So it's fun to rant about tropes I hate but I actually prefer to gush about tropes I love.

And one of them is what I call “the bargain”: it's really a game of wits between a (usually lawful) villain and a hero (or protagonist/antagonist, take your ...

There is no story without a theme. Even when written without anything prepared in terms of a message, a story will always give people things to think about and messages drawn from how the story was set up and how it was resolved (if at all).

So I don't ...

Normally in stories there is the hero vs the villain or the protagonist vs the antagonist. As the audience, we generally expect to root for the hero or the protagonist and hope for the villain's or antagonist's comeuppance.

But there come those times when we find ourselves rooting ...

Welcome to my Underground Layers

-Banes, your pop culture references are as on point as ever!



I've talked about story structure here many times, normally in similar ways.
A different approach to character and story, one I haven't used much personally, is what we could call the “onion ...

Who doesn't love a good intrigue, some scheming in the shadows, some low chuckling behind a curtain?

The author.

It's the author that doesn't love it. Or rather, the sheer background work that needs to go into writing a good scheming plot, counter plot, and the whole ...

Protagonists are always in need of antagonists.

Usually, those are visible, concrete, specific: the protagonists are up against someone or someones who are obstructing their way to attaining their goal. Some are even so powerfully clashing against each other that they are nemeses. Superman and Lex Luthor, Batman and the ...

Frames (a.k.a panels) are great, they can look simple or extraordinary, they can help the comic flow and provide feelings, a feeling of dread, excitement, anger, etc. Frames are more than just lines that encase the moments of our characters.

When you’re making your frame you always ...

The moment of change in a character is not always crystal clear in a story. Very often the secret to good storytelling I think, is to understand all the structural elements in a story, and a character arc, and then to HIDE those elements so they feel realistic while they ...

Some characters are the heroes.

Some characters are the villains.

And some characters are just punchable. But not actually bad, or even antagonists- though sometimes they can be towards specific characters rather than the general plot goals.

Every time this type of character opens their mouth to say something, our ...

Over the past couple weeks I watched and loved Cobra Kai. There are multiple articles that I could write about this show.

It's an ensemble cast, and I guess Johnny and Daniel could be called co-Protagonists. I actually think Johnny is the Protagonist, Daniel the Antagonist and Kreese is ...