Tag: structure

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Bond in a Bind

NB: This entry explores plot points from the end of the James Bond film No Time to Die. If you'd rather not know, it's best to skip this entry.

As authors, I’m sure we’ve all written ourselves into a corner at some point.

I faced this problem a few years ago after I published what was intended be a one-part story on a writers’ website. There was an enthusiastic reaction from readers, so I felt compelled to write more chapters, but the characters were all scheduled to leave school and I couldn’t realistically take them all to the same college.

Fortunately, it was an ensemble cast, allowing me to pick a few main characters and introduce others, and the story went on to comprise 25 chapters altogether.

But what if you know millions of people are waiting for you to solve a plot problem? It’s been reported over the last few weeks that the writers of the James Bond franchise have a hit just such a stumbling block.

In all the stories from Dr. No to Spectre, our hero has been forced into some difficult corners, then has ultimately escaped in one piece. But at the end of No Time to Die from 2021, Bond is killed in a missile strike, so the question is how to bring his character into a new screenplay.

If there had been any ambiguity surrounding his death, this problem might already be solved, fudged, or even circumvented altogether. Fans, by contrast, clearly saw what happened in that film and won’t accept being told otherwise.

It’s worth noting here that most of the Bond films from the last 60 years were made by Eon Productions Limited before creative control passed to Amazon MGM Studios in February 2025. I’m conjecturing, but perhaps the former owners knew a sale was in the pipeline and deliberately deployed the fatal storyline with the intention of delaying or stopping future development. This would effectively end the James Bond series on a natural break.

And yet there’s a definite thirst from filmgoers to keep the franchise alive. While it might be difficult to see a way forward at the moment, there are a few options the new writers might consider. Here are a few, starting with the one I believe is least likely.

Write off the previous film as a dream

Because it’s been discussed and parodied so much, it’s not a spoiler to mention that in 1986, the 10th season of Dallas effectively wrote off the ninth season as a dream. While that show was a little over-the-top, as is the Bond franchise in its own way, I’m confident the new writers won’t lower themselves to this ridiculous premise.

Ignore the plot point

Many sitcoms and dramas reset the story each episode, knowing that TV channels sometimes air them out of order. There may be plot points that develop over the season, but these are unlikely to be necessary for understanding the plot of individual episodes.

The key here is that each new conflict tends to be resolved by the time the final credits roll, leaving the characters are in much the same position as where they started.

As such, the death of a main character may be too large of an issue to ignore, so I find it unlikely this will be the approach taken.

Reboot the series

Over the last two to three decades, there has been a trend to give series a reboot, borrowing a term from computing jargon.

We know another actor – yet to be announced – will take over from Daniel Craig. Also, rebooting isn’t unknown to the Bond franchise, with GoldenEye (1995) and Casino Royale (2006) forming fresh starts.

Perhaps this is the perfect time for a third such reboot, ushering in a much younger main character and having him go through the process of learning the ropes.

Show the succession of the identity

Since Bond works for MI6, audiences expect secrets to surface. To my mind, writers can use that to their advantage.

Supposing the code ‘007’ and the name ‘James Bond’ aren’t personal identities at all, but titles passed to each new agent. When one agent is lost, another steps into the role. The concept could easily conveyed through dialogue in an early scene. Besides, fans are already used to actors changing over time, so this wouldn’t feel too jarring.

In my view, the final resolution will be along these lines, while keeping within the established universe and canon.

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Converting Formats

Of all the factors plaguing Dungeons & Dragons players, arranging a convenient time for everyone to gather is probably the most difficult. This meant my group ended up seeing the film Dungeons & Dragons: Honor Among Thieves at different times in different cinemas.

Making this film was a real gamble. Not only is it taking a largely open-world game and telling a linear story, but it also sits in the shadow of the last Dungeons & Dragons film made 23 years ago. That one has a score of just 3.6 on IMDB compared to 7.9 for the current one, and Ginny D from Critical Role has analysed what makes it so terrible.

Computer games in particular have a track record of being made into badly-received films, and there are plenty of top-ten lists online purporting to show the worst. Conversely, there is also a history of movies being made into great games. More than 25 years after its release, for example, GoldenEye 007 for the N64 is still highly regarded.

