hive-mind. Granted, with our catalogue of media expanding by the day, the art of creating something truly original is definitely no easy feat. Unfortunately though, rather taking the opportunity to push the boundaries of storytelling, many writers are falling back on the same few recycled plotlines. For every 100 scripts I have read, a depressingly small number of stories within that group don't end up being repeated. So, if your latest script resembles one of these repeat-offenders, please, do me a favour...

Warning: Things get pretty heavy.

1) Taken Knock Offs


Let's kick off with the most frequently occurring display of unoriginality. Child is kidnapped. Father has skills (policeman / military / Krav Maga instructor, etc.). Fights bad guys. Saves child. Taken did it (several times, in different variations), so why go back to that dried-up well? "It's just meant to be a fun action romp", you quickly counter, and sure, it may well be (most of the time, though, people seem to forget to include the "fun" part), but, at the end of the day, it's still just Taken again. Look, kidnapping can be a great narrative device (which, disclaimer, I don't condone in reality), but hanging your entire story on the back of it pretty much writes yourself into a corner.

The other issue with this clichéd variation of rescuing kids is in its execution. 9 times out of 10, dark real-world issues like human trafficking (or even child prostitution in a few instances) aren't handled with the maturity they require, instead likening the antagonists more towards the dastardly Child-Catcher from Chitty Chitty Bang Bang. As dark as it sounds, your villain's reasons for taking that child have to be justified - especially if you're falling into the trap of having Super-Dad eventually tracking them down. I mean, do these abductors not do the slightest bit of background research around their target? Take the kid of a milkman or a politician if you want your operation to keeping running, uninterrupted. Bloomin' Hell, now I'm offering advice to people who steal kids - that's what these scripts have done to me.

2) The Protagonist Might Be The Killer


Here's a fun observation - if your main character spends the entire story worrying that they are actually responsible for a murder, pretty much every time, they are not going to end up being the murderer. So, I ask you... Why waste all that time and energy on a foregone conclusion? The audience is going to be spending more of their time suspecting your supporting characters anyway, so having your protagonist crying and splashing water in their face at the bathroom mirror for 90 minutes is just unnecessarily distancing us from the real mystery. It's like having a love triangle romance story, where the third wheel spends most of the movie thinking he's in love, causing all kinds of trouble, and then at the end being like, "Screw love. I'm going to get a job instead."

Don't get me wrong - a little ambiguity as to the morality of your "hero" can be a great thing. Making their internal conflict directly related to the murders, however, doesn't provide an interesting dimension for the character. Worrying about being a killer isn't a relatable emotion (for most of us). Instead, have Peter/Patricia Protagonist working to overcome a separate internal struggle, whereby the resolution of the murders acts as a catalyst for growth. The go-to is usually alcoholism with thrillers, but really it could be just about any sort of personal problem - an illegitimate child, a mental or physical illness, or the crippling struggles of unemployment. That's a lot of dark stuff, mind, so here's a picture of a duckling stood on a Labrador's head.


3) Former Lover Teaches Our Hero to Love Again


The reality of bumping into an old flame is surprisingly different from the fiction of most romantic movies. It seems every film lover, especially in spec scripts, operates in the extremes, either acting incredibly hostile to their former partner, or being impossibly friendly, likely looking to reignite the fires. Naturally, the real world features a more murky range of emotions, from the civil, to the damaged and the incredibly awkward (the latter being my personal preference, apparently). Worse than the typical extremities in cinema, however, is the inclusion of an Ex as nothing more than a plot point, rather than bringing any sort of meaningful contribution or story of their own to the overall film.

It almost feels like we're all buying into the same false formulas - if a relationship ends for a specific reason, all we have to do is overcome that reason and then we'll definitely get back together. Or, our current dissatisfaction with a current relationship is rooted in the fact that the person we were with before was vastly superior. These "grass-is-always-greener", rose-tinted outlooks on love are nice in theory, but ultimately damaging in practice, and many budding writers find themselves opting for these optimistic messages without really offering any sort of original or realistic dissection of human connection. As a result, characters come off as bland and predictable. Again, I'm really trying not be pessimistic here - reality makes for a better story than fiction. There can be nice things in reality too!

4) Girl Possesses Strange Abilities


In fairness, this frequently appearing plotline occasionally intersects with the Taken knock-offs in point one, so yeah, you could argue I too am not contributing anything original here. But, like in that section, Carrie already exists, so why is everyone so keen to half-heartedly rehash it? The fact that all of the numerous scripts I've read using this trope featured a girl, rather than, y'know, a boy, is an odd correlation, but one that I'm quite thankful is attempting to bring a different kind of protagonist to our screens. The problem, once more, just lies in how predictable and uninteresting the execution of those stories ends up becoming.

So your leading lady is either telekinetic, telepathic, pyrokinetic, invincible, can talk to animals, a shape-shifter, can toast bread with her breath, whatever, etc. She spends the first Act discovering her abilities whilst trying to keep them hidden, yadda yadda. Then, the government or some private organisation learns of her powers and wants to abuse them - meh. She stops them, everyone finds out her big secret... WE HAVE SEEN THIS SO MANY TIMES. At least the recent Supergirl series has had the foresight to have Kara very much aware of her abilities and a bunch of supporting characters know her secret in advance of the pilot, so we can start seeing new stories emerge. Bottom line - find a new angle, kids.

5) Someone is Dying or Something...



Give me strength... Can you tell I'm now boring myself writing about these boring storylines full of boring characters and boring sequences? I don't know which asshole thought it was a great idea to tell budding writers that having a character on their deathbed was a good shortcut to creating "emotional drama". Either way, I'm hunting that person down. Yes, it's a sad scenario, but it always just reeks of trying to get the audience to cry, because, well, dying and stuff. Repeating the issues of yesterpoint once more, the notion that a character finally seeing the error of their ways or providing a convenient emotional resolution for someone else just before they kick the bucket feels too romanticised and unlike reality.

Timing is also a big problem here. You kick off your story with a deathbed scene and we don't feel connected to the characters involved. You end your story with a deathbed scene and the character resolution can feel like too little too late (although framing it as a reunion, like in Interstellar, can add an extra, tragic dimension). You hit the midpoint of your story with a deathbed scene and... Why?! It's very tricky to get right, and 95% of the time just doesn't work in spec scripts. Tragedy becomes more tragic if it's born from factors within the character's control. Old age, illnesses and freak accidents feel too "written", as if you couldn't find a natural way to include that deathbed scene you insist on jamming down our tear ducts.

Anyway, I warned you this stuff would all get a little heavy this week. So, as a final treat, here's that picture of a duckling on top of a Labrador again.



James Cottle, a Scriptwriting Mega-Scholar™, is now a real world Freelance Writer, in between intense bouts of Script Reading. Follow him on Twitter @Jxmxsc, "like" the Anti-Scriptwriting page on Facebook, and share this blog if you want his opinions on your work to be completely unbiased.

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