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This blog is for whatever I feel like writing about at the time, just to get my words out |
| I hate the thought of offending anybody and I try to keep a balanced view, so please don't be made if you don't like what I say in my blog. Please tell me so I can try to control myself in the future. Thank you |
| If there are two things I love to read its science fiction and superheroes (although the second one might always be considered part of latter, I don't know). Not to say that those are the only things I like; fantasy is something I've always liked, but I generally don't like to read about it. The reason is simply because I find most of it to be stale ideas written over again - just different character names doing basically the same thing. I've read a few of the books from the genre, such as a book from the DragonLance series (which I personally didn't like) but the only fantasy series I like thus far is the Wheel of Time series. I'm also a big video game buff and while I like the RPG genre as a whole I just can't continue with the fantasy ones a lot of times because it runs into the same problem as the books in the genre - same stuff, different name. I hear some people say (though, admittedly, I don't know for sure because I've never read them) that everyone basically just bases their ideas off of Tolkien's The Hobbit and Lord of the Rings. So why do I say I love Fantasy? Well, I like the idea of a mid-evil world of my own making, with its own name, original continents and characters but as I brought out before, the genre lacks originality in every story I've come across (Though, I haven't read many fantasy stories here yet, to be fair). Instead the bland generality of backwaters character finds item, gains party, looks for special item, and defeats evil embodied, or a few other regular dozing tales, think outside the box. I am largely a sci-fi writer but I got to thinking on my way home from work today - what if hostile, highly technologically advanced aliens invaded a mid-evil world filled with dragons and magic. To add further innovation, what if your group of main characters had to trek through a dark labyrinth fighting some of these said aliens to survive and escape, like a survivor/horror. Do you think that would spice up the genre, make it more interesting. I'm going to start developing such a book and if I get it completed, I hope it will be a fresh breath to this largely stale genre. |
| This entry is inspired by a newsletter that is now at least a month old, entitled "Villains have feeling, too!" I really loved how s/he brought out that villains should be complex and well-written but not enough to steal the show from the hero. The truth, in my case at least, is that I try to come up with the most sinister, evil villain (while trying to stay below 18+ ratings), I have to come up with a past for them that draws the reader in and I ask myself what made them this way? The answer I mostly, if not always, come up with is that evil begets evil; they are the way they are because something evil happened to them. In me, that invokes my sympathy and they become my favorite antagonist - the tragic villain. When written with the proper effect, I believe you can have your reader root for the villain in the sense that if they see a redeeming quality in him/her, they will hope for their redemption. This does not necessarily mean throwing the hero off the stage, but I believe can in some ways strengthen your readers hope for the hero to see this quality and try to redeem this foe. However, the villain usually has free will and this is what can make him fascinating if this is the case. In such circumstances, it was ultimately they alone who made this decision to do wrong, no matter what the influences; they always have a choice. This draws the reader in because everyone has made a bad choice at one point in their lives and if the villain is written well enough, the character begins to care for the villain, especially when the reader can see a chance for the characters redeeming quality to come through. (i.e., Will the antagonist show an act of mercy on someone because they care for them or remind them of that person, when before he only acted in a bloodthirsty or uncaring way?) Can your readers taste the struggle that goes on inside the tragic villain, feel their pain, empathize to a degree? The reader has to be left wondering about what final choice a villain will take: Will he be redeemed in some way or will they hold onto their wicked cause till the end, their hatred, or what drives them to destruction. To me this is the ultimate in character complexity. Two of my favorite villains of all time: 1) Anakin Skywalker/Darth Vader - While you may or may not like the prequel trilogy of Star Wars, I think that if nothing else, one of their achievements was in showing Anakin's struggle; how he wants to be good, but at the same time can't get rid of his anger and craving for ambition until at last they consume him and then turn him into the infamous Darth Vader. 2) Lex Luthor (Smallville Universe) - One of the things I find fascinating about Smallville is that they took a well known villain and made him a more likable character, even befriending Clark Kent at first. However, he quest to uncover Clark's secret, he lust for power and his greed begin to transform him into the antagonist that is well known. These two are villains are exceptional in my mind because even though I know what path they chose for themselves later in life, when you see their good side as they start out, you can sometimes find yourself wishing against all hope that they do make the right decisions. And that is masterful writing. |
| As I type this entry, I am also thinking on how to proceed with my second novel. I personally hate violence and would never intentionally hurt anyone if it was not necessary, but the novels I write are intended to keep a reader interested and intrigued with action, suspense, wondering what will happen next and the plot calls for a realistic amount of hostility and violence without exceeding the rating for my target audience. It has to be balanced - the bad guys need to be evil and ruthless enough to be believable. Likewise with the heroes, who can't just slap a villain on the wrist or go the other extreme by blowing or slicing heads off. The problem is that entertainment itself has become unbalanced. I'm not squeamish with blood and guts no matter how realistic the effects may seem but it seems that an increasing number of action movies aren't considered entertaining unless there is (X) amount of blood or some kind of graphic torture on-screen. What happened to the days where the viewer had to use their own imagination about how something actually happened. The same applies for books - us writers have an obligation to be reasonably descriptive, but do we really need to fill their minds with so many gory details? One thing every writer should do is to balance anything they write about with their comfort level and their creativity with what they believe their target audience would find appropriate. Personally, in the case of violence, I will never exceed what I believe to be appropriate, and on top of that, I will not sacrifice what I believe to be good storytelling for an unnecessary bloodbath. |
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