 Hello and welcome to EFAP episode 270. I didn't check so Sometimes the microphones like to Yeah, are you a human or is that like a weird ambient noise? That's a very specific but could be very funny joke that's animated right little guy inside discord Just to check all the noises coming through in real time He's like, I don't know what that is But then it's like there's a countdown a ticking clock where he has to make a decision Yeah, or like someone farts. He's like, I want to let that through that'll be funny I Go show with a little cheeky grin, you know, just like I'm causing havoc He drew one guy frantically pulling levers You know like the operator, you know when I got all the cables that they got a connect It's like that the discord version And he's wearing a little you know, he's wearing the tie, you know, like he's he's a little goober creature But he's still wearing a you know, like a button-up shirt and the tie Madge that says like hello, my name is whatever we haven't brainstormed his name yet. Yeah, we're getting there But I guess it's the part should we be naming him first or should we be figuring out the themes of this story? That's an interesting question. Which do you lead with? I have a question. I actually I have a question Okay. All right. You have a lion and a tiger side by side, but They've been shaved. They're bald. They have no hair on them so How do you tell the difference between which is which the tiger is bigger? The tiger yeah, maybe Yes, the tiger's bigger. Well, it might well it might be a small might be a small tiger in a big line I'm pretty sure every tiger is bigger than lions Tiger might be a tiger might be small might be juvenile Yeah, there you go say it's young good Okay That might make it a little bit harder, but again, I think generally it would be that I mean answering your question But there's a way to be sure there's a way to be certain which is which I will it's that our tigers have webbed feet Interesting not giving him the answer. He wants The other one my objection was valid, but that's actually interesting. I did not know that if that's yeah Actually, they don't mind swimming. They're actually pretty good They are tigers are one of the few yeah cats who are really keen on swimming Mm-hmm, but there were there will that is very interesting too, but there's a much more obvious Way to find the two in addition to the web feet Much more obvious. Oh, it's the tail No, no free you would have a point if if they had fur on them Yeah, but it's been shaved totally shaved Well, of course how fast they run would be a big difference Yeah, what the thing the one that killed you first is like oh, this is the tiger But what is it that the tiger's skin is also stripy is that it that is it? Yes. Oh, yes Having gone via tails and webbed feet I took a random guess at stripes it turns out that's the answer for the tiger I just like that all they're like, do you know what it is? Do you know what it is? Do I just like keep getting correct answers was like not the right correct? Did one and then another that I'm not sure of it's not thematically the useful I'm free gave three correct answers Yeah, I feel that the size one you have to admit that's correct like potentially it was like for like that We were talking about a you know a comparably aged tiger. No, no, no, man. I Really are on your question if you don't specify that. Oh, I think you're I think it is a totally fair assumption Assume that we are comparing like for like not what's the difference between like an adult that is mad I could have just well, I could have just grabbed the first tiger. I saw shaved him, you know Just right off and he would have loved it Make sure he was a tiger It was gonna be like the lion would look more depressed because the lion has like, you know I'm really impressive main and now he's got alopecia whereas the tiger is like I was still got my stripes He cut so yeah Go to extreme measures be with those away The theme of that analogy was random fun things I learned so good And I'm glad that we all got to learn that too Yeah, cuz we always have our little animal tangents that have nothing to do with the episode Well, we could have the episode episode about themes be the tangent isn't the theme of that that you can get the right answer But it is not necessarily the right answer unless it is useful answer Yes Definitely hundred percent And if you think anything else you're wrong and you don't know how themes work and you have bad media literacy Animal literacy you're lacking. I mean that is probably arguably how we could say this is a justified time to discuss this topic Even though you could talk about it whenever you want But there's been recent rumblings of the discussion over interpretation of media especially on the point of themes You're not allowed to conclude anything from a piece of media that doesn't match What the general take is slash the intended take from the author is which is something I think this kind of one if I have a few times and it has different levels of controversy per case The most iconic at this point for discussion of what does it mean? Likely could be Starship troopers I'm not gonna say it is because there's gonna be a lot of discussions on a lot of films over time of some reason that one just keeps coming back up and It was funny There's a post in the subreddit saying to the e-fab guys actually did they actually watch Starship troopers and not realize it was a satire? Like how do you watch something without watching it? No, it's like oh my sweet sub a child you'll like really Conversation because to me that's like layer one of watching Starship troopers Maybe layer two. I'll give you that like layer one of watching it is cool action movie Levels of engagement right like level one is like just the physical sensations and Understanding that there is something in front of you that you've recognized Yeah, that was maybe only being able to engage with it on the level that the thing presents itself as and level three is Actually being able to be critical Yeah, like seeing seeing the thing is for what it actually is trying to say on a deeper level And a lot of people are just stuck at level two level two is the great speed bump Of it's this image. It's this beautiful fucking image. Yeah But I guess what's funny about that bell curve is that level one kind of benefits in a way Yeah, level two level one is at the very least is like it's it's his experience That's informing his opinion. Whereas level two feels very much informed by External information the matter it like seeps in It's it's a kind of thing where we're when the director says this is what the film is about They just say ah, yes, this is what the film is about and then that becomes their opinion Because it was said by the director whereas level three you've gotten to the point of no You're back to forming your own opinions Wait, do you say level one is the one that just takes the director's opinion? No, no, no level level one I'm saying is like better than that level. Yeah Yeah level one just goes from the film pretty much level one's just like yeah, I saw this like I saw the scenes the pixels entered my brain I Listened to the sounds. Yeah, like I was able to like I know what the dialogue is This is the writing book that I've read and this is what it's all This is what it's about so that's what it's about Or maybe we need to go for like have a well if there's only three people like I said definitely number two Especially captured with the tears. That's that absolutely gives you that impression because Yeah, they're upset that no one else is listening to them about their correct opinion, you know It's not a bad little it's something that maybe we should develop this idea of you know How many levels of engagement and then something we can refer to? You know to be to where it's like a little e-fap thing that we do I like this like oh this guy He's only a level two of engagement and then we have a little giggle and a laugh well, and obviously For the Starship Troopers comparison, it's useful because yeah, but stage one is a fun action movie stage two is oh Look at the political satire and then stage three is yes That was the intention of the political satire, but there is there is more to talk about Yeah Those of the nature of how it all comes together a lot of threes and ones get mistaken for each other when you know What they're just friends they hang out and they talk about some stuff This is suitable here because two who tends to see himself as much better than three and one He's yes, he's above them, but he's miserable And three has his rich Nevada So What is it all about how do themes work damn it? What's the correct way to do it all it's kind of It's a complicated subject such that I would be baffled if it was like actually summed up in one video Well, that's the thing well, I can't see myself ever making that kind of video, you know, like how to do themes like To me it feels like a very fundamental sort of like to me that theme is kind of why the story even exists Like that that seems to me like the underlying sort of drive to even create it in the first place is to explore some subject to convey some point So like the idea of looking somebody through theme seems like kind of Man, you know, it's like hopefully we all kind of have a general understanding of like why stories exist in the first place And like what purpose they serve even, you know, if you want to even look at a straightforward parable or a sops fables or something like that The sort of clear intention of conveying some kind of point I feel that Conversations about like constructing a story on a more I guess, you know, technical level of like consistency or Developing characters and stuff like that that if you figure those things out then like the theme is naturally going to be bolstered As long as you know, like which direction you're generally going in you sort of you have to subdivide them after that point And because like you have theme is effectively the ghost of authorial intent, which is yeah This is the moral message or this is the theme the message I want to impart in the work of art that I'm creating But then you also have the thematic message It is reasonable to infer from whatever the work happens to be which might not be the same as the Thing that the author actually wanted it to be if they're particularly Incompetent so it's like I think keeping both of those alive at the same time is probably important it's often like an aligning of Characters taking actions that the story itself approves of in some way she performed or disapproves of like that That's where we can draw it can even be a simple as you watch a film where hero does heroic things in a place heroic music And yeah, and does villainous things in a place villainous music That's like a pretty clear way of a story conveying Hero has done something good and you should like that and the villain is doing something bad And you should dislike that as sort of this is the story slash the creators perspective on the events playing out They're they're still Again about like the whole idea of making a video. This is like that's still very narrow But like on you know, it's a good place to just carve out some kind of you don't be careful The language who was like that could be how you can do it that could be a place in which you could Derive the meaning of the things like this language means that the other so many other ways to do it It's so complicated. There are so many things that give away what it is and so Directly it's like it you'd give advice on how you can But any kind of definitive sweeping statement on how you know a theme must work It just invites challenge as far as I'm concerned in like a good way Well, yeah, it's how you see I guess what you would call innovative stories that are Do it in surprising and novel ways Compared to what is typically, you know, I mean like how many how many times can you see like Examples of stories that are actually contrary to the hero's journey that very effective even though hero's journey is a pretty tried-and-true You know react structure those sorts of things and the challenge is there and it's the same with conveying themes Yeah, and then some people could be like, ah, so throw it out and it's like no understand it And then break it if you want it, right and move it around and Change things with a lot of deliberate intention. It's just Understand it you can break it But only once you understand it true it's like we've mentioned when we talk about how What often makes a very good parody of something is that in order to make a very good parody of something else It's important that you understand the thing that you are parodying Because if you don't then you might just completely miss the mark and end up doing something completely totally random What why does hot fuzz work as a parody of like over-the-top action movies because there's a clear understanding of what over the top Action movies are in the vocabulary like the visual language of those types of movies and then pushing it You know as far as you can with all of the you know Like ten shots of a shotgun being reloaded from different angles with zooms and everything like that's showing a clear understanding And as well as coming from like a genuine place of appreciating like what those films are and what they have to offer and why they can be fun And and then you pair all that together with very deliberate thoughtful intelligent writing You know a script that was written over the course of over a year And then you get absolutely amazing results compared to other things where if it's haphazard and Like you don't really understand what the fuck you're doing then The results can be not so good. This makes me think about a dr. Evil said You know, I'm gonna place him in an easily escapable situation evolving an overly elaborate and exotic death And then his son is just like I have a gun I could shoot him right now Scott does workings Yeah It's definitely interesting. It's one of those things where it's like Simple in a way, but elusive at the same time Like if you if you look up the definition of it, it's just a unifying idea It's really all it is a thing that ties all the aspects of the storytelling together in one unifying direction But then when you discuss its execution and the The layers of theme it can become quite Complicated because it could be a a message. It could be a question that you're posing Yeah A lot of I'm glad you brought up the definition. I sure hope he defines it in this video. We're about to watch because otherwise A theme as a concept is just like it can be incredibly broad or people can use it to mean something very narrow Like you said like a message you're meant to take away Yeah, you know life starts in or a political statement But you know oftentimes what people when people are talking about themes They're kind of folding in stuff like subtext and symbolism to this kind of big umbrella term for all of those You can probably be more apt to describe those as like techniques or components of a story that may bolster a theme But also bolster other aspects of the story like character and plot Yeah, I like the idea of a unifying idea. I think that's useful I think it is too. Um, yeah Well, because like if someone said throughout the movie each character They are presented with a like a color grade that represents the of their like core emotional levels So say like anger or peace or whatever and if someone said like so, what does that mean? You'd be like, well, I I guess it's just another way of saying that like that's a thing that's present filmmaking wise And it does give you information, but the you know, it's not necessarily trying to tell you anything in terms of a subject Um, yeah, exactly. I mean that I like the using the word idea and the definition because an idea can be a number of things You're not necessarily trying to hit your audience over the head with a concrete statement of fact Sometimes it's just a question And then the story that you're telling is an exploration of that question with no definitive answer And the audience is meant to at the end go. Hmm You know What they're walking away with. Yeah a lot of reason recognition as well Oh, yeah, definitely Well, it's it's because that ties into something that is an important part of the discussion Which is Just because you have decided that your story has a theme does not mean that the story you've written Actually supports that theme. It may well be that the story that you've written contradicts that uh theme, which is like a That feels like a hugely important thing to understand that like your theme exists in so far as the references in the story the events in the story and the decisions the characters make and their consequences Uh, actually exist in support of that message and usually you can see it in pretty clear ways It feels like you know a lot you can benefit from just thinking about what what's why the asops fables Why do they work? It's like well, I mean the stories Basically very like clearly support whatever um points. They're trying to make they don't work with filled with plot holes Hmm Kind of the ground rule right the starting rule Make sure that your story actually supports the theme that you're trying to get across I said that is that that's a school of thought. There are other people who would say that's bullshit You don't that's you don't need that you don't need but then they would they would quickly fold Uh, well, I would argue and it maybe is a bit vain to say like I just don't think they've figured it all out because uh They would simultaneously use references in the form of like the piece of media to counter The the notion of a particular theme and things they don't like or things I disagree with That's how you do it. How else would you do it? Like I was just you know Imagine if the film exists in a vacuum with no instance of the director saying that the whole point of their film Is that it starts as a who done it and then it turns into like a thriller And then it goes back to being a who done it if you don't have the director telling you that that's what the film is about You know or any any additional elements of like what the film is about How much could you figure out with just the film on its own without the the creator telling you anything? feels like an aspect of it Think we talked about this a lot when we were um when we were discussing The Last of Us 2 With its theme primarily being revenge bad When uh the failure of that game story Is that uh it seems to the message I took from it is that if you're gonna take revenge fucking go all the way Don't stop at nothing. I'm revenge is literally the answer. Just don't half-ass it Yeah, that's the implication of it like they screw up because they don't they have abby say right? I gave you a chance since like technically joel gave you a chance so How does this work? It's uh, this this kind of speaks to an interesting topic Which is I I get the impression that some people believe that the more complex the theme the better regardless of how it pulls together In the end, but I mean an incredibly simple like idea or theme binding a story Uh, basically executed like flawlessly or as close to that as you can get is going to be worth a hell of a lot more than Uh several themes or a really complex theme That the story just does not support and often contradicts Sometimes the simpler simpler is better in terms of uh conveying a point But I would say that's often the case It was about to say so one of the reasons why the last wish is so good And then I realized that our two contestants basically weren't able to gather the theme. So I was like, well, maybe Yeah, we talked about it a bunch But like why is it that a lot of um, why is it that you can look at you know The golden age of Pixar, right from like Toy Story all the way up to Wally Um, those are films that are generally bound by like one Central idea. There's like one point that they're going for one message. They're trying to convey um And and and then they like hone in on it and and like every component of the story is built up in service of that Whereas the more that you add it's like, well, that's that's just more that you got a juggle and you can do it Um, but it's it's just like yeah, it's it's throwing in like more variables It can make things more challenging to uh to juggle compared to having one central idea that every aspect of the story is uh existing in service of I think that's like an importance of clarity for the messages of those films You know, like it's very very important in those films that there is clarity and this is what you're meant to learn from finding Nemo This is what you meant to learn from Toy Story Especially because they're aimed for all ages Exactly one one counterpoint to that though I think I agree almost entirely with what you just said If you think about stories that kind of kind of come closer to a more, uh, what you might call mythological Storytelling something like the Lord of the Rings like is there really one? central idea to the Lord of the Rings because it feels to me that some of those stories kind of Uh contain multitudes in a good way, but not in a way that Feels like they're cluttered or they're trying to accomplish too much Like is is there something in the Lord of the Rings that like really unifies everything that you did bad power corrupt, right? at least somewhat I would argue that it does have several but the they're not I don't know if they're murky or anything They put very very cleanly done. I would argue. Yeah, that's what I'm saying I don't I don't think it's cluttered or that it's trying to do too much But I do think it's hard to to really distill it down to one thing Yeah, I think no all of the themes are very well Not compartmentalized, but they're sort of segmented well and often attached to particular characters and plot lines That run in tandem with one another and that the vibe of them all mixes really well overall So you never feel like one is stepping over the other and those ideas are never really in contradiction And credit where it's due for Lord of the Rings if if I was to summarize a lot of it as power corrupt Someone could be like not every time in every instance in every way for every person I'd be like no, I know that's that's kind of the story covers a lot of different avenues for a lot of different people and in different institutions or different You know power levels and what it's done to them and how their personality seep into it Like it's a lot more complicated But if you were to summarize it in a word, which is the problem with them Sometimes people can misunderstand what you're trying to say because you're trying to be as quick as possible In the same way like genre can have that problem. Like this is a horror. It's like wait, where's my big scary jump scene jump scare scenes and you're like, oh, no, it doesn't have that Like you said, uh, yeah, probably the main difference being that genre is like almost entirely going to be descriptive So Whereas themes can be a lot more They can be meta. They could be part of the movie. They could be a mix of both You could have them running together You can say temptation is always and everywhere a risk and like theme you can you can speak in very broad terms about So the Lord of the Rings being well talking when writing it, you know coming from quite a Christian backdrop and consciously doing that Presents the ring as there's the object of temptation And it's the different ways in which temptation acts upon the various different characters in the course of the plot That drives home this point no matter how big or how small you are You are always going to be tempted by the the very existence of power So then it goes back to power corrupts But as the general sweeping statement is it's the risks of temptation Like the book actually finishes off in a way that's not as Dramatically satisfying I don't think is the film version of return of the king But it drives him the consistent thematic message when you get back and it's the scouring of the shire And you find that you just beat on this huge big bad guy and sauron And they return to the shire to find that this small piddling little business man Hobbit has sided with saraman and started turning the entire shire over into factories and chopping down forests and it's the the final in part of that thematic message is that You have to always be on guard against temptation. The local level is the best place to start Faith in your friends and things like that is the best guarantee against it But you will never actually defeat evil because evil exists in temptation Yeah, and on the note of like revenge bad Someone could be like you're making fun of Last was too. There are your rags and I'd be happy to say like oh It's I mean on one hand. Yes, but the other hand, you know, if someone said is that not a theme in ragnarok Ottawa ragnarok, I'd be like, uh, yeah cycles of violence revenge bad thing that comes up in there as well There's a couple of things that tackle that's quite a popular one And to differing levels of success, of course and it's of course that's the discussion part of all of it I suppose and it's just the The more the references conflict the more the different messages can be pulled from it Especially the big moments where characters make very explicit statements and you compare them To the events and stuff it starts to get uh, just just you start to feel like you can assess the quality of the thematic writing Just a circle back I I I still think there's something interesting and kind of hard to pin down in that you can have a story That's very very good. That has one uniting idea that There's nothing that doesn't relate to it everything Fits under this rubric and it kind of motivates every little piece of the film and it's simple and it's clear um, but you can have stories that kind of contain A lot about heroism and wisdom and all that sort of stuff and duty and all that Temptation and power and all that and that they can both be good and successful even though I still as As um apt as your description of lord of the rings was little platoon I don't know if that's all of it and not in a bad way. You know what I mean? I think Certain stories kind of it's harder to distill them to one thing in the same way, but that doesn't make them any less powerful or motivating and that sort of I'm sure but uh, I guess that the the point there is that um, it's like If it if it's refined to like a simplest central idea that can just make it easier to essentially fully achieve your Our storytelling objectives you can have more themes and if you're really really talented and then execute it well It's like oh shit. I mean then you've just created something, you know spectacular, right? It's just that it's like an understanding that the more themes The more ideas that you start to bake into your story the more