For me and two of my group, though, the gamble seems to have paid off, with all of us enjoying what Chris Pine and the cast brought to the table. It’s also no secret that a solid structure plays a large part in the success of any motion picture. In a blog post, the writer Michael Hague explains the key turning points of most major scripts, and the writers nailed this one near-perfectly.

With all this in mind, it remains to be seen how The Super Mario Bros. Movie fares at the box office this weekend.

T

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Where to Start?

I’m attempting to write the 22nd instalment of a short story series. It was supposed to be a one-off piece, so to reach this point is a tremendous achievement. But because of the existing body of work, this plot in this part has to be consistent with the rest. It therefore needs to include two particular elements:

  • A small piece of wrap-up from the previous story.
  • A scene where one of the characters makes amends with the rest of the group.

The trouble is that these elements need quite a bit of explanation. They’re slowing down the plot, even when I start in the middle of the action and refer back to them. At this stage, I might have to take the story in a different direction, as long as it fits with what’s gone before.

The good part is that there’s no particular deadline for this piece of work. It’s for a private group and I’m under no obligation to write anything. In this case, however, a deadline might be useful to focus my thoughts. Maybe I can impose one on myself and come up with a workable solution.

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Callbacks and Foreshadowing

Every August, I spend time in Edinburgh at the Fringe festival, usually for a few of the many hundreds of comedy shows.

This year’s acts were as diverse as they come, including the magician Pete Firman, the musical troupe News Revue, and the brash Nick Helm. One factor they all have in common, however, is that each act references something that happened earlier in the show.

In the comedy world, a common structural element is known as a callback, in which a performer will make a reference to a joke or an event earlier in the show. The most memorable example I’ve seen was the comedian Danny Bhoy in his show Dear Epson, which opened with a letter of complaint to the eponymous company. At the end of the show, he closed with the reply he received to that letter.

Done often enough, a callback can become a running gag, making reference not just to the current show but to past shows or outside events. To this day, Jimmy Carr brings up the subject of his tax avoidance, even though it happened ten years ago.

Many stand-ups speak in a rambling manner, so such back-referencing provides a little clue that the rambling is not entirely aimless and that there’s some structure to be found.

A similar technique can be used in prose, where it’s more often known as foreshadowing. There is often a balance to be found between making it too obvious and giving away a later plot point, or making it so subtle that the reader misses it.

A story that manages to walk that line is The Lottery by Shirley Jackson for a good example. The stones mentioned casually near the start of the story play a significant part as the narrative concludes.

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Comedy with the Structure of Drama

In June 2018, the comedian Hannah Gadsby debuted her show Nanette, causing an immediate sensation. For a time, it was hard to turn left or right without someone quoting her words or reacting to what was said.

Exactly two years on, with all the hype gone, I listened to the show with the intention of making up my own mind about it. I knew some of the gags in advance, and I knew that during the gig, she announces she’s quitting comedy.

By the end, there was a lot to chew over. I liked the content: I thought the gags were observations were spot-on, and I that Gadsby’s reasoning for quitting was a sound one, but I found it difficult to formulate a comment about it. I felt utterly indifferent.

It took more than a week to figure out what was so jarring: it was the structure of the show.

There isn’t a standard structure to stand-up comedy. As a general rule, however, a show will begin with more tried-and-tested gags, and any unifying theme or narrative will be introduced. Between the halfway and three-quarters points, you’ll often find more experimental or riskier material, which will build up to a climax near the end, often referring back to earlier in the show.

In drama, the action will usually begin with a major event, slow down a little, perhaps include some comedic elements, then the plot will thicken and thicken until the climax near the end.

What Nanette did was to switch to a drama-style structure at around the three-quarters mark.

It’s not in question this was deliberate. At one point, Gadsby actually tells the audience, ‘That was your last joke,’ before finishing her monologue, so they don’t hear the payoff they were expecting. It takes confidence to carry this off, or a sense there’s nothing to lose

Despite working through my feelings about Gadsby’s routine, I still have that indifferent reaction. It’s not dramatic enough for drama, it’s not comedic enough for comedy.

