Alright, let's review real quick. We start the story with the premise, the conflict, which is "Someone wants something badly, but they have trouble getting it."  And I made a story chart that you can fill out to design it.

And once you have a conflict, then you can fill out the next story chart, which is for the storyline (the plotline).  You're starting with the conflict and then you're asking yourself what happens. First, the exposition, what does the audience need to know in order to play along with the story? Then the culmination, what happens when the protagonist and antagonist collide? And then the resolution, when the audience finds out what happens, does the protagonist achieve their objective or not? And what do they get out of that? Why is it satisfying?

Now that last question, "Why is it satisfying?" is tricky to answer, if you're just using those first two story charts. Because those first 2 story charts are the text of the story. This week, we start designing the subtext of the story. I believe that the subtext of a story comes in two layers: the arc & the theme. This week is arc, next week is theme.

The arc is the psychological subtext. It's you, the storyteller, seeing the plotline that you've designed from the protagonist's perspective. You are the character in the story. You're pretending you're the character in the story and you're asking yourself, how would this story, all the stuff that's happening, all of these challenges, this conflict that I'm facing, how would it change me? How would I be forced to change?

So we started with the Conflict story chart, and out of that grows the Plotline story chart. And from out of that, grows the Arc story chart!

Now if you scroll to the next video, then I will tell you about how I think about arcs when I'm ready to start designing them.

I like to plan my character arcs with the same format that I use to plan a storyline. Just like the conflict tells you the premise of the storyline & then there's 3 parts that tell you what happens, it's the same with the arc.

But instead of a conflict, it's an internal conflict. And it's based on the premise that the protagonist has some form of self-sabotaging behavior. They keep doing something-- thinking something, behaving some way, believing something-- that prevents them from achieving their objective. It's basically asking how is the protagonist their own antagonist?

And sometimes this can be the text of the story. It certainly is in Hamlet, in the Lion King, in any Jack Nicholson movie.

But often it's left to the subtext! Because chances are, the character isn't trying to change. Nobody really wants to change. That's a hard thing to do!

But when you're faced with a conflict-- when you want something badly but you have trouble getting it-- then you're going to have to do something different than you've been doing, in order to get to it. Conflict is a great way to force a character to change some aspect of their personality.

So to design an internal conflict, you use the same format as the Frank Daniel prompt. The protagonist wants something badly, but they keep self-sabotaging.

Once I figure out how the protagonist is sabotaging themself with their own behaviors, I have the premise of the arc. So now I'm ready to figure out what happens in the arc!

And the first step is thinking about the beginning, and the end. Before & after, like a weight loss photo. How does the protagonist (feel / think / behave) at the beginning of the story, and at the end? What's their everyday life like before the conflict, and after the conflict? You take either end of the spectrum, and you can compare & contrast them in interesting ways.

Maybe the protagonist is learning how to be an individual. At the start, they rely upon the group that they belong to. But by the end, they become independent in some important way. Or maybe they shouldn't have left the group! They left too early, and so in the end, they suffer as a result.

When I'm ready to start designing the before and after, I start thinking about the audience's first impression of the character. Like, what's the scene like? What's the main thing that I'm getting across about this character, to the audience? And then, what's the audience's last impression of the character? Because then you can start writing scenes, and comparing & contrasting them.

 

It's worth noting: I learned a lot from Creating Character Arcs, by KM Weiland. I don't teach it the same way that she does, because I don't agree 100% with the way that she phrases things.  But she's so smart, and she's really onto something here!  So if you want to learn more about character arcs, this would be a good book to read.

I want to mention the main difference between the way I teach it and the way that she teaches it: I describe the poles of a character arc as "before & after." It's the way the character behaves at the beginning, and the way they behave at the end. Or the way they (think / feel / believe). So you can put anything you want in there.

But KM Weiland does not say "before & after." She says at the beginning, there is a lie that the character believes, and by the end, there's a truth that they must embrace. Which kind of gets into how theme works... but I figured I'd mention it in this lesson, just in case that's useful to you.

 

So as an example of a Before & After, let's consider the Little Mermaid.  One of my favorite movies!  One of my first stories that I ever paid attention to the story structure about, in the movie theater as a four-year-old. Let's take a look at the dad's arc, King Triton. Here's our first impression of King Triton.

