Fake Media - Not the Kind You're Thinking

Banes at 12:00AM, April 13, 2023


my webcomic, Typical Strange, uses many fake films in its video store setting

A few years ago I spotted a book in the second hand store - one I'd read as a kid. I bought it and reread it. It was definitely more suited to the younger me - it was ...


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Before You Save That Cat, all Willy Nilly...

Banes at 12:00AM, April 6, 2023



Since I first read it, the book “Save The Cat!” has been incredibly useful to me as far as thinking about stories, outlining them, and finishing them. It's a fun way to approach structure, and applies to a LOT of mainstream stories.

It's become an essential textbook in ...



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Addition, Subtraction, Preservation, Evolution

Banes at 12:00AM, March 30, 2023



In the latest episode of Star Trek Picard, a character talks about his efforts to prolong his own life in a way I won't spoil. He lets go of this idea, and in the message he leaves behind, he says "Evolution is not about preservation - it's about addition ...

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Conflict

Banes at 12:00AM, March 23, 2023



Conflict!

It's the essential building block of drama. You don't have a story without the basics of “someone wants something, and something's in the way of getting it.”

Screenwriting books - books I really love and have given me a lot - will often say that amping up the ...





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Another Approach to Story Structure

Banes at 12:00AM, March 16, 2023



I'm a big fan of story structure. It can be a big help to figuring out how to put a story together in a way that works. Not that structure needs to be followed in a slavish way, or that one structure applies to every story.
But it can ...


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Marisu

Banes at 12:00AM, March 9, 2023



The term “Mary Sue” became a lot more mainstream a few years ago - but around comic book websites like ours, and circles that were into writing and deeper fandom have been well versed with this for much longer.

The Mary Sue is a character who has abilities or positive qualities ...



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You Kids Are Testing My Limits

Banes at 12:00AM, March 2, 2023



I was reading a critique of a series, a successful series, of novels. I think it's an urban fantasy/horror thing where the main character has a specific paranormal ability, limited, but useful in her detective work. She had a love interest, who was maybe on and off, but ...

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Prose v Comics

Banes at 12:00AM, Feb. 23, 2023



When I first started putting together my story idea for Typical Strange many years ago, I imagined it to be an animated series. With a lot of time and effort and learning Toon Boom software along the way, I had a pretty strong idea of the main characters, and a ...

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The Modern Classics: Die Hard

Banes at 12:00AM, Feb. 16, 2023



Die Hard was a surprise smash hit back in the day, and became famous in some circles as a template for screenwriters to pitch their stories (“It's Die Hard on a bus”…or a boat, or a jet, or in a house).

It's also talked about as a ...



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Shmuck Bait

Banes at 12:00AM, Feb. 9, 2023



Shmuck Bait is the name, I think coined by one of the Breaking Bad/Better Call Saul writers, where a cliffhanger or shocking ending leads the audience to believe something major has changed. For example, the appearance that a major character has died. But when the next episode/issue/book ...

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