Comment on To save the superhero movie, we need to bring back themes
wjrii@lemmy.world 5 weeks agoHow to write okayish page-turners that are far from the only valid way to approach literature?
Comment on To save the superhero movie, we need to bring back themes
wjrii@lemmy.world 5 weeks agoHow to write okayish page-turners that are far from the only valid way to approach literature?
adam_y@lemmy.world 5 weeks ago
Yeah, if we weren’t talking about Marvel films you’d have a point.
wjrii@lemmy.world 5 weeks ago
Maybe the themes in a Marvel movie will be more universal and rather broadly drawn, but to avoid overstaying their welcome with a rote and repetitive “peril-catharis” cycle, the action needs to be in service to something compelling. Otherwise, it just sort of sputters to the finish line because ultimately we’ve seen the stories before. To the extent he’s not just talking out of his ass, King’s describing a workflow, not a philosophy.
adam_y@lemmy.world 5 weeks ago
Hang on, are we arguing for the same thing? That story, and more importantly, compelling story, is what is needed?
I was just using king as an example of someone who crafts stories… Whether they are page-turners or not, that compel audiences.
My problem with Marvel films is that they are stale, narratively, and as such the only thing that can fix them is decent writing that isn’t in the service of “franchise”.
wjrii@lemmy.world 5 weeks ago
I think we definitely want the same thing, at least.
I’m just backing up the (now absent, LOL) person you originally replied to. I think you can – and in Marvel’s case maybe you should, since they are no longer drawing on zeitgeisty, recognizable versions of their comics characters – think about what you want the story to mean at least as early as you do the events that happen in it. King is a talented writer, no two ways about it, but I don’t think you necessarily doom a script to be bad by starting with something like, “I want to tell a story about dealing with the conflict between who we wish we were and what life made us into.”
I reckon that for King, setting events into motion and figuring out the right traits to get characters through them (or to their natural stopping place), or what themes give those particular events meaning, that works for him. If they want to have him write the next Avengers movie, I’d be all for it, LOL. I just don’t think his approach is the only way to go about it.