that you're just gonna have to juggle You're just gonna have to be on guard as you're writing your story of like Okay, so this this line here bolsters this scene doesn't contradict this theme You know, it's like does this plot point in the way that it's gonna go Yeah, bolsters this scene, but doesn't run contrary to this other idea. It's like you it's just it's just like You're juggling more on the poles and it just means that if you manage to do it then everybody's going to be super impressed But if you screw it up, you know, the one guy who was juggling the two balls and they can do it for a while Let's look, you know Diving board scoring, you know, I think um Last was one to last was two is actually a good example of that where new material is damaging the overall like Messaging or subject matter and almost both of them But I would argue one of the best examples of the opposite as in you add more you risk of destroying it You managed to keep it coherent would be a probably buffy an angel. I don't really have any other references for this We're part of the work in that to remain spoiler free They develop it as they're going in terms of what overall meaning comes from certain conflicts and character journeys and You know, the writers themselves talked about how they had to do a lot of work To line everything up thematically because it was starting to break apart Especially with how audiences were taking certain journeys and certain characters Some auto correcting had to be done and I find that fascinating that like You know, the theming is so important that it will override character journeys it has to and that um The character sort of motivations and values might come into conflict with your Dramatic through line and so you have to choose one or do your best To devise some kind of solution that satisfies both the way the case of Sorry, go ahead finish your point. Just I was going to say the way I see it is that World is usually the first to be sacrificed And then plot soon after Um, but sometimes themes not even present with certain writers like they never even thought about theme and that's okay By the way, I do want to open up that possibility somewhat the if you don't care about sending a message You just want to have a dragon fight. Um, you know robot I think that's okay The thing is I just don't see how it's not gonna Inventually be imbued with some kind of thing. Well, that's what I'm saying is that they never intended one and that's okay Like if someone said can I write without caring about themes? It's like, yeah, I guess so Um, I'd be I'd be a little bit I'd be a little bit confused. I guess is all I'd just be like, why do you why like why Why do you want to write a story? Like that would probably be kind of the question that would loom over It's like what's your interest in doing this Because it might be that that they are actually they are thinking about theme, but not necessarily calling it theme They're not thinking about the theme from like this top down level But in any any story in which characters interact and one character has to make a moral choice Uh to I say side with a different character or like if you want a particular character to win And there's a reason you want that particular character to win You're dealing with aspects of theme. You're just coming at it from the other direction You might not be thinking about it sort of academically in terms of I want this to be the defining moral message of my story But you are still thinking along thematic lines in by by making a moral judgment over who should win in your story and who should not Yeah Just writing a story about a guy fights dragon and wins I mean, it could just be as simple as being heroic is good. You know, like that's that's like the message And you know when you someone would be like, oh, that sounds lame. It's like, hey, look, all right It's look it's a point. Okay. Like it's it's a point Um that's present there even if it's a pretty straightforward one Even if it's not a particularly challenging one even if the story itself doesn't challenge a lot of the difficulties of You know, like what it takes to be a strong moral character I guess that's what I mean when I say like I can't imagine what it means for a story to not have a theme Because that's not the same thing as I was saying though Someone writing with the intention of a theme being in there versus a theme being there is You know, uh, I think a lot of people don't even yeah, consider like what will my theme be? They just sort of like this idea and that would be a that that would be a neat little arc for this character And yeah, he could learn this along the way and they don't even think about you know It's just going to be emergent from the kinds of stories and things that they want to tell or find interesting Do you think most people do you think most people approach it that way or do you think the most I honestly have no idea right when you say most human most writers almost consumers of story Did I say most? I think I'm pretty sure if I if I said most I didn't mean to say most I was just saying I think that a lot of the times it's probably the case that people Don't think of it strictly as like all right. What is my theme going to be? They think of it in other elements and then that's sort of the theme just sort of You know comes into formation along the way Yeah, the couple of schools are right and right some some writers they start with a theme some may say start with a character Some start with the end start with an event start with yeah A pitch you could you could literally have a story that someone writes and they don't think about theme at all And the theme is purely just descriptive and emergent from the kind of thing they want to do To the point where you can accidentally write a really good theme. It's possible That's a that's a good thing to jump on to actually that um Like a theme we've talked about how genre it can be like prescriptive and descriptive It can be prescriptive in the sense that when you enter into a project You intend to write something that fits into a certain genre But then it would be descriptive in terms of yeah, but now that you've actually written it And you can see how the story plays out. It actually ends up more Yeah, so in the in the case of theme you can enter into a story with the intention of exploring an idea But just through the process of figuring out the characters in the plot and and working through that process You can just end up with different ideas that actually bind the story together Like theme could be something you enter into with an intention or it can be something you discover as part of the process for sure um Yeah, it would yeah, but so so yeah, that's there's a variety of different ways that you can approach and I would I assume uh, you agree with this freeing, but if that's that theoretical writer was like I've made my john wick story and they say was inspired by that and and like you read it And it's like pretty good and you're just like, huh, and then they go I got no theme though It's like you don't know anything to say about revenge or the cycles of violence That seems to be a place where these sorts of stories go and they're just like no You're like, okay. Well, you have this one character who's kind of not doing anything Do you think maybe we could figure out something for him based on what you haven't covered? In a theme that you do think applies and you do think about you know It's like this whole other dimension to storytelling that I think is very worthwhile But I don't think many people would say I don't want that shit that shit ruin stories or anything like that, you know It's hard to say how often it happens, but it definitely the case that uh thematic injection will be um subconscious In some cases you have like like I had a person ask me for writing advice I think I might have mentioned this before in the podcast, but I think it's worth mentioning here again that he had A person asking me that on advice on writing a story deliberately without theme Like he was just rejecting it in this very postmodern way where it's I don't even want themes in my story That's what I felt like and it's just like well, you know You are telling us a story in the form of a sequence of events People are going to extract something out of that pattern, you know, and so you're you're better off thinking about it than You know deliberately trying to avoid it. Otherwise, like what's Well, it's just like why are we seeing the things that we're seeing, you know What about a story where your point is that uh, we look for story and patterns and themes and everything when sometimes there isn't any You know Right But that feels like a theme in and of itself, doesn't it? Of course it is Yeah, it could be it's like the data is uh artistic movement, right where the theme is meaninglessness Um, yeah, or you could make a which is an awesome challenge. I would say stories that like, you know Stories that directly challenge conventional theme or conventional, uh, like narrative structure Or end with an anti-climax those sorts of things because so much writing advice If you've got to end on a climax and then you've got something like no country for old men that is an anti-climactic ending deliberately And it's great Yeah I love that movie It's so good that it exists because I just challenge so many Fundamental generic pieces of writing advice. I like the idea that we're in like a little, you know We're all sitting at the table and if we have a new episode of you If you have new cast or new set new variety of people that freeze just like no country for all men's ending was good That looks around with everyone. There's a peepo suss It's like There is a little bit of peepo suss not gonna lie. I'd be very peepo suss if someone's like, it's like, all right Okay, let's talk about it right now, please Yeah Tell me why you had to watch it again And you like it If I learned anything underneath the table What was that? There's like nothing nothing Um, but I've learned anything from what we've talked about so far is that uh The whole concept of themes is very simple and that there's a right and a wrong way to do it. Yeah That's right. We like clear direct black and white answers here because confusion is the enemy of progress I think that the Funnily enough, I think a lot of writers would totally disagree with me on this But the if we split to world plot character theme I find that uh will plot a much more nuts and bolts compared to like like in a way that's You do that and then you do that and then you do that depending on what you're you're building Characters and themes can be so much more Fluid and complicated because of the fact that you like you're building something and then you go Oh revenge bad So then we can't have a character that takes revenge and is happy and it's like no no no we can And that can be a really important part of the story to understand Like the difficulty of passing this out as a human being Like if someone is probably uh probably saying maybe in Steps of most to least rigid you probably would say plot is probably the most rigid Of all of them because it's most I guess fundamentally tied to Just like logic. It is supposed to be like a knock on through knock on to a knock on sort of thing. Yeah Yeah, um, then probably after that you have the world building Uh, which is just the way that things are in this world and how they operate Which is essentially like the plot that's happening Around or outside of the story um You have after that I'd say character is next because even though people are complicated There is a degree to which human beings are predictable. Yeah, there is a reason why people do things Yeah, you know the level of rationality behind the decisions that it's such an important aspect of writing characters that you want Understanding their perspective and where they're coming from and why they're making the choices And then when you get to theme you're starting to get to what I guess you would call the most fluid one in the sense That well now we're talking about like fundamental meaning and this is where it's always going to start to get a little bit more Well, the plot is Yeah, by the if you if you weigh the both of the sides like there's no Like the plots shouldn't be subjective. Like that's the thing that the story is Right, and then on the other side you have themes which can be purely subjective Like here's what I think it was and um Then you can put it not to be pedantic But I suppose there could be instances right like with a character who's insane and they don't you can't trust Like unreliable narratives and then what you believe probably happened versus what did actually happen There's a couple movies that cover it in terms of just events So we can't know for sure if the character went through door a or door b we have to judge by like what happens next They don't show us sort of thing Yeah, I guess in that circumstance, that could be the case. Yeah Out of curiosity. Well, it's yeah Um, well you go first. My thing is a little bit different um I I was just thinking and i'm not sure how much I would actually consider this related but something that uh When you know when a story is getting written and you're deciding the sequence of events that's going to be Accounted in the story you got to make choices about what you're going to show and what you're going to omit So I feel like yeah You could say that that definitely plays into the level of how much you could say that the plot is up to interpretation because There's stuff that you don't see that you don't know what happened in between But obviously you can make like reasonable inferences, right? Like if a character gets in the car and they're in the next place they drove there But you know, maybe they dropped by the shops or something and got a sausage roll Or maybe they didn't you know, maybe they like they did We're about being provided two Plots as in two of two different contradictory events by two different versions of the film at that point It's like well that is really just what do you think is canon did uh, you know who shot first? It's like Well, I guess you could have either one if you really want, um, I don't know why anyone would pick Rito, but you know, that's fine. That's fine What I was going to say was uh, just out of quick curiosity if you were forced to Teach a lesson on character assassination From left to right and since discord can switch them up. That's what I'm talking about when I could say left to right Who would be the um The subject the primary subject for teaching people about character assassination who what character in all of fiction would you choose? Hmm um Just assuming we all have the general understanding of what character assassination is I'd probably just go luke skywalker and tlj. That seems a popular and obvious choice Uh, let's go with uh, let's go with wonder uh skull witch from marvel movies I remember the goal is here is not to highlight a different one from anyone else I just am curious what you think would be the best one. I mean, I probably would have said lurk, but I think That's what I'm more interested in so okay Now I'm actually I'm not sure what when we're talking about assassination Are we talking about like the character being disgraced? From what they're the initial perception that basically written to be contradictory Everything you can establish prior to be yeah, and if you were trying to explain that concept to a class Which character would you use as the primary example? Oh Yeah So I guess to help with the example the reason why luke would be considered character assassination is because He is presented as having Certain traits in the original trilogy the main one being that he is incredibly Compassionate for his friends and family And then in tlj. He's shown to have abandoned them With basically absolutely no ration like good rationale at all. It's it's like the complete destruction of who he is Right. Yeah I got someone else can go before me because I got to think about that a little bit more. I'm not sure I mean my answer is going to be luke skywalker right and I'm I was gonna I assume that most of the answers here were going to be luke and then I was going to say someone else But we'll see the answers first Yeah, I mean if I'm being put on the spot for an answer of best I I'll go to luke skywalker. I'm I'm sort of thinking because there's some that come to mind I would probably see it'll be stuff like um, oh the willow show for those who've seen it This assonates like virtually everybody from the movie Uh in kind of that so that's kind of interesting and if we're talking about medic character assassination john halo, uh, that's some pretty medic characters Right there. You've got uh, let's see harrison ford was probably uh What's uh, what's what turns out so this one it was going to be luke and then I was going to say Indiana Jones to just to be different and then if it wasn't going to be indiana jones It might have been john luke picard and then just sort of further on down the line But luke is sort of that embodies so much of what's everyone that's gone wrong after him does that he's like the original assassin Indiana Jones is an excellent choice It is I I would love to sit down and Think a little bit more because there's a bunch of good examples, especially these days I mean there's a host and the mcu n in star wars, but well, you know, I've uh, I've called halo five the tlj before tlj It's one of many actually terminated genesis is another one but one of the reasons why halo five is uh tlj before tlj is because it assassinates cortana, which is like, you know, it's it's just funny usually The reason why you compare it to tlj is absolute decimation of uh Of what you know of what uh of character or world or plot or theme. It's it's one of those sorts of things Oh Like as compelling, but you could have a really good literal and figurative example would be john connor in dark fade In that he is literally assassinated But that also figuratively assassinates we mustn't represent. Yeah, absolutely. Um There's a there's many ways to assassinate a story slash character literally figuratively Meta meta but not metaphorically. I do like the He's inside with john connor is simultaneously literally and figuratively assassin. He's also like removed of his legacy like they They surgically take it away from it Which you could apply to a fury is another person that they they wrote away his actual legacy I think nick fury might be the winner for the most thorough assassination to where it's almost like calculated and by the book there's a word for what they do to him That's different than what they did to someone like a look what I was gonna say is like wonder I would consider to be the most thoroughly assassinated character in the end She went from being great to absolutely done. Whereas what you're describing with uh, I agree that um Am I side with rags on this one because of the fact that they've erased what we need to hear me I uh, I totally agree. It's it's it's like rags said it it almost felt systematic. Like it was at least wonder At least wonder did the good things those things are still in history Yeah, whereas they it's essentially they retconned history to destroy it They they gave him I was they gave him new characters in the form of like a wife To show how shit he was in ways that you didn't even think logically possible before They destroyed who he was they destroyed his legacy as well, which is uh, yeah different from wonder whose character was just destroyed Yeah, to be clear the good and difficult deeds that fury completed were done by not him removing the difficulty And then making them morally speaking a bit dubious Like he forced other people to do it for him under threat of not having uh, giving them a home Yeah, and even the way that this information was delivered to us was essentially someone's Sermonizing him So the skill level and the morality level both crash and is yeah, like that that's fascinating That would probably be like, you know, maybe uh next year's class on character sassane I was about to say it's got to be taught in classrooms the degree to which they systematically destroyed dick fury Because yeah, what I was going to bring up about luke being the most common answer I think it's not only because obviously star wars are so popular and everyone's so aware of those events So it's a very good intro to it But also just like you wonder what the line is for a lot of people and it's fascinating to know looking back that It got broken with that one like if you had made him If you take any I think indiana jones actually easy to translate this with he had like eight traits That people just don't agree he should have but if he had one of those eight instead anyone Like the wife had left him But he was still an adventurer who loved teaching people about archaeology and was excited for this that and the other thing I think we'd be like, yeah Okay You know, but if you switch them all out, right like he's still with the wife, but he's an alcoholic You're like, oh And then you find out. Oh, well the sun died. You're like, oh, okay I guess. Yeah, sure as long as he's still doing, you know, the sun died despite him It's even worse than that. Yeah And I think the the same would apply to a lot of sort of assassinations. It's just like once you once you cross a line They make a good pair nick fury and indiana jones and their comprehensiveness, but So many great examples now A little example is pretty gorgeous because he's so heroic It's because how iconic he was and how insanely it was it was sort of like the tipping point in a A bit of a watershed moment for like film criticism And the originals, you know, happy to use those words rags media literacy. I know well I'm gonna I'm gonna reclaim it Well, we did see a flashback that explained it. So that's true. That's true I'm still drawing a blank on a unique example But out of what's been mentioned so far indiana jones I feel the strongest about because like his Drive for adventure felt gone by the last movie And that's sort of like the defining element of that character is that he wants to go Into the crazy temple and into the dark and get the thing and dodge the traps and By the last which could have been interesting Considering that what do you do with a guy who is very adventurous and loves to globetrot and go out and see things do things But he's just old now. He physically doesn't have that capability. So but but he still has that spirit So how do you translate that without being a boring asshole and just saying he's a depressed loser alcoholic Well, yeah How does he exhibit that trait to other people? How does he encourage and inspire the next generation? Do we see it in the animated ways that he talks about history and archaeology and anthropology And the way he talks about, you know, the things that he's done in the past and how he reminisces about the amazing stuff that happened and A life well lived full of good deeds and you know, you know passions ignited and discovered Funnily enough Ghostbusters frozen empire tries to do this Um, it's an otherwise like completely unremarkable film to the extent that I've forgotten almost all of it And I don't really encourage anyone to watch it because it's a waste of everyone's time But it does have that beat when you've got a couple of the the older cast and they have the conversation because one of them Always gets himself killed without spoilers. Um, and another one turns to him and says look, you're old now You need to start, you know, this is supposed to be your golden years You're going to get yourself killed and injured. You should stop and he says but this is what I want to do with my golden years Like this is what I want to do. This is who I am and actually it's to the extent that the theme that's the theme The film has like a thematic message It's that you are only really as old as you think you are because he's actually proven right by the end In another wise pretty naff film. It's a fairly nice message It's the opposite of what they did with indy and luke and that it's it's like saying You are only going to be an old miserable bastard If you let yourself be an old miserable bastard because you assume that you are already an old miserable bastard But there's nothing about being old that actually stops you from being like full of life. That's not a bad message I don't think yeah being old. Well, there was um There was a sign I saw once and I was always remembered it being growing old is mandatory growing up is optional Um on like on the case of like could we have made that? You know like if we kept all other traits well, but we took away his interest in adventuring, uh, indy I was already trying to think of like how to defeat that challenge because that's already very like I don't like that and it's like Well, if he had the happy marriage and his son he was on really good terms with him And he was very well respected in his um field He was still teaching and very much into it But the he's just like, you know, it's addressed with a new character Or he could be an established one in like oh, we've got this new thing It's uh, you know desperately want to save this artifact from this area, blah blah And he like declines And that's the one thing that sticks out right of everything that we know about him Everything is pretty great except that and I think that's weird And then we find out that the story is about how He doesn't want to lose everything that he's gained now the back in the day it used to be more of a You know, uh, every every single mission was the mission itself And that he feels like uh now that he's got so many people that depend on him and So much to give to the world in his later years that he wouldn't want to die on some adventure But then of course he could do it with a smile on his face Yeah, and the story could be about I'm too old for it, you know But the story could be about him figuring out that he always had Everything to lose and the like every adventure was what got him to where he is in the first place and that you could reinvigorate You know, like there's there's so many ways to tell these stories And I think the uh to come back to themes right like tlj No hate to anyone who enjoys it out there. It's totally fine It's just that a lot of what is said about it will be the idealized vision of the story that is clearly looking to be told But is very sloppily told as far as I'm concerned the um The nature of like what does it mean for a man to have as grand? A uh a legacy as luke skywalker and can a man even live up to something like that? It's like that's interesting the weight of a legacy on a man who is just a man Like what does that mean? It's like the film crushed him down so hard that he's allowed the first order Which is just the empire version two to destroy everything and kill people he loves without doing shit all it's