Jon Favreau played Maz Kanada. Or Pablo Hidalgo. Or something like that

There are Easter Eggs hidden in media that might be spottable by viewers/readers, and others that the audience would never know unless they got the inside scoop from somewhere.

It's one reason I like commentaries and ...

This is gonna be yet another rambling kind of post and a long one at that–so be warned. In the recent month I’ve been doing some soul searching that ties into this personal Christmas shopping spree of sorts that I’ve had recently. To be more specific, I ...

This is an article I’m writing after midnight while being drunk on mixed drinks of brännvin and julmust. It’s November. I need booze to cope with the Scandinavian winter gloom that hits your soul like a hammer this time of the year (It’s a thing up here ...

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If something affects or disturbs you so much that you want to respond to it through a story that you write, that can be a pretty powerful ...

So it came to my attention that J.K. Rowling has taken revenge against her ‘internet trolls’ by writing a new book called The Ink Black Heart. According to reviews (I haven't read the book) the plot of the book reflects the author's experience of mass-condemnation over her ...

The Ultimate Weapon of Terror

When you are a villain trying to terrorize all that there is to serve your evil ends, you’ll find it a much easier job to do once you get yourself the ultimate weapon to terrorize with. We’ve seen this kind of weapon again ...

I took this past week off, in part to celebrate reaching the goal age of 30, but mostly to take some time to address an encroaching feeling, burnout. Creativity is a muscle, and like any muscle in your body, if overused it can become strained or even tear. I am ...

Greetings, citizens!

Superpowers coming from magical abilities or fantastic technology are essential to many stories in the fantasy and science fiction genres. They can show up in other genres, too, like horror and of course, superhero stories (are they science fiction stories? Science-Fantasy? Heroic Fantasy? Whatever - most of those folks ...

I decided to give the first episode of Riverdale chance after seeing lots of its merchandise advertised in the local Hot Topic and several teenagers recommending it. If anyone is late to the party (as I was), Riverdale is a series based off of the 1939 Archie Comics. It shares ...

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We've talked about formulas before, but mostly in the context of escaping formulas and reinventing them.
NOW however we're talking about using existing formulas to create a story, or creating new formulas and sticking to them to come up with your stories.
Formulas can be a good ...