As such, I’m also hitting a wall as I try to end this entry. At least if I’d hated every minute, I’d have some kind of conclusion to draw.

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Giving Quality Feedback on Poetry

It’s something of a badge of honour when someone asks me to read over a poem they’ve written and to provide feedback. So I was only too happy to oblige when a friend sent me a three-part piece she wasn’t sure about.

On receipt of a poem, I first of all go through a mental checklist of features I would expect to see. As I write, I realise this is the first time I’ve written down these features, so I might return to this topic and make amendments.

Punctuation

Although poetry often employs types of line breaks that don’t appear in prose, it’s a convention that sentences are still punctuated in the same way with commas, full stops and other marks.

Capitalisation

Before 1900 or so, the first letter of a new line was capitalised whether or not it was at the beginning of a new sentence. Beginning in the 20th century, however, that first letter is not usually capitalised unless it also begins a sentence.

Forced rhymes

Not all poetry rhymes, but when a rhyme is included, it’s conventional to make it sound as natural as possible. I hear too many cases where the poet has written in rhyming couplets and the order of the words in the second line of each couplet is altered to make it fit with the first.

After those three checks, I consider other aspects such as word choice, whether any clichés have been used, the rhythm of the piece, and how the structure might be amended for greater impact on the reader.

But these are only conventions and they can be broken. In the second part of her poem, my friend eschewed punctuation and capitalisation so it read like work from Allen Ginsberg or E E Cummings. If you’re planning to break poetic convention, the best way is to make it clear to the reader that you’re not following the rules.

Overall, I was pleased with the piece my friend sent, and I look forward to hearing it in its final form.

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A Structured Story

I’ve written several novels, all of which remain unfinished and unpublished. In 2011, I drafted my second one, about a man who takes part in a challenge to win millions of pounds. Since then, I’ve periodically revisited the manuscript, but it never quite shaped it into a form I like.

The most recent attempt was over the bank holiday weekend. I sat down and fitted the key events into a structure that resembles a Hollywood screenplay. There are five major turning points that occur at set intervals during the narrative.

Hollywood Sign
Hollywood Sign (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

On the face of it, this sounds rather restricting, but for the first time in a long while, I’m actually excited about the project.

One stumbling block was a scene where the main character is taken to another country and left to find his way back to the UK. Having the structure to follow helped transform this rather long and dull trek into a series of shorter journeys, each part ending in a cliffhanger and raising the stakes a little higher.

Every so often, you’ll hear a novel or a film described as ‘formulaic’. This is usually caused by the writer making the structure too obvious. The turning points ought to be invisible to the casual reader or viewer, but they will be there, shaping the story into a form that audiences subconsciously expect.

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Episodes

A couple of weeks ago, I was invited to be part of the Beans Podcast, run by three friends and updated twice a week. I appeared as one of two guests to speak on a subject of our choosing and to join in the general banter. Released on Christmas Day, the episode is available here.

But the main thrust of today’s entry is to talk about Star Wars. [Reader’s voice: On a writing blog?] Indeed, on a writing blog.

Star Wars Episode I: The Phantom Menace villag...
Star Wars Episode I: The Phantom Menace village nearby Nafta, Tunisia in Tunisia (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

I hadn’t previously been interested in the series; I’d only seen Episode I: The Phantom Menace on its release while trying to impress a girl. But 1½ weeks ago, I decided it was time to watch Episodes I to VII in the order of release then Episode VIII: The Last Jedi at the cinema, which came as a shock to some friends.

It’s a huge time investment to watch eight films at around 2¼ hours each, and you risk letting your concentration wander, thus missing a vital plot point. However, I’m pleased to report I’ve now become really rather immersed in the universe. From reading articles online, it seems I’m more or less up to speed with the action so far, and I’m understanding a lot of the jokes and references. The next stop will be to watch some of the official spin-offs.

Whether or not you’re a fan of Star Wars, it won’t be news to you that the plot of each one follows a formula. Yet you might be surprised to find out that almost every mainstream film follows a similar formula. On his website, Michael Hague discusses the six turning points of all successful screenplays, using Erin Brockovich and Gladiator for reference.