like I don't buy it Nobody buys it. You can't do that And you know, it's like could you abort it after three other movies trying to justify it? It's like there are there are ideas people have gone over them, but you didn't do that That's not what was done and I don't like any kind of filling in of gaps with hyper You know fiction to just try and make it all fit as opposed to just stating it's like they fucked it up and it shouldn't be canon I don't know if you you could like I think you could have any number infinite number of films after the facts To try and justify. I don't think you can like it's that the the origin point is just corrupted But this is a you know the guy who Sees the good in Darth Vader to the point that he's prepared to leave his own life on the line to redeem his father Sees a potential maybe little speck of the dark side in his nephew and thinks fuck. I'm gonna kill you Like that's you'd have to have a you'd have to I think you could do it people can change dramatically It's just like you have to put so much work in to do it. It's almost like A lot of people go with the whole like he's Snoke Like does something to him behind the seat like Luke like Heavily influences his mind gives him nightmares makes him stressed and anxious and stuff Terrible don't like it. No, there's there's there's that would be like one fact You'd want to start to crank a lot of them You need maybe over the years that two other students fell to the wayside and actually failed and Luke keeps trying No matter what because he believes through his father that everyone can be redeemed and stuff but that You know first movie is just about how yeah, maybe you should be fucking careful because it You know someone gets killed that meant a lot to him that because he allowed the trust in someone that they would come Through but they didn't just just stuff like that until we whittle away somewhat at his very strong POV But then you need to bring it back obviously you need to be like no that is a good position that he has You talked about it in a push and boost the last wish You know, that's an example of the character is deconstructed But then he's reconstructed in a more positive way rather than just deconstruct and it's like whoop see you next time It's like All covered in blood. It's like, yeah, moving on But hey, you know if we deconstructed it pretty good, didn't we Anyway, I see you next time. Yeah Well, that was a good Thanks for watching guys I love talking about this stuff, but let's let's bring in a seventh person technically Lovely things that's gonna have opinions about themes If we agree with them, you're writing themes wrong. Wow Okay Yeah, I mean it's that eye-catching one you're writing themes wrong and in the thumbnail It's got don't do this and it's an image of inglorious bastards Uh All right. Um Yeah, all right Which image from inglorious bastards, uh, hunslander pointing to a phone Is there like an arrow on the thumbnail pointing to somewhere in the image like here it is the theme Don't do this Don't point to the phone. Uh, is there such a thing as writing themes right or wrong in this guy's opinion? Well, I guess we'll find out, but I thought you were gonna say is that something that we would uh, Say one way or the other I mean writing things wrong Like complicated writing the themes is wrong. That would be a little bit harder to narrow down on Yeah, hmm You're writing things themes incorrectly Is that would that be my programmer? Uh All right. Well, I we want to talk about the grammar is like the sentiment of the uh of the of the You know, you are writing themes wrong. You're writing what you're saying like How can you broadly be doing it wrong as opposed to individual cases? I'd say if if you do multiple works and everyone who watches every single one of the things that you've done Takes away a completely different message than the one you've tried to impart then you might be writing themes wrong Yeah, maybe at that point Alrighty then I'm like that. Let's get going. This is from closer. Look old uh old friend of the channel We've had him on before. Oh, we had a chat with him about his I think it was endgame versus helms deep. Do you remember that? Bonechilling long time ago So we have harrell's the writer today He's our guinea pig because he believes a common lie about writing themes for all harrell's life when Let me show you definitely got that he said a common lie is believed for writing themes People talk about themes. They'll always summarize that theme into a neat topic The theme of john wick is clearly revenge. The theme of gladiator is clearly honor and so on They'll talk as if the story's theme is a topic The theme is a topic That's what That's where you're wrong. Oh, okay. I believe I bought into the lie because we because it's weird because like our topic before this was theme but I don't know. I guess I was wrong. It is difficult actually to say that anything is not a topic Yeah, like what are you talking about? That's the topic the nature of the phrase topic is such that anything could be the Yeah, it'd be like if you said that cup is an object and they're like, what are you talking about? It's a cup It's like all right. Yeah Even when level one over here When we were talking about earlier about like how a theme could potentially just be a question posed rather than a message Even with a question you could distill that down to a broad topic It's like this is a question about this subject If I were doing a film about revenge, I would probably want I could see myself describing it as revenge is the topic and someone could be like Do you mean you don't have a definitive answer as to what revenge is or whether or not you should do it In whatever case, I'd be like probably Yeah, regardless of what your message was regarding or relating to revenge. It is the topic And yeah, it's the discussion. It is the point of reference for a lot of our character journeys I don't see why we can't call that topic. So I'm curious how this is wrong. This is a lie All right, give it to me Harold not knowing how much perceiving theme like this is going to bite him in the ass quite yet does this with his novel Harold chooses justice for his theme a rich topic with much to be said about So he gets to work He makes the protagonist a policeman seeing as police deal with justice That's fairly intuitive and he throws a bunch of ideas in we see innocent people being victims of the justice system Falsely accused by officers who planted fake evidence. Hey Rambo again Rambo. Yeah, that's right. He just wanted something to eat. God damn it. He was just having a chill time You ruined it gosh done it We also see career criminals get away with crimes because officials are being bribed by the mob to look the other way We also see a man kill another but it's super morally gray was arguably just That guy that one guy is one thing the other people at the table No I didn't want to pick him too hard, but I thought it was funny that he says, uh, this part here, right? Fake evidence. We also see career criminals get away with crimes We see career criminals get away with crimes Al Capone famously did not get away And I know that he I guess he means like no he got away with a lot of his crimes He's like, yeah, I mean, yeah It's just it's just all good to show me Al Capone and say people who got away with their crimes Not as awkward as showing No, that one right by the that one's very curious mob to look the other way. We also see a man kill another By the way, I just want to mention a man. He's technically Technically he says a man kill another so I guess you're referring to only specifically this guy Right. How can he this is a this guy, you know, but this is this scene is not the one you want to go for I don't think so Why didn't he pick the uh I guess maybe describe the whole situation as morally great because he wipes out the family which doesn't seem very But specifically this man's like, I don't know man He learned the right theme from the last I mean, you've got a lot of better examples you can point to for morally gray decisions compared to this one Which is not morally gray. It ain't Super morally gray was arguably justifiable homicide And there's a big ethical debate around whether or not he even needs to face justice and go to jail or not Harold writes this story Why didn't he show there are other films you can point to if you want to make that one not that one Not like oddly enough. Yeah, there are better clear cut cases of morally gray that you could use Well, I guess what we're getting from this is that that's not really relevant. Anyway, he's trying to make a point that Is the point of things that prove things And the you know, it's going to be like this is a lot of things to adjust this fangs out the words at the end The writer in this case the the stock Is a stock, you know, the guy with the grin. He's doing it wrong. Yeah. Yeah, we're gonna find out who's doing it wrong His revisions as any good writer should all the while he is dead shuffed with himself for you see never not once Did he deviate from the theme Of justice justice he sends his novel out to some publishers Ah penguin random house has finally replied so he tears open the letter and reads the words Dear harold, thank you for submitting your story for consideration While your story gave much insightful commentary. We are unable to offer you publication Is that what they say maybe yeah You clearly put passion into it But there wasn't enough cohesion between the ideas on the page and instead of the themes being Explored it felt as if you neglected your ideas because you were trying to juggle too much at once Okay, so that's how you say it is big thin You're you're basically telling me a story about a guy writing a story in all of the details I'm gonna have to take your word for it because they haven't It's very very Ethereal we'll call it Oh, okay, so if it's If he went too broad and tried to juggle too much and he didn't tie him all together Does that negate the idea that he's like should he have picked? She is what he did wrong that he didn't narrow it down. Is that the only story? I thought he said he was focused on the theme of justice But this one is saying there wasn't enough cohesion between the ideas on the page and instead of the themes being explored Trying to juggle too much at once. I thought the whole point was I thought this was going in a different direction Where he was too focused on a singular theme But this letter makes me feel like he's was trying to do too many different No, I think uh, I think the take where I would be sure justice was his overarching idea But there was a lot of different uh A lot of different. I guess what you would like some categories Yeah subcategories of that theme One the the confusion I have is theme as topic is a lie Okay, first point. Harold was juggling too much at once But these feel like two different things Yeah, does that Does the issues with his writing stem from the fact that he treated it as a topic because based on what you presented It doesn't seem that way. Yeah, it sounds like you're going on justice as an idea But then he went too broad with it Unless of course he really does stand by theme as topic does not work because you juggle too much at once But I mean if he picked one of these If he picked one of these things instead of trying to do all three wouldn't that just be like a topic or a subtopic? Well, yeah, you can always break apart further and further and further and further It could be that justice is theme and then the many means of exploring theme are the topics and there are too many topics Therefore your theme has been lost Yeah, no that could happen, but I guess what we would assume all of us agree on is that no matter how boiled down or You know, uh nailed down your theme is you could always juggle too much Mm-hmm Yeah, you also have to factor in the the runtime or the length of the medium that you're working with I mean like lord of the rings has a lot of themes, but like there's also plenty of runtime there to spread all that out You know like Yeah, that's impossible cries harold. I had a theme and everything Harold is very angry. It doesn't make any sense Everyone knows a theme should be stated in the form of a topic Anywhere from technology to Capitalism that's what great writers do. I'm seriously fine with those. I know they're funny, but like I'm fine with that If if a person was writing a story this my theme is going to be about capitalism or it is capitalism as topic And you'd be like I assume criticisms and praises and breakdowns. That's probably what it is. Sure If someone said like this too broad it'd be like not really Well, it's I mean simultaneously is too broad and too narrow. Is it not could I not say the economic systems is the broad one And capitalism is not the broad one I understand the the merit and the virtue of narrowing it down and being specific But it all strikes me as like these are just topics still But like yeah your topics are smaller topics What I find for a great source of insight and any kind of critical thinking is just just stay the opposite state with Let's see how true you think it feels like could we not get too narrow for the themes like yeah, probably If you just had is revenge bad when someone kills your daughter by throwing her into a fire And you decide to kill their mother while she sleeps you're like That's your theme What do you mean? You're like as well. I'm just like I'm trying to address a very specific idea You know, you're like I don't I don't think uh, I think that's insane. You should probably broaden it out to I don't know human nature when it comes to revenge slash justice On your capitalism example, I think you could you could make a movie specifically about Capitalism and just because it you know, it outlines the pros and cons doesn't mean you have to sort of broaden it out into like the theme being socio-economic systems overall You know, like if you make something your theme You can present a negative and positive case like one or the other or both You know, I think so. Um, if someone said my film is about human nature, it'd be like damn It's okay But like, you know, not impossible you could do it. I guess I guess that would be more likely what you'd point to in terms of a theme being too Broad it's like it's about human nature. It's like oh so everything Okay Yeah, I consider that too broad is that it's not telling me anything about your story and they'd be like well No, but that's what my story's about and I'd be like no I mean you're gonna be covering something more specific than that more than likely, right? What about human nature? Yeah I think you could say that about things like justice and uh, what was the other one he is Anyway, doesn't matter Yeah, you could you could say okay, but what about it? You know, you could be more specific, but yeah Yeah Saying that your theme is human nature is like saying that your main character just wants to be happy It's that kind of thing It's like you gotta narrow it down a little bit push back on someone for starting there Be like, yeah, that's fine. Let's see where you go with it. I guess, you know Let them figure it out instead of being like you better be more specific before you start writing your story And it's like well, they're gonna be inevitably, right? It's just a headline thought my my thing is about human nature specifically the ways in which Theme interacts with theme to create Theme using theme as the placeholder for anything more specific you want to say like take dune for example Dune is a story about human nature Frank Herbert would say specifically about human natures want to control things and how control leads to destruction And chaos that's the essential theme of dune and every character interaction every person in the world Every political faction is there to illustrate that everyone wants control and because everybody wants control everybody Like has inevitably to fall into conflict with each other. That's just basically the whole thing condensed into Theme statement Yeah, I think all of this is totally fine and healthy in terms of discovering your theme as well Because if if we had a class of people and you say you're all of you are going to write a story And the theme will be human nature and then you go first guy What's your story going to be about and then instead of saying human nature They have to say something more specific and if you said it's going to be about how humans always search for meaning and patterns That's that's my story. You know, okay, cool. Next guy next guy's like, oh, the humans are always tribalistic They will always find a way to otherwise everybody who they don't connect to or something they'll always find a way to categorize Okay, cool. Next guy. What do you think he's like? Oh, well, I think that humans are always aspiring to do better to be better And they're never happy and it causes a feedback loop of like absolute destruction mentally that they have to keep moving forward Or that they'll die. Essentially. That's how they like wired. You know, interesting too. Next guy. He's like I think humans are nice and fun And we're gonna have a story about how they all hang out and help each other build things because communities Growing growing together is great. Like, yeah, all is like and if he said that's evidence of it being too broad I'll be like, no, that's like a that's fine. Any one of them describing their stories is it's about human nature Is totally the beginning of the discussion, right? Sure. Yeah, I think that's fair Great writers do but I just did that and the editor says they didn't like You you I mean you prescriptively made a story in which that happened and then said but I did do that It it seems a weird example to use the story that you've fabricated My story all hypothetical, right? What did harold do wrong? Well, who knows? Who knows? I read that as pause two Pause to the sequel I was really for that split second. I was super confused. What does that mean pause two? And yeah, before I say that there's a I'm inclined to agree that the issue here is gonna be the We can't solve anything for harold until we read his work Yes, I need to know the thing. It's super important to the case what he specifically wrote and how he wrote it It's like if we say well God If you were it's like saying I'm inventing a story Uh in harold writes a story about how revenge is bad, but the book doesn't say that so see it's a bad theme Is like well what I there's nothing I could really do with that You just you just sort of just made up a story about it and I I don't know what to say I don't know how I can engage with that really if if we take what the publisher said and just take that as gospel That the ideas weren't connected together I wouldn't necessarily say that being too broad is Necessarily his problem. It could be that he just didn't unite them all together You know yeah coherent way, but like to go back to lord of the rings Like there's a lot of stuff in there that all feels like it ties together, you know Um, but there's a lot going on I think maybe if someone was If if someone said oh lord of the rings like you're trying to say too much about human nature and everything So like you should really narrow it down. It's like well, you can pull it off. You can talk about a lot You know you need the space you need the characters to do it and they it all has to Fit together as like a sort of coherent vision of the world, which I think it does but it's totally possible It's just really difficult Which is why most people don't the definition of theme we we are the one at the beginning wasn't it theme Is the unifying idea like the theme is the thing which makes all of these various expressions of itself united into one Essential like discoverable story beat. Yeah, I wouldn't nothing under them I wouldn't blame anyone for saying you mean like a topic. They're like kind of yeah, sure. Yeah, it's a topic And I would never think less of a movie because the theme was simple and clear I actually like that. Yeah Did harold do wrong? Well before I say that there's a plot twist in this story for you see Harold Is me He didn't that hyper they look dude is in the background Thetical story is what I did And I chose identity as my theme and just like harold story I don't like how he says that dismissively, but I'm gonna continue anyway Yeah, wouldn't call it a dumpster fire, but it tried to say so much about so many things That's a different problem. Are you just had bad execution? Well, I I mean already it seems like we Your point of the approaching it as a topic. Why would approaching it as a topic? necessitate that you Ended up doing something so broad and tackling so many things at once Yeah, why sounds like does that have anything to do with topic? Yeah Ended up having nothing to say and it taught me some hard truths about how to not write themes Okay, but Surely the story has to add you making a new story that penguin accepted, right? Maybe Well, it depends did he write another book way out of different approach that did get published That's what you're saying is like in order to feel because he's using the rejection from penguin as evidence that he can't write themes and therefore Yeah, and you don't even know that that's what penguin thought No, that might have been what they sent out in their letter But in reality, they were just like, I don't know man. The characters kind of sucked or something We're shitty or I just don't care about the subject matter You don't actually know that their problem with it was that um, like just because that's what that said in the letter Like that it's it's too broad It's too broad to pull away anything specific other than anything based on your criteria Which by the way, if you I mean you can disagree with them, right? Like if they reject you you can be like, oh whatever. I'm gonna if you know, I'm gonna take it somewhere else I'm gonna self publish it. That's totally fine, too. But like it seems as though he has concluded that They feel the same way that he does which is that when you approach them as topic you've screwed up When I one of the things that I find particularly uh Ironic about the still of or at least of him talking and the here could roll it back Let me roll it back just a few bit. Okay. One of the things I find incredibly Ironic about this particular story And this um, I guess treating penguin publishing as sort of like a super authority As a publishing company is that behind him most prominently on the bookshelf Is frank herbert's dune which famously went through like 20 different publication rejections before it was finally accepted Mm-hmm a lot of books do a lot of successful books go through a lot of Rejection from a lot of publishers before they get picked up Or rather a lot of a lot of writers get you know rejected the sequel is actually rejected because the theme not not because the theme was Unclear, but because the theme was the destruction of the hero And so by having a cohesive theme it offended the particular publisher and the publisher said no We don't want to tell that sort of story. Goodbye Hmm I don't like the way he's staring at me Yeah, he has a very soul piercing gaze right now. You have to stare back Um, I think this there's the same sort of thing happens with uh movie studios and television networks, you know Like sometimes executives have notes and they pass on things. Sometimes they're right. Sometimes they're wrong sometimes they just Don't get it and sometimes um They see it's a good story But they pass up on it because they just don't have the money to produce a show like that or whatever Like there could all be all be all kinds of reasons, you know Not right themes The biggest mistake new writers make a round theme other than not bothering to have one is they get to again I don't know how you can not have one unless he's talking about not intending to have one Uh, sure. I don't think that's a mistake either though No, I don't like I said I am open to the idea that there's plenty of stories that can come from writers who are not interested in having a theme They just want to write their story because we just aren't thinking about it. Yeah and that well and they Like I say as though it's not fun to write a theme it is but like a lot of people would say I just want I just want to have fun I just want to write my story about a bunch of marines that go into a building that's covered in alien things And they want to shoot them all and you're like, yeah, that's fine It's okay And I also um I just want to say I I'm a little offended by how poorly that you is drawn I don't know why you would have all of the letters be captured Which is under case and a very poor representation of an under case you should get poor. Yeah, it's very confusing I think that if we're trying to be very specifically talking about language here I feel like you've committed quite a linguistic faux pas by mixing your capitals in your lower cases So, uh, yeah And she's specifically recruited because she's like she specializes in ancient languages or yeah Yeah, well She studied other languages, but she could not study her own in the amazon Just before her mother was killed Not bothering to have one is they get too vague about it You've got to get super specific with the issue you're grappling with way more specific than you might initially think You've got to get specific Hmm I don't agree Well, I'm fine with that as it like a place to start You know, it's like a rule of thumb that is true a lot of the times but isn't necessarily all encompassing as a principle That's why I'm humming it. I don't know. I'm not sure how I feel about that. Yeah I don't know if I'd want to tell someone. Yeah Be specific with your themes as like a general piece of advice because I feel like a lot of people might take that Too far and be like specific with their themes Well, you know, like if someone said what is too specific look like do you think in a bad way? If someone said, uh, I love Lord of the Rings because of the message about like if we just work together We can overcome anything and then someone says, yeah, what if bad guys work together? So working together isn't always good. Is it you'd be like that's a weird I mean, maybe you should have that in the story like what you mean like Somebody could encounter people in their journey and all of those people have an extremely specific similarity with their protagonist that relates to the theme in terms of maybe a slain relative or an aspiration that they have And it sort of defies logic and reason In contrivance that everything and everything about the protagonist's life all of a sudden starts to converge into one message A very specific one. Yeah, I see what you're saying. Yeah, I think that could be Hamphuses. I think I feel like if I'm if you have an aspiring writer I almost feel like theme is something you almost maybe don't even want to Talk about