My first impression of King Triton is that he's treating his daughter like she's a little girl. Once I watched the movie and know the full context of it, Ariel doesn't care at all about singing. She doesn't care at all about performing! That's a thing her dad values. What she values is studying the human world.

This concert is supposed to be her big debut. He's especially looking forward to hearing his "little Ariel." But he's signed her up for the wrong after-school activities! She's just not really interested in this. It's not her Thing. So when she just clean forgets, he gets really mad at his disobedient child. So that's my first impression of King Triton, is that he's mad at his disobedient child.

Now here's the audience's last impression of King Triton:

His daughter is getting married... too young & too soon, I will say. That part is problematic. But the point is, our last impression of Triton is that he's saying goodbye to his daughter. She's moving out of town. She's hooked up with a human who, at the beginning of the arc, King Triton was prejudiced against.

But now Triton is willing to bow to her human boyfriend and give his daughter his blessing to go pursue this new weird lifestyle. Before & after!

Somewhere in the middle of that before & after, King Triton has realized that he can't control his daughter anymore. That she's like strong-willed, and often capable of handling herself in dangerous situations, and really really intent in getting herself into dangerous situations.

But she's found a nice guy who like rescued her & King Triton & the rest of the ocean from King Triton's arch-nemesis. So the new boyfriend made a good first impression.

So King Triton's learned that his efforts to be a controlling parent don't seem to yield good results. So now he's willing to try being supportive & gentle & remote.

Good for you, Ariel!  Move out. That's a healthy life choice, I think. You can visit for the holidays. You'll be happier in the long run.

You see how much subtext you can get, with a good Before & After?

All right, so we've got a before and an after. So what happens in the middle? Well, we've got to demonstrate the change! How did it happen??

This is the part where I start pretending that I'm the character who's experiencing the arc. I'm in the story. I have this self-defeating behavior. The conflict is happening to me. How does it force me to change my behavior?

And then what's the trial & error, when I try to change? Because I'm not going to figure it out immediately. I'm going to try a bunch of stuff, and it's not going to work well. But I can't escape the conflict, so I keep trying.

And eventually-- after I try enough-- the lightbulb clicks! I have an "aha" moment. I've heard it described as the character looks at themself in the mirror. And the protagonist realizes what they've been doing wrong (and / or) what they need to do to do it right in one scene, in one moment. And this scene we call the midpoint.

And midpoints are super-fun. If you're watching a movie on Netflix or Hulu or Disney Plus or whatever, I challenge you: pick a movie you like, and you can take a look at the arc of the movie just by watching the first scene, the last scene, and the middle scene (the midpoint). Now I can just tell instinctively!  Now I'll be watching something with my wife, and I'll pause & be like, "Is this the midpoint?? Haha, look at that, runtime exactly in the middle! I got it!!"

The midpoint is the scene where the protagonist groks their arc. Maybe they're able to see the Before, from the audience's perspective.  Or they're able to see a path towards the after. They're still doing the wrong thing, they haven't figured out how to stop. And they're not doing the right thing yet, because hey haven't figured out how to do it. But they have some insight that unlocks the puzzle for them.

So for example, let's return to King Triton from the Little Mermaid. At the beginning of the story, King Triton is treating his daughter like she's a disobedient child. And by the end, he's giving her his blessing to move out & try a new human lifestyle.

At the midpoint, King Triton finds out that Ariel has a humongous collection of human stuff, rescued Prince Eric from drowning. He hates humans. He's real racist against humans. And that she has a crush on him. And he gets so mad that he destroys her room. He wrecks all her stuff!

It's a really intense scene! And it doesn't get the reaction that he wants. Immediately after this, she goes & sells her soul to the sea witch. Just all-around bad parenting. The wrong thing, at the wrong time.  And like, whatever, we've seen King Triton be a jerk & a bad parent earlier in the movie.

The reason why this moment is different, is because it's much more violent. Ariel's clearly heartbroken. And Triton, for the first time, listens to his daughter!  He swims away & is like, "Hmm, she's upset. That's interesting! Maybe that was a bit much?"

It's just one shot, but you can see the lightbulb click!