The word ‘formulaic’ is often used negatively as a synonym for ‘predictable’. Predictability often stems from weak plot twists. A formula, by contrast, helps the screenwriter to keep the attention of the audience as the characters’ difficulties become worse and worse.  Note that a happy ending isn’t necessary, merely a satisfying resolution of the preceding story; I refer you to A Clockwork Orange (1971) and Buried (2010).

Next time you’re at the pictures, look out for the structure. A good writer will make the turning points natural and the formula invisible, but these elements will almost certainly be present.

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Outside The Box

Regular readers will be aware that this blog covers all types of writing from short stories and poetry to screenplays and rap music. I believe there’s a lot we can learn from all these forms. Even watching Made in Chelsea is a great lesson in improv.

However, on moving into a new place last month, I took the decision not to own a TV. This was something I’d considered for a long time as I would either rarely watch it, or it would become a distraction when I could be doing something productive. Either way, it would more than counteract the benefits of having one.

The other factor swaying my decision is the matter of the TV licence. In the UK, you need to pay an annual fee if you have equipment that receives television broadcasts, if you watch live TV online, or if you use BBC iPlayer for any purpose. The money goes towards funding the BBC and there are heavy fines if you aren’t correctly licensed.

While it’s a difficult field to police, that’s enough of a disincentive for me not to have a telly. If there’s something I really want to see, I have other options. You can watch DVDs or most catch-up services without a licence, and you can also own a radio without charge. Even better, I’m fortunate enough to be within easy reach of two cinemas: one mainstream, the other independent.

With not having a TV, it’s an obvious question to ask what I have in its place. The answer:

 

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Accidental Acquisition

If there’s one thing that keeps me awake at night, it’s subconscious plagiarism. It was reported this week that Ed Sheeran is being sued by two songwriters as he allegedly copied their work, and it’s always in the back of my mind that however original I think I am, there’s a chance I’ve accidentally remembered words from elsewhere.

At its most extreme, it can leave a person’s reputation damaged. In 2015, poet Sheree Mack was accused by some of ‘wholesale plagiarism’ of other poets’ work, although she denied it was deliberate.

But if you like another poet’s work, there are legitimate ways to reference them.

Writing After, then naming the poet

It’s a convention in poetry that you can credit someone else using this format. Let’s say I wanted to credit a certain political poet from the 1980s, I might write:

Nigel at B&Q
After Attila the Stockbroker

Nigel wants to go to B&Q,
but there’s Isis fighters all round the bathroom department.
Nigel doesn’t like Isis fighters.

Bear in mind this is not a licence to copy that poet word for word; you should be responding to their work, updating it, making your own interpretation, &c.

English: Attila the Stockbroker, taken in the ...
English: Attila the Stockbroker, taken in the Cabaret Tent at the 2010 Glastonbury Festival (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

Using a title

In the majority of cases, it’s all right to use a title, particularly if the word can be found in a dictionary. A quick look at Wikipedia offers a whole list of instances of the title Life.

However, be wary if the title is very distinctive, as it can seem as though you’re capitalising on the other person’s success. If you used the title Evidently Chickentown but your work was completely different, a lot of John Cooper Clarke fans would be unhappy.

Imitating a structure

Unless a structure is so closely associated with one particular poet, it’s fair game to emulate a structure as long as you’re saying your own thing. When I wrote Purple, I was going through a Luke Wright phase, so I borrowed the structure of Bloody Hell, It’s Barbara for the last section:

Excerpt from Purple

You’re always dressed in gingham checks
and Oakley specs, and round your neck
those headphones: Oh, I do love Beck.
Large as life, it’s you.

Here, the words are totally different from Wright’s, but would fit a similar metrical pattern.

General themes and ideas

Many people are familiar with the Allen Ginsberg poem Howl and the Gil Scott Heron track The Revolution Will Not Be Televised. The two works touch upon the same themes: disaffected youth, race relations, rebellion, &c. Both also make heavy use of repetition.

It is possible that Scott Heron was influenced by Ginsberg, as his work was written 15 years later, but despite the described similarities, there is no way that one could be accused of copying the other.