Because it's so it becomes so emergent from other things The character is what they want what they're trying to do The lesson that they learn the progression of events And then once you get those things down you could say now we could talk, you know, like thematics now that you've shown That you could sort of write a story we can get into this element of it a lot of times I'll just end up doing it naturally Without I agree. Yeah, I think there's definitely a danger in being too explicit About your message in themes. I think they can I think that's how people end up with like really ham-fisted on-the-nose kind of stuff I would yeah, it's it's such a huge It's such a thick line the quote-unquote acceptability of theme specificity Of the weird thing to say that you probably don't even want to really I almost want to feel like just letting it just let them just let them write and Get all the other things kind of nailed down the theme if you write it themes will come Part of it like because this is complicated from my point of view because uh, I would say joss weeden like with firefly buffy angel Very likely with avengers and some other stuff There's usually explicit lines by the time you hit the third act for what the whole point of the story is But the dialogue is so well written That I would like I would consider the story damaged if you were to remove these lines the point you directly to What the the the whole story is about or what the theme is themes themes are often very I mean I think the last wish is a good example of themes are explicitly stated without room for misinterpretation essentially despite some people's best attempts as we've noticed But it's a film that has very explicit messages very explicit thematics and it's still executed extremely well And it's never distracting because of that. It's a good example of doing that well Despite it's you know being so conspicuous who here has seen serenity out of curiosity Okay, well, um a world without sin right that line is perfect like before he plays the message should be nice and non-specific I uh If if one was to argue that that is what firefly and serenity are about uh, I would net like which I would I would just like that line is so fucking good if someone said yeah, but it's a bit it's a bit cringe Isn't it you've made your theme pretty clear now. I'd be like whatever The specific meaning is is not like a world without sin could mean basically Anything it's it's the surrounding unspoken parts of the film the context that it gives that makes that thing actually applicable um, even villains can say a world without sin if the villain conceives of goodness as being Uh a backward morally corrupting thing like the line is is vague enough that it's not like hammering you home with exposition The problem with like specificity with theme often comes across in just really really ham fisted exposition Where a character has to be explained very very didactically This is what the whole thing is about in layman's terms So no one even the most stupid person can possibly miss it and i'm actually going to give you this in a lecture about what the hell This thing you're watching it is explicit that there's no room for interpretation And you can't draw these connections yourself because you have to have a character draw them all for you And I don't like in the way that firefly doesn't do that with a world without sin What you are i'm curious you pick that over i am to misbehave as the like the line that you would point to as like This is what firefly is about the same thing Just to yeah, well i'm in there same thing. Yeah, I get you Oh, that's such good lines. Yes, they are surrounding such a cool movie I think we're Go ahead just can have different inclinations to you know, some people are very idea focused You know, they think about ideas abstractly a lot and they're very interested in ideas and some people Much more focused on characters Um, I think everyone who's let's say they're writing a story. They're really only concerned with the plot You know, like let's say it's a heist movie, you know, you got some characters You like but you're really focused on the nuts and bolts of the plot I think When you're writing about like a plot when you're writing about characters like you're still writing about ideas Whether you're being conscious about them Per se, you know what I mean? I think different writers can have different Inclinations like to how deliberately they're thinking about the ideas behind the story You know, I think sometimes they're just sort of happening unconsciously and sometimes people are being very deliberate Like that's their whole genesis for the story itself Said having said that I think part of why it's hard to make Videos like you're writing themes wrong is because I don't know if I'd give the same piece of writing advice to all writers Yeah, you know what I mean? Yeah Yeah, they see Like we were talking about before like I have no problem if like a theme is clear and identifiable Um, but there are risks associated with that like uh platoon was saying you you can have it So the writer writes their characters that make the theme so explicit and on the nose And then also I think another risk is that people get so locked into that theme That they're afraid to like let their characters potentially take them in a different direction where they might come to the realization Like oh, you know what the story is actually about this thing or that thing Where they might decide like no I decided already. This is my theme I'm gonna force this theme at the expense of other things, you know, like that's a mistake You got to be willing to jump back and forth You know, it's like just think about your story You can start from anywhere come up with a theme just that can potentially change But you just want something there to act as a sort of guidepost And then you start thinking on the level of characters and plot And then but then you have to be willing to like throw your theme out I think in place of another one if you decide if you're If you realize that your characters are sort of taking you in an unexpected direction I think you got to be willing to go with the flow You know, yeah, particularly if you change your mind on whatever the theme is, you know It might be that you eventually reach a point going. Hmm. I don't think I believe this Like I don't think I believe that this theme is something I agree with or that it is representative of a life And then being able to change it's it's like It's kind of interesting that you can think of the process as being like Sure on one hand There is objectives that you're gonna set out to achieve with your characters or your theme or your plot But at the same time if the approach may lead you away from what your objectives were initially And that there's a degree to which you need to be willing to do that But also a degree to which you need to be willing to actually stick with what you've got Uh and not go off the fucking rails completely It's a balancing act. Yeah. Yeah, I think so Annus was right Hey, then you might initially think this is the problem with perceiving theme as a topic Because let's say just like harold, we're writing a story about the justice system. Is that not already more specific than justice? Yeah It's it's literally it's a huge narrowing it down. We've gone from basically purely philosophical slash conceptual to legality, um But like I would argue the legality was included, but now it's the only but now it's specific. Well, yeah Yeah, it's narrowing it down. Yeah, justice is a concept exists beyond the justice system But okay, well let's run with the hypotheticals though. It's a refresh right Yeah, and also both of those things are topic when it's just more broad than others There's a reason why people say, you know, this is a narrow topic or this is a broad topic The issue is this will have several sub subjects and those new subjects are so vague as Why would the justice system have several sub Subjects it would have Well, why several? well as opposed to As opposed to a view yeah, yeah, okay For a second there. I thought you were gonna say it would have just one or something ever like will it be huge, right? Well, no, it's no just go for Ages on what the justice system is about because like he's broken it into punishment. Yeah, or what you want to criticize I think it's a different example I'm sure he was hard with the terrible because he didn't he worded it ambiguously, but I'll give him the yeah To have their own host of sub subjects But you don't have to explore it, but you don't have to explore any of these Nope, you know You don't just because your theme is the justice system You could just pick one of these ones of your sub subjects as part of your broad subject on the justice system You could pick punishment You can pick when the system fails and you could pick rehabilitation And if you picked one of those you could just go down to mental health Or when the punishment prevents rehab or juvenile crimes You could pick each of those as being the focal point Like none of this changes the fact that you are still picking a subject or a sub subject Or a sub sub sub subject doesn't make a difference Well, what's interesting is I feel like if you put all these on dice and roll them It would create interesting stories like you have to make a story about mental health and corruption of systems or whatever Like oh Those can act in interesting ways, don't they? And I'd also say that you could go a completely different route and have make a story Or make of a story essentially a story about the justice system And it's just uh It's a textbook talking about the history of justice systems in particular countries or whatever through time And that would be a completely different direction than writing some kind of a novel That was about you know thematically the justice system as a topic because I assume the point of this video Those sticks specifically in that example though the the writing of fiction or I'm assuming I I don't know I don't actually know so And often you'll find this may be uh, this made me think of um When I was going to film school, I would Be a part of a bunch of film competitions like four to eight hours You know make a movie from start to finish and like They would have often have these rules where like locks you into a certain prop And a certain line of dialogue Like somewhere in the your short film these things have to happen And that always bugged the fuck out of me because it was like on the surface level where it's just like Like if it was like a dice roll like you were saying Mahler on theme Where it's like it needs to be about this broadly I'd actually like that way more than being locked into like surface elements where it's just like Someone needs to be holding an axe at somewhere and say this line like So annoying it just made me think of that. I like the idea of um Taking a dice roll on theme. That's interesting Often you'll find those sub subjects have sub subjects. Well, the theme is about randomness In chaos on the universe. So you know the theme is about discussing broad topics Oh, what about the topic is broad topics checks of their own Meaning your original theme has literally hundreds of potential sub sub sub subjects. It has to contend with So I feel like this just destroyed his own point um We're always broad in a sense He also says that it has subjects it has to contend with it doesn't have to contend with every single one of these things So I am not not objecting at all to the argument But if you're taking a broad theme like the the justice or yeah, not the justice system Justice as a whole and the best way of exploring that is to explore a specific part of that Then you can pose questions using that part of some of the other things Which you're not necessarily exploring in the same depth, but which at least pose questions about Rehabilitation or when the system fails specificity is good fine with that no problem By the way vigilantism sub category can vigilantism be good Like it feels very uh Shouldn't good or bad just be attached to all of these I guess or something is a prescription thinking of a third thing. All right The importance of oversight heroism and can it be good I wish there was more than one way to spell optional Beautiful this is why theme as topic is a stupid idea. No, what? So first of all, he hasn't proven that yet. Give me you yeah, you just said it You just said the words theme equal topic bad and stupid, but But theme is a topic. I don't Well, and he's all he's shown us is that you can subcategorize almost infinitely. I'm curious where we stop He should have shown us that yeah from a writer's point of view because it gets very messy very quickly Not necessarily I mean a sub topic is still a topic. Yeah, you know You can stay perfectly within the bounds of the theme you've given yourself And yet still your story will lack precision in terms of what it's out to say No, it might But wait lack precision execution is a huge element of this piece of writing That's true. No matter how mountainary you are you could lack precision Yeah, that's right. You can talk about Yeah Talk about something very specific Yeah, you'll But then most of the story has nothing to do with that theme you just end up doing a bunch of other crazy things Like they could even be themes that are completely disconnected from your from what would be considered an overarching binding theme Like you give out one that could be bound to justice or one that could be bound I don't know like the natural world or one that can be bound to robots or something And throw them all together as very specific themes and it would still be confusing as hell And it really has nothing to do with it being approached as a topic. It's sloppy writing Yeah, if you made a if you made a story about let's uh one theme that pops up a lot is like um change versus uh Tradition I guess you'd call it If you have a theme about change versus tradition and in the story you end up sort of Like wiggling around the idea and eventually both are terrible So you're kind of left by the story in a place where you have no idea what to do And that's not even the point then you could say yeah, it's a fairly this specific especially with context Topics or theme even though themes are topics you can still fail at that despite its specificity or how small it is Especially if you put that that that that theme of change versus tradition in a very like like a very specific historical and national context I almost feel like it's irrelevant to the choice of Emo topic compared to If we had 10 people who were horrifically harmed by someone because let's say they're all in an apartment building And it got burned down by this guy's negligence and all their family members died and all 10 collectively swear to get revenge And they choose 10 different ways and that's what the film is about But then like by the end of it five of them live very happy and satisfied lives of their choices The other five maybe some of them go to jail some of them kill themselves from depression Are the others like at the end you're like, so what do you have to say about revenge? Be like I have to fucking clue This thing was insane like If he said like yeah, because you're not specific enough It'd be like what what is that the problem? Or is it more so just you don't know what you think about revenge at this point? Right Which is a sin. I think that in terms um Theme and topic they're not always interchangeable But sometimes they are and framing their equivalence entirely is stupid is just uh It's an overstatement thing. He needs to think more about that Of what it's out to say, which is a sin not a virtue So let's I would like to hear that again just a second Sure Roll that back a bit a writer's point of view because it gets very messy very quickly You can stay perfectly within the bounds of the theme you've given yourself and yet still you're By the way that maybe as with perfectly within the bounds of the theme you've created that is Percing perfectly within the bounds like nothing exists outside of it. I don't even know if that's possible Is usually going to be something in your story that People will be like oh interesting that they had this happen You know there's got to be elements of plot character world building That are just don't have Yeah It's also interesting because it's like you are the one that generates the bounds in a sense, right? If I said I'm only covering Vigilantism and then someone's like the board about those parts with the guy who works in the justice system trying to make things Right his way like that's just supposed to be contrast to the vigilance. He's like, yeah, but you've You've got that there. So now that your thing is broader whether or not you Approve it to be you know what I'm saying It's like the story partner story where the cop goes to the waffle house and eats breakfast before he goes into work What do that have to do with justice? Nothing that was just a little bit of world building his daily routine and comedy and it's just you know a little bit of comedy because he just He he never said when when the waitress was pouring the syrup and it started to fill up the waffle house And everyone was going to die. So we just had to have it I think yeah, and naturally in your exploration of themes you're you're inevitably going to Set foot into other sort of adjacent ideas and I mean you can dedicate screen time or Page time to that if you want You know unless it's not I mean, yeah, it's I feel like that's inevitable Yeah, eventually you're you're gonna skirt the bounds of what it is you're talking about I just do whatever you can never be perfectly within the bounds With everything he says it feels as though there's like well, there are times where this thing is not true And you need to be ready for that and that's okay right The bounds of the theme you've given yourself and yet still your story will lack precision in terms of what it's out to say Which is a sin not a virtue and I wonder about that too. Oh Why does he say it will how does How does he possibly know that that it will I'm not Again this there needs to be way there needs to be way more emphasis on the execution of the element because He's just saying things that are not at all necessarily true. You can't you can't actually follow this advice and get a better story No, I think this is funny enough. I think it's too vague We need a less broad topic because I I want to question what he means by a precise like Uh, you know say for example, my story ends with two characters having done the same thing But having two different outcomes and he says that's not very precise in terms of your messaging They're like well, but my point is that different things could happen and that you have to be you know I mean like everyone's precise one man's precise is another man's broad I guess or whatever Is the lord of the rings a collection of really precise themes or is it one broad theme that all the specific elements fall within You know, I mean because it the lord of the rings is not one very specific idea I don't think I like no like not that you said that but I don't like the idea that precise good You know what I mean? It's like well, I agree because no When you have a conglomeration of themes you want them to be Complementary to one another like rags. I think other people were saying like part of a broader topic. Maybe Yeah, like if I don't I don't think you can distill the lord of the rings to one theme I think it's silly to to do that But I think you can try and rank them Like if I if I were to say what the real the biggest driving one was It would be the corruptive nature of power because that's sort of what the ring symbolizes Which on a surface level the ring is just at the top of everything. That's what's driving everybody's Action in the story So I feel like I personally would put that at the top But then inevitably when you have something like the ring and a story that's Fashioned this world this oppressive world Naturally, you're going to have stories of friendship and camaraderie In duty and responsibility in the people that are trying to set the world right. Yeah So it's not just a bunch of themes just thrown together for the sake of telling A big complicated story like that all the themes work together They compliment each other if you go broad enough they all kind of fall within the same category and there seems to be a sort of A tiered ranked importance of them if you will in terms of like how much weight they're all given it's not Oh, yeah So many ideas all thrown together all trying to give all trying to have equal weight and importance You know, there's a there's a sort of hierarchy to them. You could say I definitely think a little platoon mentioned Oh god temptation sword. That's definitely one of the big ones, you know, but there are smaller ones that all kind of Compliment yeah, and I mean the this sort of sub theme of temptation is hugely important in lord of the rings You can't say that's the only one And I think it really helps to rank them In terms of their prevalence in the story because if like if you just start off thinking I want to tell a story about the You know the corrupting nature of power and friendship and all this it's just like, okay Well, which way do I go? You know like because they're all They're all potentially they could all potentially be the highest ranking theme in a story, right? It's just like well, which way do you want to go with it? And then if you try and do everything at once and treat everything with equal importance, I think it can end up being a mess You know It's like dimension is oftentimes the theme that feels most important most I guess significant to the story could be the one that just meant the most to you Like a lot of people will end up being like that's the one I saw the clearest and you'd be like well at that point Is it just about finding amount of screen time that refers to a particular theme because The most meaningful thing to me in lord of the rings would be the Redemption aspect of it and if if close look we're here right now and he goes redemption No, it's it'll be more most precise than that and I'd be like, okay man's capacity for redemption Then he's like no still not precise enough. I go Okay, well a man Like at this point I'll actually start writing fucking stories, you know It'd be like borrow me if I just list out his story versus death or versus theater and versus Wormtongue versus at that point. It's like, yeah, it doesn't I feel like redemption caught it already As a broad topic, but then we're exploring piece of it And I just want to say this this image you shared rags is almost perfect for this Well, yeah, I was I was gonna let you go because I was talking about precision and accuracy I realized oh wait the the mapping of the difference to explain The the difference in in common parlance precision and accuracy are used interchangeably, but they're they're technically is a difference So the graph that's used to or the the icons that are used to distinguish Accuracy and precision actually map really well to storytelling. I feel Out of the four of these I feel like the bottom left high accuracy low precision Is like I think that's a really good way to write stories Because it becomes almost Conspicuous when you have both high accuracy and high precision sometimes Which isn't always necessarily bad But it really can be and I feel like a lot of the times if everything in the story if you're a theme if you're a thematic structure is high accuracy High precision whereas every every one of those like thematic or plot points in the story if we if we say that a dot on the bullseye Is something that is within the bounds of the theme that you're trying to execute If everything is within that it can come across as odd like that's it's almost like predictable Maybe even in a bad way where something's about to happen You're like, let me guess it's about the folly of revenge or something like that, right? Whereas a high accuracy low precision story There's clearly this area There's this zone that you know that the the the movie is telling you But there's also some other stuff going on as well The film doesn't have just like one thing to say that it's honing in on to the detriment of everything surrounding it I agree. Yeah, I that that's a great point because I think if you try and tell a story that's High accuracy high precision You are becoming more and more divorced from what it's like just living life day to day and you know thinking back on your own thinking back on your life and trying to Like not just outside of like going to movies or reading books It's just thinking about your own life and trying to extract a theme of like something that you went through And it's just like what the fuck did that mean? You know, so what do you think about I went through that experience You know and that that is often low accuracy low precision material that you're digging through to try to Extract meaning out of something that happened to you And if we spent the time I bet if we took all four of these examples We could come up with movies that fit each of these examples What do you think of my choices that I I'm curious if you could figure out why I would have given these choices Oh, you did it. You'd actually did it. I was literally gonna say Lord of the Rings was bottom left I uh, I understand what you mean low accuracy low precision is because star wars broadly is kind of a mess The whole series has become a bit of a mess Is that I was also gonna say that if we went with just the ot That this could be like the center dot is the luke stuff and then Everything to do with han could be like well, that's the one dot a little bit to the right as a different topic That's covered, you know, okay ish Yeah, because if you you have to look at the you have to look at these images in the context of the bullseye is just a Single theme right a miss doesn't mean bad a miss just means it's it's not part of that specific theme Pretty self-explanatory it is laser focused on a very specific point Well, it's actually gonna say that the high precision high accuracy stuff that's that tends to lend itself to allegory, right? So like 1984 would be high precision high accuracy Narnia would probably be high precision high accuracy as well anything which is trying to tell an allegorical Very specific point which is usually Parable as well parables fables those would be the kind of things I feel are like high accuracy high precision and then of course Yeah, a lot of the rings is Very focused but cast a wider net Yeah, uh in terms of what it's seeking to explore and how they're all sort of bound together Yeah, like all of the it's it's got a lot of themes that sort of loosely Run parallel with this, you know, whatever theme we're examining for the purpose of this graph Nothing seems nothing in Lord of the Rings feels like it's