What Reality Should Be

After ripping what some think reality is, I guess I should set some guidelines for what I would like to see in a reality-based script.

Relationships: I want to see relationships where neither partner is wrong all the time, and shouting isn't the only mode of communication. You need quiet moments as well as loud ones, and you need people caring for each other; if the only thing that they do together is yell, then why are they together? Note that I'm not saying that a group should be nice to each other all of the time; however, they shouldn't be in what amounts to a negative relationship just because it fits the plot. The relationship needs to be balanced to at least some degree or else your story itself will suffer later on at some point.

Crime and Violence: Obviously I'm not going to advocate against them; they are too important to good plots. Rather, unless there is a good reason for it, don't have more than you need. If you're going to use violence, use it only when you need to make a point; too much and it loses its impact. Crime is just a form of polite violence; it's a violation of the person's rights. Again, use it just when you need to make an impact, or it's going to lose its ability to make an one.

Victimization: If using violence too much will make it lose its impact, making all of your characters victims will create an even more ineffective character. Women as victims of rape is a cliche, and rightly so; not every female needs to be that violated. The same obviously applies to young male characters as well. The point here is that there needs to be a limit to how much victimization occurs; not everyone needs to be damaged goods, as that can get boring quickly. You should have no more than one or two severely damaged characters; any more than that and your story is going to be more likely to be filled with cliches, and that will generally bring down the entire story.

People in Black: Too many characters wearing black is boring. Boring! Don't do it. Period.

If you are trying to create more realistic setting, then please stay away from one with gothic or street sensibilities; it may seem more realistic, but you're more likely to hit cliches....and there are only so many stories that you can write about wannabe rappers or people standing around talking about how things are so angsty. Yes, I'm over-simplifying, but even Neil Gaiman has been known to write happy stories once in a while. You should try it as well....

Realism....Why?

One of the most amusing things I see critics saying about various stories is that they are more "realistic". Worse, they say that is a good thing.

I disagree.

What they are referring to is that the comic is grittier than the average, with more sex, drama, and uglier characters. The world isn't all that pleasant, as violence is more common, women are raped, and young men are forced to humiliate themselves to get ahead, and racism and homophobia are part of everyone's make-up. The people aren't centerfolds, tend to ignore basic manners, and generally have some sort of sex or drug vice, usually both. The society isn't much better, as it tears down the heroic, elevates the evil, and tromps on the morally neutral.

It's not a great place to raise kids, and few do; the kids are usually orphans, latch-key, or selling themselves on the street, either as whores, hustlers, or drug-runners. And when they grow up, they usually find themselves in a private hell of dead-end job, loveless marriages, and barely keeping their heads above water. Eventually, they are either forced to become virtually homeless, retired without respect, or killed for no real reason.

I just don't find such a world all that realistic. Don't get me wrong; I don't think that the world is full of rainbows and lollipops; I don't think that good things happens to good people and bad ones are punished. I know that bad things happen randomly, and that even the safest places have their dark places. There is no question that real life has its warts and police records.

However...Even though anyone who has seen my yaoi scripts, or even looked at the Hinami Neon script knows that I can do dark as well as the next, that doesn't mean I don't get bored of it. "Dark and gritty" isn't necessary realistic; not everyone gets laid every Friday night, and there's a limit to even Murphy's Law. I want a world in which even the quarterback fumbles at love, the cheerleader has to cry on the nerd's shoulder without laying the kid, and a group of boys can sing along with disco with none of them being gay.

In short, a world of Norman Rockwell paintings would be boring, but so is a world where no one can succeed without that success being marred. When you write, it's easy to explore the shadows and go away from the light, but every so often you need to explore the place between the two...it can probably be the scariest place for a writer to go.

My Sincerest Apologies

I have not been posting for a while. I know it's a duhsich, but there have been a number of reasons I stopped posting. Of course, when I stopped, it was hard to get back into it. Suffice to say, I think I'm back. It may take me a few weeks to get back into it, but when I do, you should hopefully see three articles a week, two on writing and one on marketing. Here's hoping!

Adaptations: Fat and Skeletons

The issue with most adaptations is to what you can adapt from the original source, and how to make it work. The obvious solution is to look at what you need, rather than what you want.

The first step is to look at the plot, and see what works as a book and what works as a comic. Although a comic is a literary work, it faces a lot of the same limits as film when it comes to literary adaptations. With film the source needs to edited severely, as only so much can be filmed, even with a full-adaptation. Look at it this way: A two-hour movie converts to about 300 pages of comic script. This means that a 200-page book of average complexity (think your average young adult book) should convert nicely to 300 pages. Obviously, you need to see if something can be dropped.

Start by shrinking the plot to a skeleton. Once you've done that, start stripping out threads that don't belong or don't really add anything to the plot. Try to limit yourself to four or five act breaks (events that signal that an act is ending and another is starting); this will not only help you eliminate huge swaths of the story, but will also help you focus the script a bit. Then start highlighting scenes that are important; you shouldn't need each and every scene in a book, so this should be easy. It may sound hard, but a lot of scenes in your average book are more flavor than substance; they are there just to develop characters or act as red herrings. If the scene doesn't work in one of your act breaks, then that's a good sign to get rid of it. If all it does is give history on a background character, get rid of it. If it just describes a character, get rid of it. Get rid of as much fat as you can.

At the same time, keep some of it in. If the scene is a fan favorite or allows the character a trademark moment, keep it in (not all of them, obviously; even though Tom Sawyer is known for its swimming scenes, you usually only see one or two in any movie). Just a like a good steak, some fat helps flavor it; just decide which fat is important for the right taste.

You should also cull characters. Don't touch the majority of the main characters; they are usually too important to the theme and hard to combine because of their importance to the story feeling right. By the same token, see what minor characters can be dropped or combined; as not all of them are important, but they do sometimes serve important purposes. It's important to see know which characters can be combined, and which are just chaff.

Once you have all of the events and all of the characters, you need to recreate the plot skeleton, but with only your chosen events listed. You also need to create a relationship chart between your chosen characters. Once you have those, you can then write your own script based on the original source.

Writing an adaptation is a lot more effort than it looks. But, if you truly love the source, then it can be a work of love. If you don't, then I hope you're getting paid well for it...