When two characters want to fight, write the fight. When two characters are ready to kiss, let them kiss. When it's time to reveal the villain, reveal the villain. When it's time for a bomb to go off...boom.
Novice writers tend to delay the inevitable.
For example, suppose a human-looking
character is actually an alien. You drop a few hints that
this might be so, but other characters are slow to pick up
on
the hints. You keep dropping hints; the characters
continue to be stupid. After a while, your readers lose
respect for
your characters because they aren't seeing the obvious.
But you (the writer) are afraid to come right out and say,
"This woman is an alien," because then you'll have to
figure out what happens when the secret is revealed.
| This is an example of avoiding the future: pussyfooting around something that has to happen sooner or later. Readers will find it annoying. Commit yourself and live with the consequences. |
I'm reminded of the TV series Lois and Clark (about Superman). There was a beautiful moment when Clark proposed to Lois and she asked, "Who's proposing? Clark Kent or Superman?" That was great. Up to that moment, we didn't know Lois had figured out Clark's secret...but the writers made a ballsy move and laid everything out in the open. Audiences loved it.
Audiences didn't love what came next. For the rest of the season, the writers stalled and stalled and stalled, using one delaying tactic after another to prevent Lois and Clark from actually getting married. After a while, I stopped watching; so did a lot of other people. I realized there'd be hitches on the way to the wedding—nothing ever runs smoothly in TV or comic books—but after Lois lost her memory and fell in love with someone else, after Lois got kidnapped a few dozen times, after Lois got replaced on the wedding night by a mutant frog (!)... that was too much. I couldn't stomach any more.
There's a fear in Hollywood that if you consummate a
relationship, viewers have no more reason to
watch...but I can't imagine that letting Lois and Clark get
married would have damaged the ratings half as much as the
ridiculous delaying tactics the writers used to prevent it.
| Avoiding the future is worse than plowing straight ahead and damn the torpedoes. |
If someone's a werewolf, reveal the secret and then
deal with it—don't keep going to ever more
ridiculous lengths to avoid committing yourself to the
consequences. Whenever you find yourself holding back from
something you know really has to happen...just do it.
Write the fight, write the kiss, write the revelation.
Your story will suffer if you don't.
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Copyright © 2001, James Alan Gardner