just like this weird crazy outlier Because we didn't have Tom Bombadilla in the movies So there's elements of it that that's why it works so well because it's this great Area that you have to work with But um, you know what mola. I'm not sure that I understand unforgiven I'm not sure let me take a crack at it Go ahead is it because it's because it's subversion Um, I think the way my brain is Processed this is the further outside of the center ring you are the further away from like commonly explored themes you are It's okay. I think I think yeah I think we're both right in in that aspect depending on how you want to interpret it whereas Subversion the reason I said that is because you think it's going for this But then you realize oh shit this whole time. It's been nailing it on something else Then you realize and it's like, oh, that's the subversion. He wasn't aiming at that place He was aiming at that thing up there um, I I Don't know if that's a super I don't know if that maps super well to the image for me. I I'm more inclined to think that the low Uh to this graph. I think that unforgiven specifically Um, I think low accuracy high precision Might be something like everything's laser focused on an idea, but it's not what it like thinks it is It's something like I don't know I think like we're also like That's why where they like get They think they're sending one message and they're sending another one stuff like that But the thing for me is that I've gone with this being all positives. None of these are negatives I've gone with that interpretation as in like you don't have to be highly accurate or highly precise or lowly or for both of them Because in a way that's why sometimes it's difficult to tell A really that's why like a subversive story and a very poorly written story Often can seem similar if the skill isn't there Because I think that there is a Another version of this like Fringy Stein with like Star Wars is a mess like yeah, that would be suitable in the sense of Nobody knows what Star Wars is about anymore and that that's what the board could look like with interpretation Well, I'm curious when Mahler when you write Star Wars Are you including all the post disney acquisition stuff? I was saying that it could apply on both. The reason I chose it for this one was more so that I think Star Wars Doesn't cover in a lot of depth Several ideas, but it covers them pretty well Like it gets yeah You know it gets a few things pretty good and then obviously luke is the big one and I think that's the center target hit Because I was thinking that interpretation of Star Wars could just cover like the original Trilogy, yeah, like you're not saying it's a bad thing Yeah, that it's like sort of low on both ends Because obviously tortoise and the hare is like one of most fundamentally like a lot of those Sort of stories cover things that we're all just like yeah, everyone agrees with that one Yeah Yeah, that was a good tangent. Well, I mean it's it's interesting to think about that It's not necessarily supposed to work. It's not even necessarily supposed to teach us anything. I just find it interesting It's it is interesting It's a way for us to sort of visualize Elements of you know thematics and execution because what would be really interesting too is if you took this and you made like the negative version of it Um, yeah, you know these sorts of general concepts have been done poorly That's what was throwing me off because low accuracy low precision Sounds negative to me like like you failed Yeah, but it also could be like it just does sort of a lot of things decently or it does a lot of things so So or it just sort of like this or maybe it's a story that you that has a that doesn't have very tight thematics But it's a good story, you know and you could take a lot of different things From it in terms of its theme based off of what you see and how you're feeling and the way that you interpret events Yeah, because the way I've gone with this means the accuracy just refers to Uh, how concentrated your points are Yeah, I see that's it's a cool meme. Yeah, because like before seeing this I would have been foggy on like what exactly is the Difference between accuracy and precision like I would have thought of them as very similar That they are like the difference is they're often used in common parlance as being essentially interchangeable Yeah, but like there there is a difference Between the two in terms of the way it's described in marksmanship. By the way, yeah, the the idea of hitting a bullseye is Yeah Oh, let's take harrell's story and fix it. He's got three main ideas all around the topic of justice People being framed for crimes guilty people getting away with crimes and someone committing a case of justifiable murder Uh, we'll stop using the sicario Stop, okay. Stop. Say don't say justifiable murder. That's literally an oxymoron It's justifiable murder. Yeah baked into the definition of murder isn't unjustified killing I saw it. I saw a married bachelors. Well at that point I guess he's saying kill he's like you just swap him out for killing But he doesn't realize that killing and murder are not interchangeable Um, also, I would like to point out that I think in the in the scope of a tv show You could actually you could absolutely do all three of these Yeah I think The fucking rick and morty episode of the citadel Right. Yeah All three of these in there. I think they are Uh, I think so. Yeah Though I do think the shorter the the the the format the more specific you probably want to be generally speaking Yeah, probably because it's just matter of how much time do you have to delve into each of your themes That episode is 20 minutes long, right Fringy? Yes 20 minutes something like that. I think at this point I'd be like if you have these And you're struggling like if they're really well executed as far as I'm concerned is like so the story is about corruption at this point, is it? I mean in this case it would seem like corruption is probably the more at uh Rather than justice broadly, it's like well the the broad one would be corruption in the justice system Yeah, or corrupt justice something like that. Nope. That's a topic and that's stupid True. I consider that that's a topic that you're talking about I presume he knows and recognize that each of these three are topics, right? Yeah. He must do that's the point Well, I hope I hope he would recognize that Best way to tighten this story up is to delete two of these ideas. Whoop. Oh Okay, so here's the thing Technically deleting things tightens it. However, meaningfully, you don't have by any means have to tighten up a story You can be too tight. Oh, no. No No, no Go even further than that just because you've removed two out of three doesn't actually mean you've tightened anything It could be that number three is written incredibly sloppily And that somebody could have all three But they're so precise that broadly it would be a tighter story than the one that just covers the one topic But it's all over the place But also you can have a story that does have all three of these themes and number two Is really tight and well written and you're like, yeah, I'm kind of going for three though So we're going to delete one and two from the story and I'm going to redraft it a bit And you've actually accidentally Gotten rid of the best part of your story. I could happen. I was also going to say on these just two types of infinity Essentially, yeah, you could go for ages on the context for why someone would kill someone Yeah Justified you could there's a variety of different Scenarios that you could I guess I just find this funny because yeah When you think about a show like law and order it's like yeah I mean law and order is delving into topics several times over And a variety of different topics related to it. It's not like it's over That there's only one way that you can approach this kind of story because even on on topic three Um depends on who the pov is are we following the pov of the person who did the crime? Or are you following the pov of the person who has to stop them? Or are we following the pov of the person who then gets killed and that's like the end of the story And then you could you could go in a variety of different directions with even this one Apparently straightforward and tight premise And then the amount of times you can change up all every single character you can conceive of for each of those three And then just jumbling them up every time That's not to include the actions that were committed Not to include whether it was intentional This is what I mean It's just like why are we even pretending for a second that this is specific and you know not a topic I guess what I find interesting as well in terms of the use of visuals is like if you ask someone what Rambo was about They probably wouldn't go for that innocent people being framed for crimes. It's like, well, I mean that happens in the film Sure, but like there's broader I'm not these visuals are just kind of throwing me off I think it's representative of the video so far, which is just that like, uh, this feels like it needed more thought thought out This is game makers toolkit, but for writing It's one of those things where you listen it to it and you're like This is not going to help me write a better story These are just like broad Things and wrong things mixed together that can't actually make this tool because tends to be accurate, but really simple This is Yeah Essentially, um Well, I guess it's useful if you've never played a video again before. Yeah, it's useful if you were Yeah, like it's literally a new concept. You know, like aida jump hold down aida jump longer. You're like, wait, does he think people Who want to develop games that are aware of this? You're like, apparently the left stick controls your movement The right sticks controls the way you're looking Wow Just on the three examples on the screen at the moment though that if you have got rid of one and two Three does not necessarily convey anything like the same thematic message as the combination of one two and three does Because it all depends then on what happens to the guy who commits justifiable murder Does he go to prison even though it was justifiable? Well, in which case then your theme could just as well be the inflexibility of the justice system as opposed to the corruption of the justice system or he would be let off in which case it's Morality chance and justice and what's a character story about a guy who gets away With committing a justifiable murder by framing an innocent person for that crime Literally all of these things can exist in the same event in the same story As one two three, it could be an innocent person was framed for a crime and a guilty person got away with the crime therefore You know Well, how can you have one without two? One one is inextricably linked to two isn't it an innocent person was being framed for a crime You the guilty person The crime could be fake There's no guilt. Well, you're right. The guilty person is the one just framing. So Yes Would you you wouldn't necessarily need both of those if you're again if you're telling a story and the theme is corruption in the justice system You wouldn't necessarily need to show would you people Both getting away for crimes they're guilty of and being framed for crimes They didn't commit because just framing somebody for Yeah, who's innocent would would accomplish the same point, right? The justice system is corrupt Yeah Protagonist or pov character could be the innocent person and we never learned who the guilty person was and we never focused on it We just know that they they have to they have to exist logic. Is it not hilarious because I was thinking like, okay What what about a story where there's a mercenary who is hired to kill does it extremely well But he's unfortunate in that he stumbles across a police like precinct or a particular corrupt system That frames him for a murder he didn't commit And he's like outraged at the injustice of this bullshit And then he has to pay off someone to frame someone else for a murder that he didn't even commit You know, but even though all this is happening in relation to his job and the nature of everything that he had killed people Like there's so much to think about in terms of where the justice lies there and where the corruption lies Um, yeah, it's just funny because it's like you can easily tie these three over and over and over and over and over again That is that is a really funny idea though This guy who murders for a living gets framed for him He didn't actually do and then he's really pissed up pissed off and upset about it He's like, look, I didn't kill this person. Damn. Gee. Well, what's funny about that? You can actually go drama or comedy with it. It would work both times Yeah It would be funny because he's like well if I if I would have killed them Then I would have done this and this and this and this and he explains the entire thing and everyone's just Anything there like what the fuck Well, he's so annoyed it hadn't been framed for a crime. He didn't commit that he goes away and murders someone It could be he's he's upset that the thing he was framed for is such a sloppy shitty murder that it's like a pride thing for him I do not want to be known for such a sloppy shitty amateur job like this Well, imagine the person he's paying off right the kingpin of all this situation is like, haha I framed you and you have to pay me I imagine he said like I will pay you but I need you to tell the other people in our fucking circuit That I didn't do this because it makes me look like a fucking moron and he's like, no I'm not going to do that and then like right at the end of the film. He just realizes Fuck it. It just shoots the guy It's like it all comes down to another murder. It's like Yeah, that would be funny because then there would be a he'd commit a murder that he is getting away with to help him get a Ride him actually do justice by trying to alleviate himself of him being framed for a murder. He didn't do It's it. It's actually funny. Yeah But no cut work Yeah, true. Also, e-fap is not condone murder or killing No killing's fine. No It's only about rags too broad quagmire of justifiable murder Suddenly just from this change this story feels way stronger and You just said it feels stronger, but it might feel way worse because it's like it's like the graph. It's too hyper focused It's too conspicuous. It's too It relies too much on coincidences and contrivance to stay To have that narrow focus execution is too important here. You can't say it Once again, stop fucking using cicario as your visual for this. It's like it's just a story But whether it's justified like what are you talking about? that movie for one For one Like obviously you've talked about whether he was justified in killing those people there, but most of the movie isn't about this actually No, this is what it builds to but like we follow emily blunt's character whose name I can't remember right now And she has a whole arc and a whole story that really isn't about this There is a great irony In him saying let's focus on this subcategory of a category when in the film This is a subcategory of the main category they're covering Yes And it's a really good fucking film So explain to me like I need him to tell me how he's not noticed a problem here of like you shouldn't do this But it does work What of justifiable murder? Suddenly just from this change this story feels way stronger unless he thought that this is what the whole film was about this moment If I saw a trailer for a film with this concept I would be so much more interested to go see it than I would a trailer Which has the concept for harrell's original story. How do you know that? You don't know that you don't even This is the specific story The specifics matter like and and the way it really is Matters You this is silly the idea that you'd be like, well, no, I would necessarily be more interested in My version rather than the original. You don't know that trailer even trailer of all things. Yeah, that's pretty silly This is something that can be true and he's broadened it out to like a a law essentially Like this can be the case I said to you guys What is what trailer sounds more interesting to you one that describes a movie? That's about a peg would go into the shopping center or one that's about like a war between aliens and humans You'd be like, I don't know Which one has the more specific theme moller. Oh, yeah, that'll do But why well, it's partly because the story is more lean now clearly It has more of an identity But leaving it there would be like a Ah, that was kind of hate that I saw the second one and I was like, man, this is like not even remotely The second one's a significant downgrade. Yeah Well, it's just it feels like they turned it into a generic action movie when sicario was very bold Yeah, yeah, why is he putting this on for more lean? It's more lean. It's I don't know the visuals have been weird Coming in turning our nasty dinner into a tasty And I'm saying gosh, isn't it tasty? That's pretty awkward considering our episode on retitude. We talked about the themes and not quite right I was gonna bring that up earlier. Yeah when we were talking about discussion of things and themes and debating them and you know Well executed versus poor and you know, it's where they discussed it watch our ratatouille episode Ratatouille is in need of a sequel That's not shit that covers the things that ratatouille one did not cover Well, I never want them to make a sequel. I don't want Pixar to make any sequels to any if they make a wally So I will be destroyed. They'll do it. I'll be I will be inconsolable. It will do it and it will be sad I mean well because they've done of toy story sequels at monsters university. They did fine in dory They did the Incredibles 2 they've done many cast films. So yeah, all that's left is ratatouille and wally It's like the the wolves are surrounding that it doesn't like oh god I think I think it's probably even more likely now that our Pixar is kind of uh struggling Um, they might actually start to push them kind of like, you know inside out too, right? Was that necessary? No, but yeah Is it necessary they continue to share their ideas with us? No Oh and failing to examine how he identified and fixed the problems in the dish. How precisely did I just fix this story? You didn't I don't know I literally To answer that question you changed it. That's it. Whether you're not gonna fix it. I don't know I'm not looking at the these are just abstract concepts. They're not the story the story is a film Uh, the words on the page Uh, the sounds of the coming three speakers or the you know, the the cut scenes as they're playing out or the gameplay and the and the Environment design these are the things that convey the story not your like broad sort of gods I view of this these are the concepts that are present in my story. It doesn't tell me anything What he's basically saying is What is he's asking? What's the difference between this story and another story? Yeah As far as he's gonna say I don't know. I don't know man. They're they're I don't know Well, there's an example of how removing important parts of your story does not necessarily make for a tighter story or a story with more identity Which is the thing I think he also said if it's lean it has more an identity You've got on the one hand. You've got the lord of the rings with you know, all of its many multifaceted Um topics or themes whatever we want to call them on the other hand You've got a story about a little like goblin type creature who has to crawl through some caves and escape an evil thing You've got the lord of the rings on one hand and you've got lord of ring golem on the other Are they the same story and is one more like ties and identifiable than the other one Lord of ring golem is indeed more tight. I agree. I mean we could use We're talking about ratatouille. We could use food as an analogy where you can have You know delicious berries and uh, you know yogurts and things and put them in a blender blend them all up Ah, what a delicious yummy smoothie that sure was delicious yummy And then you can have a stew right with all of its little pieces all of its potatoes and carrots and Mushrooms and its meat and everything and then you mix it all around and it's the parts are easily much more easy to distinguish But it also tastes delicious and then you could have something that is just that's super pure But it's just like a chocolate bar and that's delicious too so There's men it's it's I think that I got you I got what you mean It's like so my big trick for writing themes is to never perceive theme as writing a topic Instead perceive theme as writing a question How the fuck isn't a question going to be broad or at least sometimes broad too broad This is really any topic into a question. What is justice? Just because You mean the justice system Like this is awful. That's a good point. Yeah, yeah, you can turn anything into a question It truly is. Um, I I I guess if you write things you are technically a writer. That's what I'm learning So that's wait. I'm a writer Yeah, uh, I I have I feel like I Yeah I don't know. I'm trying to formulate. I'm trying to put into words. Ironically, I'm failing to communicate Don't put it into a topic. Why why is here? Okay? The question is why is someone who's giving it right who's giving writing advice so bad Why is someone who writes and who is talking about writing doing such a bad job at delivering writing advice You know, um Maybe I'll defend him on the the topic. I understand him completely. I think he's just completely wrong You know, like the way he's delivered this information. I guess it's arguably even worse Arguably worse. I'm not sure if what's worse like what if you badly explain a bad idea Well, it was like I understand him completely and his idea is terrible versus I don't think I was saying There's something to what he's saying right here That I kind of like because when if you're writing a story and you think of your theme as a question You are more immediately inclined to explore all sides of an issue rather than just saying, okay Here's my theme. I'm just going to forge a story that just concretely comes to this one Outcome that may be one sided, you know what I mean? I don't think that's necessarily true, but it could be that wasn't the context is anyway He was he was talking about how to not unbroaden it which adding a question mark does not do that Okay, yeah, right. Okay, we create a different type of story again 1984 is the example If you want to make a story which is all about 1984. Yeah 1984 question mark or is it 1985? Um If your goal is to say I am telling a story to stress how evil Human oppression is and I just want this to be as straightforward the allegorical as possible And didactic as possible as well So nobody can possibly miss the point I'm trying to make as opposed to I want to explore the themes of totalitarianism And what human oppression really means and maybe there are some good sides to it that we haven't accounted for That would be a very different type of tale Which would be it could you could make it interesting, but it wouldn't be 1984 Right Yeah, like maybe sarron had a point is like, okay, you can write that story if you want The empire was right That can be true sometimes enacting like that's the problem all these are sometimes that he's saying they're definitive and That's it like that's my big trick So don't you think even as a person like he writing this was like man I can't believe I cracked it with such a simple thing. He's like, don't you think maybe it's more complicated than that Yeah, don't I wonder yeah if first of I don't even know if his writing is good or bad This video leads me to believe it's not good But I don't know who knows if this guy's writing is good or bad. He could he could write amazing books He could write shit books And you wrote doon racks right back there. Oh, wow This is frank herbert Frank herbert you're younger than I thought you'd be he's aged really well. Yeah. Yeah He's aged fucking gracefully like an angel that spice Old spice Did you like that his big trick though is just punctuation Dude the sequel video he's like not a question mark and then he wipes away the curve and it's just the dot He's like full stop The sequel video the sequel video is uh video is you're writing themes wrong Oh, yeah That's what this video should be for the end conclusion is instead of the justice system or the justice system. It's the justice system Like I get it now. Oh, that was a conclusion because he went down at the end. Yeah The basis might I don't know how far we are into the video But I feel like this is is this gonna be the crux of his whole argument It's just thinking of themes as questions Apparently, I'm not sure how he's gonna explore this further, but we got plenty of video left. So Oh, okay Like that's my big trick that's the basis for my entire philosophy for for this video But what you will find is if you apply this technique properly Not only is this issue of being too vague with your theme going to be completely solved Not only is this the most thought-provoking way to write themes if oh boy You are you are making a lie You're you're writing a lot of checks here, buddy And I don't know if you can cash him if you ask me it also me It's kind of funny. He's being so definitive You think if you it'd be more thought-provoking if you like raised questions instead of trying to prevent different I think the best way to explore these things is to find definitive statements And then present examples that everyone agrees destroys the the statement because then it makes you go like, oh, fuck. Yeah, right It's not exciting, but it depends is probably gonna be the best answer to many many many questions I don't think it's awful advice for like novice Writers who are just first getting into this but anybody whose experience is already going to be thinking of themes in terms of a question already I never did. That's the thing like I I've never considered to to think of themes in terms of a question it I think of them more as I don't even I don't even know I think of them I guess I just think of them more in contextual Like broad contextual terms first instead of like formulating them into a you know a series of clauses But but even if you weren't to think of them as a question I assume that you wouldn't approach it in a one-sided way. You you'd be thinking what about this What about that aspect of this one theme? Uh, maybe it probably depends on the theme Uh Because in the same vein he would never have done that had he not asked a question I don't believe I don't believe any human thinks the justice system then goes I know exactly what I want to do and it doesn't involve any ambiguity whatsoever Like really the justice system is no ambiguity at all