MacGuffin comin' through!


MacGuffins

I'm not sure if everyone knows this already, but a MacGuffin is a term that was made popular by Alfred Hitchcock, and is now widely used in writing and storytelling circles.

It is an item or event (or possibly even a character) that exists only ...

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 ...

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It's been a great year! DD has continued to grow bit by bit, we've been stable and a great host for many many webcomics. DD ...

As another year draws to a close, I'm once again thinking about how much time is flying by, more and more quickly the older I get.

Weeks whiz by like mad these days, and how quickly we've reached the end of the year reminds me that YEARS are ...

Peter Quill is an earthling living and working in space

In an interview about SNL creatives, it was said that actors who write prefer Strange characters in a normal world. While writers will write pieces about Regular people in a bizarre world. I have no idea how true that is ...

When my writing partner and I were penning the beginnings of issue 0 of The Constellation Chronicle we designed two characters Marcel and Wainwright. We wanted to introduce the looming threat that was barreling towards the main cast and the most convenient way to do that was through these two ...

In the middle of nowhere a strange little bald boy appears in the forest. He can't speak a word and there's something very strange about him… but the workers on a little farm take him in and do what they can to make him comfortable and welcome. There ...

Years ago while living abroad, I heard an expat mom explain to her kids that it was good to try new foods just like in Green Eggs and Ham by Dr Seuss!

For anyone unfamiliar with the red covered book filled with rhymes, Green Eggs and Ham is a story ...

I Was Wrong - The Character Arc

Last time I was here I talked about “The Old Warrior”. It's one of my favorite character types and story elements.

This time I'm going to go into another trope/theme that almost always works for me: The realization of a character ...

When Stranger Things ended their first season I didn’t feel that there was a need to continue. The character’s had had their arcs come full circle, most loose ends were neatly tied and, despite the ending being left slightly ambiguous, for the most part, it was wrapped up ...