Never Underestimate Your Audience

We've been watching Heroes with the kids.    I've never seen beyond season 1, and we're almost at the end of the first season now, so all I know of the show is limited.

However, as we were watching the last episode we saw together, Patrick asked a question.

"If Peter can regenerate how come he has a scar?"

As it turns out, this had been the subject of online debate and discussion long before our viewing with the kids, but I'm not really concerned with the answer at this point.  What stood out in my mind is the simple truth that if you don't maintain your own internal consistency, or explain a significant change, the audience disengages from the story.  It loses some of the intrigue and adoration of fans when they're pulled out of the story and legitimately think the writer has made a mistake.

I think, if you've been reading everyone's posts on The Dark Knight Rises, some might argue that the final installment of the trilogy lost the plot.  I didn't see it that way, but it took seeing the movie a second time to be able to fully explain why.  There was one critical detail near the end I hadn't really processed the first time around, but it made the end make sense to me.  I take no conclusion as absolute - not that Bruce wouldn't return, not that "Robin" wasn't about the become the next Batman - and so I'm not as bothered by the ending as some have been.  In fact, I liked it, and the audience in two packed theaters both times I saw the movie cheered. 

They were certainly satisfied.

That said, I think it's often easier to have the audience overlook character consistency and some plot holes in movies, and to a lesser extent, on TV.  In books, readers are far more likely to skim back and double-check.

My advice to writers is simple.  Don't underestimate your audience - we have a ten-year-old and eleven-year-old critiquing book and TV stories in this house, and no, just because they're kids doesn't mean they'll read anything and think it's okay.  If they think it's crap, they'll tell us why.  That's how a huge fan of The Hunger Games ended up giving up on the third book in the series.  It didn't hold up.

The other tip I have is to know what the core of your story is.  If you do, it makes it harder to lose the plot... If an 11-year-old can notice when it doesn't hold together and make sense just imagine what an editor or agent will say if your story doesn't stand up against its own established internal truths.

Debate or damage?

by: Joelle Charbonneau

I love debate.  Even if I agree with someone, I am happy to debate the other side of the argument just because it allows me to look at something from a new point of view.  That may not change my mind, but seeing an issue from all sides is the best way to understand it.  Personally, I think that the more information I have, the better I can make a decision.

Unfortunately, no matter what the issue – self-publishing, which books should be eligible for what awards, politics, fast-food CEOs and their religious beliefs—I have found that a great number of people do not take care with the words they use when discussing the topic at hand.  I have seen US political leaders likened to Hitler (which—yes, we have problems, but NO none of our current US leaders are killing millions in gas chambers) and publishers referred to as the devil.  The employees at the polarizing fast food chain (and if you’ve lived in a bubble this past week and don’t know which one I mean – I’m jealous!) have been called evil for needing their paycheck and have been praised by some patrons for beliefs that they do not support.  And up and down my Facebook newsfeed I see messages that bash those who do not hold the same political or social ideals.

YIKES!

Technology is wonderful.  It puts information at our fingertips.  We get to communicate via Skype and social media with people we might otherwise forget to pick up the phone to call.  However, technology—specifically social media, websites and blogs, have given many the impression that because they are communicating to the masses via a screen that their message doesn’t not do damage.  They throw around highly charged words like “Hilter and “Against God” and call people who hold certain beliefs names all the while not believing that they are doing anything wrong.

And maybe you don’t believe they are because—hey—the first amendment says that we all have the freedom of speech.  Do I believe in free speech?  Hell, yes!  But I would argue that much of the discourse I have seen could be considered a form of bullying.  It is one thing to say “I support this idea.”  It is quite another to say that anyone who supports something else is ignorant or evil.  Saying that there are questions you have about publishing or self-publishing is valid.  Saying that anyone who makes a choice to traditionally publish is an idiot and is a traitor to their creativity is just silly.  And let’s not get me started on what people were saying this week about those who supported the fast food chain and those who protested it.

People!  Yes, there is free speech.  Yes, I believe in it.  People I know and love have gone to war and fought for our right to have that privilege.  But they didn’t put their lives on the line just so people on Facebook could browbeat and bully their friends who dare not agree with their stance on certain issues. 

As writers, we know that words matter.  Words can evoke tears.  Prompt laughter.  Cause pain.  Whether face to face or behind a screen, words should be chosen with care.  Debate should be encouraged, but while debating we should hold ourselves to the standard that we would hold our children to.  Think of many of the posts that you see by your friends on Facebook, on blogs or on other social media sites today.  How many of those if posted by a teenager to their friends would be considered belittling or bullying?  How many could cause them trouble with parents or get them expelled?

So, I will say it again—words matter.  Please, choose the words you use with care.  By doing so, you will encourage others to do the same.  Once we have taken the anger and intent to damage out of our discourse, debate is possible.  And debate—a true exchange of ideas—is a wonderful thing.

Watching The Dark Knight Rises From the Heart

By

Scott D. Parker

I read Jay’s take on The Dark Knight Rises on Thursday (read it now) and agreed with a lot that he said. We saw the same film, but I think we left with a different emotional impact. 

When I enter a movie theater to see a film for the first time, I rarely bring my brain. Other than my eyes and ears, I bring the one thing that suits me best for watching a movie: the heart. In this way, I allow the filmmakers to envelop me in their world, with all of its sights, sounds, and storytelling. It takes a pretty drastic film** to bring out my brain and start fussing over the details. It was with my heart that I watched John Carter this past spring and was so enthralled with the world of Barsoom that I overlooked its flaws. Yes, I saw them on subsequent viewings but that did little to change how I felt about the film when I first saw it in the theater. Ditto for many of my favorites films throughout the years. Sure, I can snark on and on about how so many bad choices were made with Return of the Jedi, but, when I sat down and re-watched it again recently with my boy, I became 13 again. (Well, I was 97% a thirteen year old; I still cringe with some of Han Solo’s antics.)