That's often the really good treatment that since dune is on his shelf Like so frank Herbert used to give advice for prospective writers to say that one of the best things to do just to generate ideas Is to take say the top 10 bestsellers of the week or the month or the year or whatever it is And just take them part look at every assumption they make so in other words Look at the themes that they represent And just unpack those and then turn them on their head and then create something which Sort of questions or at least begins by questioning that theme But actually translates into making an equivalently definitive statement about the thing just in the opposite direction So dune is quite explicitly premised on a questioning of asimov's themes in foundation Like this idea that you can save humanity from a dark age by your faith in Rational scientifically minded people to control grand human populations And set them back on the right path and then Herbert looks at that and says well That's not my experience of life control tends to lead to chaos So i'm going to invert that and sort of satirize or parody Uh foundation and dune is going to be beginning with the question Is that true before i start writing it come up with a theme which is no it isn't and therefore by explaining my theme It's the opposite is the truth, but you're still making a definitive statement You're not actually having theme as question. You're just beginning by questioning somebody else's theme. Yeah Because I I do think that one can make an argument for every form of theme exploration If someone said never start with a question always start with a statement You'd be like what why and you go well because from the statement We then explore how true it is or how false it is You know like yeah by stating it in the form of a statement You know it gives you a sort of path way to follow and it doesn't let you And make sure you don't wander too far away from the original point and get too wishy-washy and ambiguous And then was it tell you about yourself when you hear it as a statement that you agree with it or disagree with it Where does that lead you and should you inspect that part of yourself and thus your story? You know, I mean like you say like it's decent advice for like a starting writer I think you can have this video in every permutation Like the best thing to do with themes is actually to have five of them and then throw You know a dart at a board because you should never choose based on what you want to do You should also go with like a broad set of what you want to do and then let fate decide So it actually has you exploring things that you may have felt were uncomfortable. It's like that's okay Like yeah, I guess you could do that A lot of these you could just do That's true. I agree with that. I mean there's multiple ways of thinking about it and like there's pros and cons to all of them I think that the most important thing is to just be fluid with the whole process and be as open as possible to like Exploring facets of whatever it is you want to write a story about. Yeah I think like like a lot of things the virtue is in the balance between two extremes So like one extreme is I have this thing I'd like everyone to know So I'm going to write a book so that everyone will know how how correct I am in having this opinion And then the other extreme is like, oh, you're just exploring a topic But you never really settle on any answers And so you just kind of wander aimlessly through some ideas But don't really maybe you wander off the trail like rag said and then you don't really You don't come to any conclusions in the end. I think this is kind of extremes in both directions Exactly. Yeah That just thinking of it strictly as a question definitely there's that risk of getting lost in the weeds But then also if you think of it as a statement, you might be provoking yourself to think Well, is it though? Is this theme like this this way? Maybe it's the other way, you know Well, if someone said like what is what is killing justified? And this one says when they kill your whole family and then everyone on the table agrees like yeah, and then some guy goes is it They're all like What if they had it come in the past I just mean like he's literally paid to just say is it whatever there's a conclusion Is it though? Means that large chunks of your story really do write themselves That's something I agree with in hyper isolation So there we go The party story can very much write themselves when you get everything in place So that second story I suggested that's true. I agree with hitler when it comes to the Volkswagen and the autobahn so you see in hyper Hyper fixated in specific areas. Yeah, sure. It can work about justifiable murder Justifiable murder this is a much stronger story conceptually because the entire story now has one question it revolves around Are there situations where murdering another human in cold blood is morally justifiable? No because murder is murdering It is necessarily wrong So even if you you replace murder with killing because that's what he means. Um, I don't think that's all of cicario No, I think at this point we're supposed to not think about cicario at all. He's just using that as a visual You're right You're right And I think it's genuinely a fucking failing on video assayists when they don't use that dimension of the format Which is a visual format as well as audio like this is gonna be the how many Yeah, well, this will be how many e-faps in a row. I feel like we we need to like officially adopt this as the first law of e-fap I already said it was a fucking law in my videos, but I it's not a law. It's just something that happens. Everyone does it I don't I don't do that It's funny because he's I mean, it's the video is obviously designed to be visually Interpreted. It's not, you know, he's got like stuff popping up on screen with text and like trees Splitting apart. So there's obviously you meant to look at the screen I mean these videos don't help at all scaling it only as far as man with gun about to shoot Which we should have chosen There's a billion fucking things from film you could have chosen He has to understand that people who've seen sacchario are gonna be like, hmm. This is weird It's not just that it it doesn't map on perfectly It kind of contradicts his whole point because he's talking about oh, you need to pick a specific theme And hone everything around that get rid of all the stuff that doesn't fit And it's like well What you're showing me on screen is a movie that doesn't do that and it's exactly what's cario is about more than just one thing It's mostly not about that actually. Oh, it's mostly not about This specifically no Yeah, that's what I yeah Yeah, I agree And as I design the story this theme this question is the skeleton around which I build it can Man, that's a really nice. Uh, just sort of Can I be a dick and say yes Why are you showing me that the skeleton has already been built around organ or at least one? You don't mean like what specifically lungs a very prominent lungs Freaky cartoon skeleton. He should have had jack Skellington, you know He should have had a skeleton from a movie Well, but now it's throwing me off because if you're like wait, do the organs come So what are the lungs skeleton then the flash then the skin, you know Is the lung the theme or is the skeleton the theme? Yeah, the the organs of the theme and the skeletons the characters like oh god No, the skeleton is the plot and the flash characters To the left lung is the protagonist the right lung antagonist the theme is the spine they need each other I mean you could exist without one, but I mean it's nice to have both I build it constrains me because now I'm not bouncing around and throwing in all kinds of just random Characters and scene ideas that are vaguely to do why are you showing me good fellas? Yeah good fellas has a lot to say Come on the topic of justice, but everything is now all about assisting the exploration So justice Where good fellas failed untouchables succeeded it's like Yeah, I assume that's not a point he wants to make I I would be stunned if it was So let's go through the thought process. We obviously want the main character to have a murdered someone in a way That's morally gray. We don't want to say a dude was Stop saying That's why we that's why we have specific words to note the immense and important difference between killing and murder You're a writer. I think I was gonna say I think somebody would be like, oh come on leave below It's like he is a writer and he's talking like writer talking about writing And and I mean he's decided to make it about the justice system. So yes more specific and correct. Yeah This is like the worst time to get this wrong Yeah, there's no such thing morally gray murder. It's like no murder murder is immoral. It's baked into the definition Running at him with a knife and it was self-defense. That is too easy to justify But he didn't die. So it's not even a good example. He just got impaled. That's true Like these visuals are just this you've seen many films you can find Angel tripped like angel didn't do anything. He tripped over it. Like it's a terrible example This is an example of heroism being that he was gonna just tank the knife to save the kid This was about how cold and blood Let's say perhaps that someone he loves was horribly killed But the justice system failed at dishing out. I I wish you would have said killed horribly Wait, wait, what did he just say? He said somebody loves has been killed, but the justice system fails It's like wait, isn't that exactly what we showed in the initial? Remember the one two three We actually reintroduced Yes, we're getting very broad now He's already screwed up. No, we're getting too broad. It's a topic. No I was horribly killed But the justice system failed at dishing out proper justice Meaning the villain mostly just got away with the crime So why did you say a villain getting away with crime and show a black man? What what do you mean by this? I actually don't know this film. So I can't even He's already screwed up He has already screwed up because these things are just Like intertwined This is that high accuracy low precision element where it's like a lot of those things surround That one particular theme. They're very linked a lot of them will be on the border of it That's something that straddles both of those themes simultaneously by its nature That's just crazy to me that he said You can't have a story that explores an innocent person being framed and a guilty person getting away and and also Somebody commits a justified killing So in my example The hero's you know wife just got killed and the guilty person got away with it. Therefore. He goes after them So dude, you have to wonder whether it's justifiable. You're like, hmm Just reincorporated one of the themes that you said you wanted to get rid of and he has no idea Is it like by his own argument the story he's now telling is less tight than the story he thinks he's telling Yeah, this is a terrible trailer Oh the protagonist hunts him down and submits him to a gruesome death for revenge And I just accidentally came with the concept for law-abiding citizen. Didn't I Anyone here seen that other than me? I haven't seen law abiding citizen I fucking hate the ending of that film. Fucking hate it. Yeah, it's not a very well-regarded movie I don't know why you would use this as your example I don't know if he's about to say that mate. Well, no, he can't because he just built all that up as a good thing Yes, he's a good thing. So he has to be praising it Um, this is not a very well-written movie. Yeah, my issues with this film are plentiful But um, I just I really hate how it ends. It's one of like things. I've never forgotten about the film Which we don't need to talk about it's just that It's it hasn't I the film clearly has an idea. It just doesn't do it very well I think I'm seeing most of gerard butler's movies because they're just hilarious schlock But that's one I haven't seen is 300 is on I'm using that film for b-roll from now on But where is an intuitive place to have this question addressed in a courtroom? So that's our setting He's on Just like that Yeah, the question of whether or not it was morally justifiable for him to kill someone Who killed his wife and was not addressed by the justice system correctly We've already skipped over several important questions. Have we not? Was he properly justified given who got to judge whether or not he was given the correct, you know Treatment by the justice system Like well, I guess that's what's being discussed in this court case It's like no, I'm pretty sure they're just addressing him killing the guy I mean, I have to rewatch the movie. What I'm getting at is just that there are so many topics that could have been explored But he's already treated all of those as a given and we're moving on to the main topic of They're not a given Well, it's like this is the setting to explore. It's like, why did you say that? What do you mean? We can explore that You could have the setting just be the protagonist and the guy who did the crime like in a room having a conversation about I don't I don't think he's saying this is the only one but it just Is that what the film does? Yeah, I could have sworn he said it was it made sense to do it here He said it was the most intuitive It's just it's I guess he's just saying it's a straightforward place to start at least I mean, that's that's how I heard it, but maybe I miss I mean I guess here's the question Is it the most straightforward place to start in if the premise for why the crime was committed in the first place? Was that a guilty person was let free by the justice system or the failure of the justice system? Yeah, if the justice system has failed, maybe that's not the best place to explore the question of whether it's right or wrong in that story That's true You could you could just do the story of he's trapped in a room with you know, an ex-judge a police officer Ed Evel Punisher talking on the roof. Exactly. Yeah, that could be the most appropriate Except for Laura Bidingcetizen didn't I I guess I'm using that film for b-roll from now on But where is an intuitive place to have this question addressed in a courtroom? So that's our setting Yeah, the the funny thing here is that I think that's much more agreeable than what we may have thought he said until you realize that The premise here is the justice system failed so it's not intuitive at all. It's actually the opposite He's on trial for this and the defense is making the argument that murder can be justifiable sometimes And by nature we want to balance this out with another viewpoint We want the antagonist the prosecution to argue no the law is absolute No one is above I don't feel like that was achieved in that film at all But I guess he's just using an example. So whatever it's murder is always wrong Stop using I mean, I thought a lot. Yes murder is always wrong. Yes. That's why it's called murder We want our two main sides to have two diametrically opposed dances on this core thematic question I don't like the implication here, but we'll let him go further because uh, you know, like the That may be true. I'm not even sure we can judge this based on the film anymore You'd have to go with his theory Yeah And I'm not a huge fan of it so far because it sounds like he's saying that's the appropriate thing to do is to have them Be diametrically opposed like you can you don't have to do that To have the best story of your story You're telling and what we need to do is in the end after a great deal of exploration Both prosecution and defense have their closing statements about their perspectives Something happens, which is the final nail in the coffin for one side of the debate and the jury makes their verdict And what decision the jury makes combined with the judge's punishment is the answer to this Not necessarily I thought why not just have them both give their closing arguments so we don't see the resolution of the I'm so glad you said that rags when I watched the verdict for the first time Uh as our main character was giving his closing speech I was wondering like, hmm, you know, we could end without seeing the verdict Like we could end without knowing what the uh the answer to the question is and it would still be totally Fine. It could be isn't I mean, I I love the film Isn't that a movie though? Isn't that the what the anthony hopkins and um, what was it rye fracture Well, he's rags, technically correct. You never see the result of the case that we assume very strongly Yeah, uh, whereas in the case of but yeah, like that's um, you can end your story without providing an answer And it could be that the answer is wrong Yes, um, I mean like what does he believe that in like to kill a mockingbird That the guilty verdict is considered the story saying like yeah, they got they got that one, right, you know Like is that That would be pretty funny Plenty of examples, but just on top of I hate the theory here of like You you have both the ideas prevented presented and then one of them defeated is like And therefore if the jury or the judge decides Yeah, they win then the story is saying ah see they got that one right not necessarily sometimes. Yeah Sometimes no Sometimes the point is that they got it wrong Sometimes it's that we don't need to know whether they got it right or wrong Yeah, that's the whole thing with like crime and punishment, right? Where like the the verdict is reached but the the guy did the crime feels like He he upset the moral order of the of the universe somehow and he's never going to be at peace with himself despite The court system saying that oh, it was all fine Like this this idea of like if there's a court in a movie and they reach an outcome That's like that's the message you're meant to draw like it's silly It's kind of weird that Mordor is a portmanteau of moral order. That's odd And the jury makes combined with the judge's punishment is the answer to this thematic question Not to say this is the only way to write this Okay, thank god But I'll set the potential way to do it well everything I just laid out. That's the problem with your whole video, man Everything is a potential way to do it well that you've covered Out there was honestly quite effortless for me I'm good for you Okay, Jesus because when you get super specific with the theme you want to explore Large chunks of your story really do write themselves. All I did was go the all right Time for me to push back now because I was agree with it early It was like way to set like where do you talk about writing For yourself like there's some outcomes that feel so appropriate considering everything that you've built up in the first place You're like that is too perfect for me to think about doing anything else that sort of stuff But like saying large parts of your story is already written for he's like no Getting dialogue down and pacing down is a huge problem that that doesn't write itself, you know Oh man, I really wish that more people were aware that the actual like nuts and bolts process of crafting Of just writing the words down and making the flow of the words sound nice or That the shots are well composed and well, uh cut together or that the music is good That all all of these Individual components of what you can have a great idea and ruin it with like terrible execution on all fronts Your idea is only so far a huge amount of what it is that we respect about the craft of storytelling Is the craft of storytelling not just coming up with the ideas But finding ways to get ideas your brain as an abstract sort of set of concepts in your head It's just something that you can present to anybody that they'll be able to take something away from it Yeah, it's the it's the difference between some guy and a talented filmmaker Exactly all of the parts that make that idea tangible And that doesn't address the problem of let's take which is going to sound bizarre at first 2001 versus Deadpool Where you have a film that is so specific and unified in terms of what point it's trying to make and doesn't give a Shit at all about how entertained you're going to be in the individual pieces as it goes along It's not going to sacrifice anything of its vision Which creates a hell of a lot of people who find it absolutely boring and almost like meaningless to them This is a Deadpool where you might end up saying it's mostly meaningless because you're just kind of watching a funny thing But each scene by scene piece by piece dialogue by dialogue action by action is so entertaining But by the time you hit the end it's like I don't even know what I really like got from that But I had fun Like it was you know, I mean it's like two sides of the same coin in the sense of someone could find a thing meaningless because They just didn't even catch what the meaning was or someone find it meaningless because they weren't engaging at all because they were so bored by the pieces that connected it but that The artist's goals can be so different just that the whole like it writes itself. It's like I almost don't want to tell anyone that anymore I think it would be as silly as saying the game will code itself. That's just stupid. No worry You have to actually do the work The game still designs itself It might be like the most important thing to understand about pursuing any creative enterprise It's like saying the pitch will draw itself. No, you got to move your fucking hand All right, like you got to you have to make yourself do that work Even when it's frustrating even when you feel like you're not making any progress Even when you'd rather be doing something else, you got to be able to do that work and do it consistently It's not going to write itself Funny as part about when you get specific about your idea it writes itself And he's like I just wrote law-abiding citizens. Like, yeah, that's not a good movie though He also didn't write anything He didn't write war-abiding citizens He narrated about writing something. He wrote about writing. He didn't even create a trailer The fool in shoot the direction The good thing about having a theme is that it sort of lays this line out Where you can construct a story Along but like you still got to do all that work The the thing all that happening on its own is such an overstatement like of course it doesn't work like that You gotta You got to think about it and do it carefully and it's not easy Just because that line is there, you know Chunks of your story really do write themselves. All I did was go the intuitive direction story would need to go They really do I don't like this at all I do not like this appeal to letting intuition drive where the story goes because that is a great way To write the shittiest Awful garbage story that civilization has ever wrought Do not you cannot rely on intuition when it comes to this kind of craftsmanship There's also a very good way of losing track of what your theme is supposed to be, right? I mean give the theme that we are supposed to have started with the story that he just Didn't tell is innocent man Justifiably kills Person that's that's the theme that he wanted to Explore and in the course of writing intuitively He has re-added the two bits that he had to cut out in order to write this story to begin with And he would have spotted that if he hadn't been relying on his intuition so much because he wasn't paying attention So we've we've actually progressed from man justifiably kill someone to does legal system Acknowledge the rightness or wrongness of moral acts of killing or is the legal system too restrictive that that's like That's a different plank of your theme. You haven't cut that out. You just Found the wrong tool is wrong tool for the job The intuition in your brain in your ape brain did not evolve such that it allows you to create naturally good stories That is that's not what it's there to do. That's not its job Don't not wrong tool for this job Not left to its own devices or if not relied on entirely because I'm gonna train it I guess It's one. Yeah, it's one thing to like feel things out to do it to give the old to to give it a smell test to sort of Uh to go by vibes. Those are still ambiguous, but less so than just saying just let intuition Do its thing it just it writes itself the game designs itself the the the portrait paints itself like when people say these things It's it like you kind of know what they mean by that but you can't use that as the advice you give It's almost like something that happens once you've acquired the talent. It's something that happens You don't give people who haven't acquired that thing The advice to do the thing that they'll maybe get once they know how to do the thing As the advice of what they should do I think I follow that I think I do I'm half and a half Chunks of your story it works better for different aspects of storytelling I think the intuition can be a fairly useful and the idea that it writes itself It can work if you're saying like if you're solely concerned with plot and you've got point a in mind and you've got Zed in mind and all you have to do is chart how your people get from point a to point z And if it's like an adventure story Then yeah, it logically follows that you have to go via this set Route and one, you know You might find yourself going to a place in the course of your story that you didn't originally plan to go to But then you put your characters in a new situation And if your characters are reasonably well fleshed out in your own head Then you can sort of say it's intuition that the character will do Certain things in response to the situation you hadn't planned for them to be in but have found that they're in That's all kind of fine But I don't think it works particularly well for theme especially just because Theme is supposed to be this single unifying message And if you are relying on intuition to keep track of that Then you what you well, you could very easily go quite badly wrong and end up writing a very different story to the one You thought you were writing You can also, you know just code of like free you can sort of free write a first draft But you're not going to publish that you're going to go back and look at things analytically You're gonna set the intuition aside at that point But you know if you if you follow your intuition as like just to get material on the page You know, I don't think there's anything necessarily wrong with starting from that point And isn't stream of consciousness writing that as I used and say like psychotherapy If someone asked you to do right just your stream of consciousness The whole sort of point of that the utility of it is it's supposed to allow Some therapist person somewhere to look at your stream of consciousness and work out from your intuition What your actual problem is yeah, I haven't been able to do that Just say just write whatever