“Asymmetric threats” is a military term. It is defined as “an unequal balance or when thinking about threats, an unfair advantage to the perpetrator. Phillips, A (2012) provided an excellent overview of what an asymmetric threat is. He described attacks of this nature to be undetectable, and once occurred, impossible ...

We've talked before about theme in these Newsposts.

Many people know what a theme is, but just to set it up right, theme is what a story is about, on a deeper level. It's about the journey the character is taking. It's the larger “point” of the ...

Reflection Characters

When I was doing a little reading on the “Mentor” character type, I learned about something called “Reflection Characters”. It was an eye opener; I'd never heard of this before, though I could instantly see how it made sense in storytelling, and dozens of examples came to ...

edward norton in “primal fear”

One of the things I like in fiction is characters who are not what they seem.

Like all things, this sort of thing can be done well, or badly, or somewhere in between. It can be fascinating and surprising, or cliche and predictable. It can ...

Time travel is a narrative trap. It's quicksand.

It's very alluring to use, being able to put a person from one historical era into another and watch as shenanigans ensue, but very quickly, a writer (and often the audience too) discovers that it quickly unravels, and the story ...

Guilt is a powerful tool in the creative process.

No, I'm not talking about the guilt you feel because you haven't updated in six months which pushes you to sit down and finish that darn page (though that helps too, we've all been there).

Guilt is very ...

CHARACTER SHAPES

I remember hearing about this notion some time ago, on the dvd special features for an animated movie or show. I don't remember which one.

Characters derived from basic shapes can give a very strong impression of their basic personality type. This can help the audience feel ...

Creating a Cast - in 1-2-3

One of the challenges…and maybe one of the greatest pleasures…of creating a series is populating it with a cast of heroes. I know I spend many weeks or months tinkering with characters and deciding who they're going to be. …And how many ...

LISTEN!

This week we mine Banes's ideas about damaged protagonists. Does having physiologically damaged protagonists (as opposed to merely flawed), make them more realistic or relatable? I think we came to the conclusion that this isn't necessarily the case at all, in fact it can mean the opposite ...

A well written protagonist will generally have some flaws, starting out as an underdog of some kind, with lessons to learn and improvements to make over the course of the story.

Granted, some heroes are, well, just heroes, who are pretty much who they need to be from the beginning ...