To date, I have seen The Dark Knight Rises (TDKR) only once. In the week leading up to the film, I re-watched Batman Begins and The Dark Knight because, after I had seen the third installment, there would never again be a time when TDKR would be new and unexpected. Oh, and SPOILERS abound here, so, like Jay wrote on Thursday, if you haven’t seen the film and don’t want to be spoiled, bookmark this page and come back later. Bookmark his, too.

The trailers for TDKR pretty much indicated something I suspected: that Batman would not survive. When Batman responds to Selina Kyle’s comment “You have given them everything,” with his own “Not everything. Not yet.” I pretty much guessed—no, expected—Batman not to survive. So I was ready. As good as it is to watch/read a big story with a hero you know will survive (Luke Skywalker, Indiana Jones, Frodo, every other superhero film), when you have a story in which your main character either dies of sacrifices himself (Batman, Harry Potter), the stakes are raised.

And my heart swells. It grows inside of me and gets me so wrapped up in the story that I let the narrative just sweep me along. That’s how I got with TDKR. This story is Big. As Jay pointed out, director Christopher Nolan aimed for the stars with this film. He wanted an epic and he delivered one. We can quibble about the details, but the epic size of the film—no, of the entire trilogy—was monumental. Let’s also note that the scope of his trilogy was enhanced greatly by the death of Heath Ledger. The actor’s death gave an exaggerated quality to that second film that was more than the sum of its parts. Don’t get me wrong: had Ledger lived to see the film open, word of mouth would still have made its way to non-comic book folks to get them to see the film, it just may not have been the groundswell it actually was.

Back to TDKR. Jay is astute in his observations on the new movie. Gary Oldmans’s Commissioner Gordan and Joseph Gordon-Levitt’s Officer Blake do provide the everyman quality to this story that you don’t normally get. Now, up until now, I didn’t really care that I didn’t have it because, you know, this is about the billionaire Bruce Wayne and all of his rich friends. Perhaps it’s a testament to Nolan’s craft is that he gave me something I didn’t know I wanted. I really, really enjoyed Gordon-Levitt’s role in this film, where he came from and why he did what he did. I could watch an entire film about Officer Blake (Gotham Central anyone?) and be happy. Tom Hardy’s Bane was a good adversary to Batman from a physical standpoint. Hey, he broke Batman’s back, didn’t he? And, yes, he lacked the intellectual capacity from the comics (I was a little disappointed that Bane was, like in “Batman and Robin,” just the muscle), but he physically commanded the screen for me. Whereas Joker, in The Dark Knight, talked on and on about anarchy, Bane was putting it into effect, and that proved quite scary. Michael Caine was called on to remind the audience of the tragic origin of Bruce Wayne-as-Batman. Yes, he cried a lot, but he was supposed to cry a lot. He failed, in his mind, Bruce’s parents and failed to keep the darkness away from Bruce. I think I’d be crying, too.

Another thing Jay finds lacking in TDKR is sub-text. Since all the characters stop what they’re doing and tell the audience how they feel, there’s no room for subtlety. There’s no room for the minds of the audience to put two-and-two together, to think on a line of dialogue or a character action later, while driving home from the theater, and then have that spark of understanding. Tis true, I’ll agree, but this is, after all, a giant comic book movie. Harry Potter, Frodo, Luke Skywalker: they all talk about what they’re going to do and then go do it. I didn’t have a problem with the characters in TDKR doing the same thing. It allowed me to experience the film viscerally rather than intellectually, and allowed me to get wrapped up in the final scenes with all the emotional baggage that had crept into me in the first two hours and the first two movies. 

And I loved the ending, the one with Alfred sitting in that European restaurant, and seeing what he saw: a happy Bruce Wayne, a smiling Bruce Wayne, that had finally emerged from the darkness of his parents’ murder and the darkness of Batman that threatened to engulf him and destroy him from the inside. And, yes, my tears flowed. 

Because finally, a superhero story ended. Don’t get me wrong. I love comics and read the new ones and re-read the old ones, but it’s great to have an ending. And it was a happy ending. It’s a good thing, too, because this trilogy is very “of its time,” that is, dark, almost oppressively so. Which is why I so reveled in the ending. The bright, sunlit ending of a great trilogy and a very good movie.

There will be another Batman and he’ll have to live in the shadow of this interpretation, and, either way, I’ll be there, in that theater, waiting for the new Batman film. There will also be time enough to re-watch The Dark Knight Rises and pick it apart from a structural, writerly standpoint. Heck, even I, in the theater, said to my wife, “Now, just how did Bruce get himself across the ocean to Gotham from that prison cell?” (I didn’t dwell on it because the entrance was awesome.) But for now, I am basking in the thrilling, emotional, heartfelt conclusion to this version of Batman.

**Lest you think I’m a deluded Bat-fan, I nearly walked out on “Batman and Robin” back in 1997. I didn’t, but it was years until I saw it again. And lest you think I think Batman should only be dark, far from it. Two cases in point: One, the old stories from the 1970s I’ve been reading. Batman is still a brooding figure, but he smiles, he has a bit of a sense of humor (current New 52 version doesn’t), and much of the emotional baggage is not present. Two, I absolutely love the animated Batman: The Brave and the Bold cartoon from 2008. All the humor, all the corniness, all the flat-out fun of a comic book that is alive and moving. I really, really hated that it was cancelled to make room for—yet another—dark interpretation. Sigh.