comes to mind any thought that just comes to mind just write it down Just whatever comes in your brain say it. Tell me say it out loud I've yeah, I've heard of that being a way to sort of find out what's going on inside Give an example with bad movies and then a good movie of how as well Intuition could be like fucking you over from what you assume The audience would like to see and even when you're correct Not necessarily what you should give them If you look at tfa and rebel moon right they both Awful and they both end with our what's going to be probably a trilogy or at least a series of films hero Defeating the villain that they're going to fight again and again And it's like probably not advisable Just saying it's like yeah, but you the hero beats the villain at the end of the film You're like no, I know but like you should probably take care of the fact that like an investment will be paid off there that you can't Then like rebank But yet they do in tfa tlj and then they do again in revenge Rise of the fucking Rise of the sin Um, and it's just like it's like be careful with that intuitive like oh, this is supposed to happen because that's how it happens And that's just the thing that happens and even if it's the whole the whole audience in the room with you saying yes Yes, yes, yes make that happen. You gotta be careful because I was thinking about um the killer A lot of reviews I watched said that ending shit. Why didn't he do the thing that you would expect him to do? You know It's it's like yeah intuitively he would do the thing you would expect him to do but that's not at all what the story was about and uh I don't think that you should change that even if 99 of people in the world say you should Because that could be fine If you believe in your story Then you should follow through even if that runs contrary to intuition And then you'll be like we have seen that before like really though And it's like isn't blade runner and the thing kind of examples of how they they're telling stories that people just at first Just were like nah, this isn't right. This is all wrong. You'd fuck this up and those people were wrong All right, it wasn't that the film was in the wrong. They fucked up They got it wrong give it time tlj will be seen the same way Oh, yeah, that's right any day now that's like we'll do any day now Any day now, but I don't I don't think intuition is of much or any use without wisdom You know like um if you think you've got a totally skewed idea of what the world is Like your intuition is not going to be an accurate thing to follow It's not this core incorruptible thing that everyone has and can tap into you know, you got to you got to inform it with yeah wisdom and experience intuition can lead you to bad I mean using intuition can lead you to incorrect results. I mean you could use intuition to Uh conclude that the earth is flat, right? It's Rick and Morty came up earlier, didn't it? So one example of like bad intuition is the head that arrives And they create a whole religion based on intuition because they're just correlating things that don't actually have any causative link whatsoever But you know intuitively it made sense to them I want to leave you alone Intuition is often good at keeping you alive in the wilderness. It's not necessarily good at you know Creating you know like making a film It's kind of the challenges of like being a human right a lot of things that were beneficial to us when we were hunting gatherers Living out in the savannah is not necessarily useful to us navigating the incredibly complex world that we've created Yeah Really do write themselves. All I did was go the intuitive direction The story would need to go in order to address that question properly and suddenly I've created a protagonist You said address it properly, but you also said that's one of many ways you could do it Yeah, exactly. So is it proper or not? Or is it just one of the many proper ways? And also the proper way could also be terrible depending on the execution too. So Well, what's funny is I don't like it all like I said how this ends Is the opposite like in terms of I don't know why I'm avoiding spoiling it. I wouldn't recommend the film so The bad guy loses Like drastically in this film when I always felt what watching I was like he should have just fucking won to be honest with you It didn't mean that the film has to sign off on his point of view It would just mean that um It makes you think about a lot of what his point of view was and I didn't think uh capsity person I guess we could Have input on this, but I didn't think jamie fox the character they'd built in that film was smart enough at all to defeat him No This movie has that problem of like, oh, there's a villain who's like planned like a billion steps ahead for everything And like we're watching his like plan play out perfectly and Yeah, I don't know. I don't like the movie at all An antagonist a setting and I know pretty clearly what the end is gonna look like Here is why forcing yourself to say your theme in the form of a question is a powerful way to write stories For one by the very nature of what you can be sure Question is it forces you to get specific No No, it forces you to explore Uh a variety of different thoughts that you may have on a on a subject Art of exploration It invites you to explore would be what I would say over it forces you to be specific like not like blade runner What does it what does it mean to be a human if you wanted to say that's a question that asks like well, shit I mean, you know Yeah, that's actually not Not only blade runner would if you're interpreting it in the way that I would would expand your perspective on what it means to Be a human in a way that's kind of interesting Uh challenges a lot of preconceived notions and potentially replaces them with new ones Uh and and if he's talking from a writer pov I'd say that what it does is kind of invite you to ask a lot of questions that may inform The way that your story will pan out Like if you view the questions that you're going to ask yourself For the process of writing the story may well be different to the kinds of questions that the viewer's going to take away from it You know or interpret and then start to think about If we had two writers one says what it means to be human that is my theme Okay, and the next guy says Well, I've watched a video actually that gets you way on a better path than this He's like what do you mean? He's like well, my theme is uh, what does it mean to be human? The question mark on First guy's like, okay. Well, like I feel as though I'm addressing the same thing as like how you haven't even got a question I'll hit his head and go, of course Ah, why didn't I think of that one like I'm not trying to be a dick to the guy who made this video, but How do you not ask yourself questions when your primary theme is what it means to be human? Of course, you're asking yourself questions like the implication is if you don't write the question mark Are you even asking questions? Like Come on man Yeah, the foundation of course Also the phrase I will ask myself a question Is not a question So like it's a really weird way to Really wait explore it It's so silly framing it as just like this is the definitive way to think about this Like everybody's brain is different and it's just whatever best facilitates writers um Way of thinking about an idea most deeply Like just go with that whether you want to think of it as questions or statements or whatever Is it forces you to get specific? It forces you to narrow your sights on one issue and also because you've constrained yourself You now have a much easier question might actually send you fucking all over the place. Yeah, my broaden it out like crazy Well, I mean part of exploration is you know getting to the top of that hill and Realizing there's a whole world on the other side that you have yet to even get into Someone because you could just be a pedantic little shit about it Be like so lord the rings reckons that we couldn't do no one person can make a significant difference You have to team up with other people Be like Couldn't have done it on his own. Yeah, this is always like see that's that's that's stupid It should be broader. You're like damn your question. You've ruined lord of the rings. Like how could you do this? An issue and also because you've constrained yourself You now have a much easier time realizing the elements you need to cut That's one of the lovely things about constraints in writing As far as I'm concerned like we used to buy the only constraints that ever really generated it by yourself And what you've written prior as in like Your box is only as small or big As whatever you've already said is the case I mean, that's kind of the whole thing he was discussing earlier with cutting out theme one and two because it's better If we only have three because we don't want to get too broad. We have to be super Yeah, that's the thing right if you go I'm only addressing whether or not killing is justifiable and that's my box And so when when it comes up which he literally had come up did the justice system fails like whoa That's outside your box buddy. I'm gonna be going there like really Can I at least nail the box onto my current box? It's a slightly bigger box It doesn't follow on from anything he said so far, but the idea that limitations breed creativity. I think is true Interesting concept. Yeah, I agree. Yeah It doesn't follow on from this point Yeah, you just said just a random correct thing. That's interesting Well, because yeah, you might it's you might be like by box yourself in you'll start to expose places where the box maybe is You know not useful to the story and that you need to expand But no his point is more so the box Has to be there like you need to crush yourself down so that then you'll figure out what you need to have a story be about or something it's like very very specific Which is I guess thematically the point of his video You are always facing a sea of infinite possibility at the start of making any piece of art and it is always daunting um Does I not fuck up his whole video or no Let's hear it one more time. I also want to make sure We're trying to be more and more specific, but he says at the beginning of making any piece of art. We're like Stream with so many Brazilian questions, which is like, yeah So any question you begin with almost has infinite possibilities, but his whole point was that by making it a question We narrow it down Yeah, he's definitely confusing some things here, but I I do think this is a brief tangent where he says something That's just true. I think that you know like okay. I'm gonna write a story and it's like well I could write about anything. It's hard to come up with an idea if you limit yourself to something very specific It's a good place to start at least you might break out of it later The different infinities I was talking about though, right where We started with justice and he was like too broad You need to be like what is justice or or you know vigilantism or when is it okay to kill? And the thing is both any of those choices you have will lead you to this visual where you've got a billion question marks I not necessarily I I do understand that like there's so much you could explore within even these smaller boxes, but having Having um things that like okay, we're not going to talk about all these other aspects of justice We're just going to focus on this. I think that can be very helpful That's been the whole point we're trying to make is that nobody does the I'm going to do all of justice when they say justice In the same way as like if I'm covering depression, they're not going to cover every home I'm talking about like where you start as a genesis for like starting to write in the first place You know that just that having something more specific in mind like putting uh Constraints on what you're going to write about can help you It not be overwhelmed by say well, I could write about anything I could write about all these different things. So if you like give yourself limitations like Oh, I want to write a very very specific type of I don't know short story that can be made into a horror short That I can put on youtube or something like that That's that's it's way easier to come up with something when you kind of Force yourself into that at least to start then I'm going to sit down to write. I could write literally anything I feel like uh Either that those two are just stages of the writing process. They're both within the same pathway or That they if you the like the point I thought was being made here Was that we still end up with almost infinite questions? Which goes counter to the whole reason why we shouldn't be starting with a broad topic, which I think doesn't match the like if this is a problem He's encountering regardless then we should be okay with a broad topic to start for any writer Which I do believe Yeah, I yeah, no, I agree. I don't think this part really follows on from what he was saying before just that I just the broader point just that limitations can help you be more creative At least as a starting off point. I just think that's true I do agree with that notion but the That notion always seems to be expressed under the assumption that you'd think more control more constriction would lead to less creativity But in actuality not necessarily and so you have to agree I assume That complete freedom can lead to amazing creativity as well um well Yeah What I guess I'm getting that is just that like a lot of the lessons in here are very um useless without a lot more context That's definitely my In my own approach to writing stories I think when it comes to like a starting point it can be absolutely anything even if it's like At the broadest level or something really specific like it could be an outfit of characters wearing that you just get an image of Or something or like a piece of music that you're listening to and from that point I Try as quickly as I can to get to a theme that moves me. It doesn't have to be unique like Like i'm working on this story right now and this theme that I have is that a single person can I'll like alter the course of um civilization Like it's it's not a unique theme. I've seen it before but it's a powerful idea and it's It's the thing that I've decided that I want to most write about So right now like I've slotted that into like this is My guidepost like this is the overarching theme that I'm heading towards And then at that point it's just like, okay, let's take some steps backwards I have this theme How do I best illustrate this theme like what and what what characters would be most Um meaningful in that illustration where it's just like oh this character is manifesting this idea. Isn't that like That's interesting And then it's once you sort of come up with that illustration whether it's a part of your climax or a part of your crisis in your story Then it you start going you start thinking about plot Where it's just like okay scene by scene. How do I sort of build up to this moment? And um, that's the way I think about it Like you know, you start from anywhere And then you try and go to theme as as quickly as possible just to give yourself that Direction, but you you can switch that theme out at any time like in because in the process of your story your theme might change Or you know or grow or whatever You know, yeah, and that first idea that spawned all of this might be something that by the end you cut out You're like actually this is getting in the way Right. Yeah, you got to be willing to throw it all out the window too like And mollo to your point. I I definitely do agree that like, you know, you could just start with I'll just write anything I'll just have a blank piece of paper. I'll just start writing and see what happens. You can lead to something great as well Like like a lot of a lot of things. I think his sort of Where he goes wrong a lot in this video. We've mentioned it already, but he's like this is how it is for me Therefore, this is how it is for all people. So like when I sit down to write. I'm like, oh, there's too many things I could write about I need to get specific or else I can't write anything I'm overwhelmed by possibilities and it's like, yeah, that's true for some people And so a good advice for them might be like just give yourself an arbitrary limitation to start with Yeah, and then go from there, but not everybody's like that well, because With what John was talking about I was actually triggered to think of like because this can come down to Giving advice and stuff but also like the the advisor could be really wonky because of their own narrow thinking as in if he was to say Hey, Tolkien, I really like the story you're coming up with here But um, you need to box yourself in a little more because now you've got a bit of a Like you're flowing around in a couple places and he's like, what do you mean? Well, I'm detecting a lot of like, you know, you need to work together We need to come together to be stronger to Enhance each other to support each other to overcome like the greatest of evils and he's like, yeah You know, yeah, but you also have this thing about Even the smallest and tiniest of people can make a difference Like no matter how small you are and you know, whatever whatever, you know Tiny lowest level piece of shit you are that you'll you'll have you can have great impacts So which is it Tolkien are we are we going to do it together? Are we going to do it on our own? You need to you need to you know box yourself in a little bit more and make this a little bit Meanwhile, I just be like, no, you've boxed yourself too far You need to broaden your view on like what the story is trying to say Which is an interesting sort of I guess what we're getting to there is just In the same vein we want to see a story that he submitted to penguin and see if they were right He was right or maybe it was an amazing story and no one will see it now This whole thing would have been much better if instead of making up some stupid hypothetical story from herald That he just talked about his own story with specifics You know So we can see for ourselves if that was the problem. You know what I mean? Yeah, yeah Always facing a sea of infinite possibility at the start of making any piece of art and it is always daunting There are just too many things for you to choose from But the moment you throw in a constraint such as a thematic question like is power inherently corrupting I'm sorry Simple concepts right now Yeah, because it isn't so we could move on to the next question I'd be I would disagree with your that rags depends on what we do by all of these things, right? Is power inherently corrupting? Yeah, what does corrupting mean fundamentally? Does it mean it changes your actions because obviously whether or not you feel you've been corrupted is one thing Whether someone else feels you've been corrupted You know, what if the idea is that power doesn't corrupt, but it reveals corruption that was already present in some way, you know This is actually It's not that power corrupts is that power attracts corruptible people which is Yeah, have we not proven how like already Because each of those could then be broken up into a variety of different things Is power inherently corrupting if you answer the question? Yes, then it would be like, okay What do we do about it? You know that becomes like the next question that you need to start exploring Yeah to this point It's slightly helpful in the sense that you know, at least you've elit upon Something around which to structure your inquiries. So like at least we we've ruled out like does cheese taste good Like that's one of the potential infinite things Oh Again, like is the power of cheese tasting good actually corruptible like is that the expression we want to go down We've narrowed it down a little bit. It's just that it's so little that it basically makes no difference Yeah, that's kind of the point. We're trying to make I assume that between the lot of us is that like You know, we're solving the problem of it being too broad too infinite by making it slightly less infinite you know, like And I just you know that's why that's why I'm thinking about it as questions Is stupid because you can always break it down into sub questions and you can break those sub questions into sub sub questions That's why that's why you should think about it as a topic Yeah, that's what I was trying to highlight with like, you know guy Accidentally Burns apartment kills your whole family. So you go and kill his sister who's terminally ill but also wants to die but also Was related to your second cousin. Is it moral you're like, what? This has gotten very very limited now. I don't even know what to say about that scenario You get limited if you get so specific You can get so specific that you're just describing the plot of the movie and it's not really the theme anymore You know somewhere we have to abstract to a broader idea Well, but in the same vein if someone said that's my story and my theme is the morality of the situation You should be like, uh I feel like you've gone really weird like I don't like what else is in the story. It's like that's mainly a I mean you're still talking about justice and morality there You know, and I mean, yes I could use an oddly specific case. Yeah I think I think people would say it's not would people say that's the problem. There's oddly People say like, I don't know what you think people are going to take from this Or what even there is to take from this like it's there's so many variables that are all very Have you guys seen burn after reading? Yes You know the end Take It's like, what did we learn here palmer? I guess we learned whatever we did not to do it again. Yeah All right One of the most remembered random death scenes from that movie of all film I love that movie. It's I fucking lost my shit laughing when I first saw that I couldn't believe it. It's the expression It's Every element that has nothing to do with that question and just like that Realizing what needs or do you've only got three which was precisely what he said we shouldn't have earlier We need one How do you determine whether something has nothing to do with the particular theme? I feel like we've skipped over a its own topic of discussion here Well, so all I need to do is list like 20 things That are very different that relate to power that he would agree are all part of it But then you'd be like, yeah, but okay, I guess we need to be more specific and I'd be like, cool Yeah, let's do it and then I wanted to try and create the same challenge at the next level We said like is power corrupting only related to politics like oh boy. Yeah, we can spend another half an hour talking about how that's infinite, too Doesn't need to be in your story has become a breeze With a story about power's corruption You obviously want to have someone go through a journey where they've suddenly gained power And you fleshed that out with a supporting cast who all believe very different things about the nature of power And just like that from out of nowhere, we've got a pretty clear vision of where this story is going to go It's also a powerful technique because by the nature of it being a question. It's provoking exploration but What where was it supposed to go then from his explanation? What would you have all said we're definitely let's listen to this again And just tell me where do you think the story is going? Suddenly gained power and you fleshed that out with a supporting cast who all believe very different things about the nature of power And just like that from out of nowhere We've got a pretty clear vision of where this story is going to go Now you still have so many to do That's the whole story the story can be basically anything we have barely narrowed down our infinity to the point where that's Like what do you mean? I just know I'm half expecting him to say like of course. He is corrupted by the end You'd be like no and it's like of course. He isn't corrupted by the end. No Like one of the examples on the screen is palpatine, right and palpatine doesn't become corrupt when he gains power So the premise that the story must involve somebody who gains power In order to experience the corruption of power doesn't follow with the example He's just given us on the screen when it's corruption that leads to the gaining of power to begin with Which is a very different story and a different conclusion to draw from your premise Um, is it even necessarily true that to illustrate the corruption of power? You need to have a character a protagonist gain power to illustrate the point I don't necessarily even that This can be challenged like the whole um, we need a supporting cast filled with people of different perspectives It's like not necessarily there's all these things that can be challenged. What if we had two characters and that was it? Or if we had one character and the rest of it was portrayed through like, you know the events of the world You know with a complete disconnection from that person with all of the power They don't realize they're the ones pulling the strings, but that's how we discover the effects of the power Even if you follow down his supposedly clear vision of what your story ought to be like there's it doesn't really get you much further You know like do you like you don't necessarily have to have these characters with different perspectives talk about it explicitly? We can just see it through their actions. Yeah, it doesn't tell you anything about the setting Or the kind of power the level of power You know, yeah, it gets you a little closer, but it's not suddenly Oh, it's totally clear where we're going because we have a map and it's like that's hardly a map No, I mean that that setup that he outlined I mean that could end in a number of extremes like you could have it where you know that make the character who Gains the power becomes a tyrant Or it could be something like conquerors bad fur day at the end where he's got the crown on his head But he feels the weight of it and he's miserable or something like harry potter where he's got the elder wand And he smat he snaps it in half because he realizes Nobody should have this Because there's a lot of directions you can go Yep Power and just like that from out of nowhere We've got a pretty clear vision of where this story is going to go No, he does really just crazy that he said that millions of stories Yeah, I can go in different directions in different pathways, but okay, dude It's also a powerful technique because by the nature of being a question it's provoking exploration We're not writing asops fables here Okay, so what I was trying to bring up earlier with the whole like It provokes exploration when it's a question But not when it's a statement or rather just a word It's like isn't it interesting if I said the word justice just to have everybody say what the first thing that comes to their head is Even if it's not a question It's just Being like a asops fables we ain't doing that shit You're like there's a time and place for this stuff, man It's it's like perfectly reasonable and there's plenty of questions that can come from them I would argue a lot of stories we have in like a contemporary time our developments on top of Very very specifically understood and agreed upon moral standards like don't kill a person Is it is pretty straightforward and then it's like yeah, but what if what if this though? You're like, oh Like that's half the time what we're dealing with in batman stories I mean you could make an estimation Maybe of what's going to happen short term or long term, but like That's typically what an act break is is like it throws everything in a drastically different direction Where it's just like you thought it was going this way, but now we're going this way now like what's everyone going to do now like You can't just Just definitively say the ending is going to be this maybe this is down to how inquisitive a person is But what generally gets you guys to think about a thing more if it's phrased as a question if it's phrased as a statement I mean, I I think this I mean let's um you go ahead Let's put let's put it this way this video is phrasing a lot of things as statements and here we are discussing them Very deeply exploring different possibilities just because he's saying factually and declaratively that things are the way they are So I I don't Isn't everyone's least favorite question in the anything from a job interview to like a family gets together The least favorite thing is tell me about yourself Because like it's so impossibly broad like what what the fuck do you want me to talk about like I'm not even that interesting But I could find any like any number of things posed by your question But you need to give me something to work with otherwise you're kind of holding me hostage here It's much more interesting to be told something about what somebody believes because it structures your inquiry Which is kind of the point he's trying to make but in completely the wrong way If you if you begin with a statement, you're more structured and more limited and more confined and so by his definition more creatively Liberated in a paradoxical sense because you've got something to bounce off of um anyone here see anger management Yes, yeah, yeah a long time ago. There's a seed where Jack Dixon's just trying to piss off Adam Sadler. So he just says like tell me who who are you? That he like says his name and where he's from. He's like, no, no, no, no Tell me who you are. He's like, okay. I'm I feel like I'm personable outgoing. He goes. No, no. Tell me who you are It's just like I have no idea what the fucking want me to say I feel like I'm asking this question in every way possible. It's like, whoa, calm down, dude Uh, it's definitely on theme with this video, but I think you know phrasing things as a question can be helpful Can lead to more exploration, but so can saying a statement You know, like both can be the case depending on who you are how you think about things um, the other example that came to mind is Uh, you know that advice that if you want the right answer to a question on the internet, don't ask Just give the wrong one. Absolutely So when you say something like, you know Well, let let if you do it this way is batman an anti hero Which do you think you get more answers for that one or batman is an anti-hero? Batman is not an anti-hero probably more likely. Oh, yeah, all of a sudden you've provoked people Yeah, because they're like, wait, uh, right. Uh, that challenges my notions of this Batman doesn't kill It's so funny because it could come across as like you just try to disagree at every Point it's like, well, no, but this video is trying to disagree with a lot of conventional wisdom I think and the the fact that you'll highlight a question will always lead to more Thought or more exploration. It's just like we know that's not true. It really depends on the question or the statement Sometimes yeah, that's the whole video sometimes which gets more results justice is blind Or is justice blind? It was actually an old thing in generally I think it's called better riches law and it's the statement and any headline that ends in a question can be answered No, because if the person writing the article writing the headline was confident that the answer is yes, they would have Phrased it as a statement Yeah, it's it's more interesting to be presented with a contestable statement. I think than an open-ended question I suppose it is funny because if he said to us like well, when I say is a killing ever justifiable That helps you explore it. You really go and it's like, no, I just say yes A killing. Yeah, but there's almost like depending on the nature of the statement made it has like a built-in adversarial sort of element to it that a question simply lacks oftentimes Almost as if you have a have an opponent in the marketplace of ideas So someone saying, you know batman is not an anti hero. Well get this element of crank it up. Oh, there's um, Yeah, is batman fascist versus batman is fascist. We'll be like, oh boy Yeah Yeah, like is batman fascist you're like Why are you asking that? What the fuck you must have misspelled a word somewhere along the line And then the other person says, you know, yeah, batman is fascist and then you're like, listen here Listen here motherfucker. Yeah. Yes This gets back to the problem of giving blanket advice to everyone when people's different temperaments might like They have different proclivities, right? Some people if a really contrarian person Like you tell them like a contentious statement and that's going to really set them off You know, but someone who's I don't know Maybe like they just really like thinking about ideas and like a question might be more intriguing to them You know, like so I wouldn't give one piece of advice to everybody in that sense I don't think it's helpful Yeah, I think the the title of this video is another example of this kind of thing It's like you're writing themes wrong like I'm just not a fan of that Are you why did he phrase it as a question? What the hell? Yeah, why didn't he Yeah, why didn't he why didn't he say? Yeah Are you writing themes wrong? It's like as me like somebody personally like put a lot of time writing stories I read a title like that's like you're writing themes wrongs like am I Okay, let's see what the thought that you've put into it. All right. Oh, yeah Well, like a deliberately trying to provoke but like I think I would rather it was Like a statement that was a bit more friendly or You know or poses you could be writing themes wrong. Well, if it was I've been writing themes wrong for years Here's what I've learned or something like that. It'd be like, hmm. Okay Let's check this out. This could be anything but you're writing themes wrong. You're like, oh shut up Yeah, I know not up about plot holes You're fucking up. I figured it out though. Click my video tick for all the answers. Mm-hmm. Okay. All right, dude We're not writing asops fables here. We're novelists and screenwriters writing for an adult Asops fables is some good shit. All right. This is where I mean, I don't like this Framing that like a lesson of friendship is nice or something like that. I'd be like, we're not doing that. We're adults like Hang on But like asops fables are just good stories. They are they're good like they're of good quality In the sense that they're very coherent I don't think The this framing works. You could argue that asops fables are their skin rather than their theme is uh Arguably meant for a child audience because I mean, fuck it I watched Lord of the Rings as a kid and an adult and I got a lot from Both experiences in the sense of like if someone said Isn't it like the child vision of Lord of the Rings is teamwork beats the is the dream makes the dream work Or something like that that the adult one is How complicated the nature of corrupting powers can be or something like as we're like well Hang on you can just flip those two in terms of the simplicity or the complexity depending on what you get from the story just because Like if he said to me all you lid is the you should be so overconfident and then you should instead like Just work hard. That's the point of the The tortoise in the hair I'm like we can probably get plenty more out of it. But even if we didn't what's wrong with that. Is it the simplicity? That's that's wrong or the clarity of the message When I say wrong, it's like do you see what he did? He was like we're novelists. We're not writing that shit Like well hang on. What the fuck? Yeah, I can't write out great jobs I find that cringey as hell by the nature of being a question. It's provoking exploration We're not writing asops fables here. We're novelists and screenwriters writing for an adult audience People don't want parables that hit them in the head with a blunt moral telling them That explains why asops fables have endured for hundreds and you know, indeed Why people have used them as templates for stories When people hear parables like the Good Samaritan, they're like, wow, that's really trite Beating me over the head. He's never got rejected by penguin random house. So, you know The man who built this house on sat he's like look right when novelists here, okay? It's so funny too because of how shit a lot of what he I guess would consider like more novelist stories are Like because they combine the whole complicated story But also a message that's attempting to fucking hit you over the head with it, right like We I would argue tlj went through this problem. A lot of people were like, did you not listen to the dialogue in the film? That's the point it's making and you're sitting there being like, yeah, I know what point it wanted to make I understand that Um, it's stash of troopers is arguably the same problem How clear the message is I really don't think Is indicative of how good the story is And it's certainly not whether or not you find the message agreeable If the message the core message was isn't nice things good or something Uh, we just get into absurdities at this point. I don't know Yeah Stop shitting on ace ups fables naughty If they don't do as the writer says trust me audiences hate that what people We are in an unprecedented era of people hating subversion and deconstruction. Why is that? Yeah, interesting We need more ace ups fables in our lives. We need more variations of them We need more retellings and you know People want to see a superman who is brave courageous and wants to save people As simple as that. Okay. That's all they want to see If you know how people hate tortoise in the hair, I'd be like, no I don't know that that's not a thing. I know I feel like a lot of um Like uh star trek episodes would be about something that's relatively simple and straightforward ultimately and that's totally fine I would like I would enjoy the challenge of it's like making an episode of this tv show But the ultimate message is friendship is magic. I'd be like, all right Figure this out. It should be fine Surely it's about the execution And it because he's saying like it hits you over the head. It's like what that's not necessarily bad Depends right Do I don't think uh simplicity and hitting you over the head are the same thing? That's also true. Yeah Or clarity Is the tortoise in the hair hitting you over the head with the notion that slow and steady wins the race Or is it showing you that in a very clear way such that you wouldn't misunderstand that message There's a difference between like clarity and hitting you over the head with a point Right. It's just a clear illustration of a very important message to extract. Exactly. Yeah I'm like the good it's a good smell and hitting you over the head with the point that you should like be kind to people Like I mean, I guess you could say that it's hitting you over the head But I feel like that would be a bit silly this also It's not like laying out didactically what the applications of these lessons are So the tortoise in the hair isn't hitting you over the head with this is the principle And here's how you should apply it in every conceivable aspect of your life This is therefore an extensive lesson What it's doing is establishing like a mind broadening principle for a child Which you are then free to apply in any number of settings Which just has you thinking about a common thing in a slightly different way than you otherwise might have done Which is sensible and good storytelling. It's not like Also assume because I don't know about you guys But like when this was first taught to me in my Particular areas of school or whatever the once the story is told there was not being like What do you guys think what's what's going on with the story? And one of the things that we we discussed are like at least partial of the stories I've always thought of it as being a part of it is a the nature of a prejudice, right? It's like the hair wins like does it though You're like why do you assume that and it's like well, it's just more capable and you're like well Maybe physically like but there's there's aspects happening here. They're a little bit more You know complicated like what I'm getting at is that this there's more to draw from this story Nessus like in a lot of different ways that may not be completely obvious that may even be considered above child level God forbid I just find this so lame like we're We're beyond asops fables. Okay. It's like maybe we're not I think it's safe to say there's a reason why asops fables have endured for like thousands of years at this point You know, yeah, there's probably a reason why You know the same goes for a lot of our ancient fables and tails and whatnot Like there's a reason why they're pretty enduring and it's because Well, I mean first of all it is like just pretty sound in terms of there's really nothing wrong with these stories I'd be I'd be I'd be curious to see what somebody would say is wrong with like the grasshopper and the ants for instance What's wrong with that story? Well, I think if if you were here, you know, there's nothing wrong with it. I just think that we need to move beyond it I mean do we need to move beyond it when they're pretty essential and eternal sort of Lessons conveyed in pretty straightforward ways. Well, especially if we're gonna I don't need all stories to be asops fables. I don't want all stories to be like that, but Let's Yeah, if we're highlighting the oh well, these are for kids not for adults like, okay So they are good then because we a lot of stories are written for kids Is there not a lot to learn to know that if this is a direct good story for children And something like fucking I don't know 1984 is a very good story for adults Where's the uh, how do we combine something like that that makes it enjoyable for the whole family? And it's like then you come to you know, like a pixel movie Good picks on it Trying to figure out and it's like what what of asop fables is in the Incredibles versus something as complicated or Rather just more considered like in 1984 in the Incredibles and it's like oh, it's interesting to tear apart But they're both valid Talk about asops. I mean, you know a bug's life is based on asops fables Like a bug's life is based on the grasshopper in the ants Well, that's the thing, right? We're only as old as we are we'll net like it keeps going back Like everything's based on another thing inspired by another thing because stories have been told since we could fucking Communicate yeah I think the the age of stories is one Dumb thing that people use to look down on stories like this and another one is the incorporation of animals At like it's like true like somebody who says like animal farm is like a kid's Story like are you fucking kidding me, dude? Like can you not just look past the animals like one layer past the fucking animal Graphic novel mouse was for children and they would be saying they said that Like using animals as allegory is something that we've been doing as well That's like a really old staple. We've been describing human You know, we've been anthropomorphizing animals for ages Like the idea that foxes are like trickster animals, right? Or or that like the eagle is noble Or that they are or you know that the bear is ferocious these sorts of things we've been doing for ages And it's no wonder that it's like it doesn't make sense to me But the idea that you'd look down on it's like, yeah, but I mean it's about a tortoise and a a hare That's of no use to me as a human. It's like well, that's pretty silly Right, but there's in a case tortoise and hares they're four people, you know, even though they're about animals They're four people And in the context of this story, there's obvious utility in Choosing those specific animals the tortoise is slow the hare is fast and you're Right, you're using what they are in terms of animals like to Make the point more clear Yeah, you just like I mean it's sort of clear already just with the events of it But like just having that extra layer of like the tortoise is slow the hare is fast And yet the tortoise one like that sort of helps hammer the point home For a younger audience like it definitely helps A young gronious understand it but that doesn't mean it's exclusively for a younger audience. That's stupid. What's funny is He's just so it's just every every dynamic possible He is wrong because I was like what's one of the what is the theme of the tortoise and the hare You've already got people saying like what was once understood to be the theme was to be the tortoise rather than the hare Despite the fact that There's like a sense of you know like inadequacy about the The hare because he's got negative traits or whatever But it's like the developed version is be the tortoise and the hare That there's aspects to both of them that you need to consider that are important but then like there's A description here from just type it into google is the tortoise and the hare is a classic children's story featuring the themes of speed over confidence tenacity and just desserts like We're already at the point where this has gone beyond what a lot of people tend to think about with the story already You know what I mean? I'm so glad you said this more because I decided you know what? I want to see what Wikipedia has to say about the ant and the grasshopper And so it describes the fable describes how a hungry grasshopper begs for food from an ant when winter comes and it's refused The situation sums up moral lessons about the virtues of hard work and planning for the future Even in classical times, however, this advice was miscontrued by some as an alternative story Represented by the ants industry as mean and self-serving I was like, oh, yeah. No, there's nothing to talk about with asops fables, huh? Yeah We're waiting for adults here. Okay Right. I was saying earlier. It's like a lot of this is dependent on the viewer as opposed to the writer Like what your ability to actually see in these stories and to have said like this is for kids. Fuck this is like man I mean it really is like p o v because slow and steady wins the races one way of looking at But another one is like hubris, you know pride cometh before the fall if you're looking at the hares p o v Depends on who you're looking at Persistence and overconfidence. Yeah, it's it's interesting what somebody would go to first Do they associate more with the grasshopper? Not the grasshopper. Do they associate more with the tortoise or the hare? Like even that is interesting in terms of which which character is the is the lesson that you're extracting Is it the positive one or the negative one? Um, but yeah, no, we're writing for adults here. Okay Sobs fame was out of here. The the moral of tortoise and the hare is do not do not take a nap if you are in a race That's the moral of this story That's pretty solid advice. I will say that's pretty good. It'll work It's like there's a strong mid-wit energy though about the the kind of people who say things like oh, no We're writing for adults who it must be like more complicated than something like ezebs fable Like the one that comes to mind is it's got to be tlj again the arms dealer It's all there are people who are Morally gray. Don't you know and they do like good and bad things depending on your point of view This is a grown-up message for a grown-up adult audience Like no, it isn't there's way more complexity and nuance and ease up than there is in that sort of portrayal Well, uh, you know the the developed version of that character because he's called dj, right? And it's supposed to stand for don't join I think like the idea is That you shouldn't be on the rebels or the empire side that they're both corrupted They're both a part of a system that's just turmoil and killing people and stuff. It's just like what the what the fuck What do you How much I find tlj frustrated I'll have to make some videos Entire solar systems the other side buys weapons. These are morally a fight. You know aforementioned evil space Nazis It's also weird too. It's like when you think I mean just sum it up in the phrase of yeah We're writing a story for adults makes the last Jedi We're writing a story for kids makes the last wish He's like, okay. Well, huh it goes a bit deeper than that Them that they're naughty if they don't do as the right I almost I almost said I almost said rebel moon there when I was thinking this is this is a story for adults Saxiders riding out rebel moon Every once in a while to keep it every once in a while. He writes, you know He chooses a new color of crayon to write the script just to swap things up a bit. No He's got a pad that he doesn't fill with egg. It's filled with his blood. He's like, yeah Yeah, fucking epic There's that story recently that actress and harry potter that shadow all over the The franchise because it's like oh, this is a story for kids. Like can we just get over? Oh, yeah, the lady just get over that already. God. No, whatever. She played the uh, herbology professor. I can't remember the actress Right. Yeah, she said can we move on or something? It's like the fuck Yeah, you can go get a new fucking job. If you don't like the check they gave you Right. I mean the ingratitude is one thing, but it's just like You you are just looking at it the surface level of magic and wands and the fact that it's like about You know a child ensemble And it's just like okay, it must be a story for kids totally ignoring the you know, this the archetype and the The story about integrating the shadow and and all this stuff about friendship and sacrifice You're just throwing that all out the window because it's just about You know kids casting spells and therefore it's a kid's story like what how how would you define an adult story? Because it's purely grounded in the real world. It has a couple sex scenes in it. Yeah, exactly Like really that might be the only distinction these people have is like is there a sex scene in it? Therefore it's an adult story. No heroes. No villains only tops and bottoms We've talked about like adult themes versus child things that usually just as a matter of if not going to be something The children will be able to comprehend very well if you're talking about uh, let's say like Incredibly complicated political corruption. It's like they may even find it just completely boring Let alone understanding the nature of the world and why we would be in that position. However You can have intros to that the kids in many different ways. Some would argue that the prequels did that Oh, did I just go there? Oh my god. I wish you didn't Moral telling them that they're naughty if they don't do as the writer says trust me audiences hate that What people really want is a nuanced exploration of an issue where all sides of the debate are given their due Not true. No, that's just not fucking true. Listen. The only good bug is a dead bug There are times there's sometimes a good story. There is a clear evil There is a clear you want fleshed out view of the dark side of the sith You know like and yeah, and uh, the main line star wars, uh, like in the ot Look, sometimes there's just a bastard and he needs his ass kicked and that's a great story I've seen it, but does shindler's list give the Nazis a fair hearing? Oh, they'll get a hearing. All right, it's it's this right me It's like how could you write this be like audiences definitively want all aspects covered is like no, they don't Yeah, about every last year movie He doesn't do a good good enough job speaking for himself to start speaking so confidently for everyone else true That's the way you create the most provoking themes and if you frame your theme as a question You're setting yourself up to do exactly that She's gotta be a question and he's gonna cover everything Well, I think we skipped over the first bit. I feel which is that some themes are just better than other themes If you have an an ontologically inherently evil force that needs to be Fought against by the forces of good How come the theme of heroism and you know Persistence in the face of all odds. What makes that a worse theme than some Something some theme that's a bit more. I guess just any other theme How could he's just like he's done the thing where he's just saying yeah Some things are some themes are just better than others and you just like snuck that into a sentence The more morally gray thought provoking ones are better than others I guess that's like the client is strong. That's that's the that's based on the the exact verbiage that I've forgotten here It's that's basically the strong claim or the strong implication Either way something that I just don't think you could just say that His quote is saying at one point in this video The harold was juggling too much at once He simultaneously just argued you need to explore every point of view on your subject Good luck. Good luck. Yeah Yeah, but it's difficult. There are quite a few caveats to this technique that if you want to use it I strongly recommend you bear in mind Firstly what you will find is there is a That was so british what the hell Oh, you strongly recommend it. Do you like what have you done like If you've written anything is this youtuber done, you know, written novels or screen titles? I thought you meant what have you done like you've created such a bad video What have you done Oh sure A few caveats to this technique that if you want to use it, I strongly recommend you bear in mind Firstly what you will find is there is a direct correlation Between the difficulty of answering the thematic question and the degree to which your story is thought provoking There is a direct correlation between the difficulty of answering the thematic question And the degree to which your story is thought provoking wrong. No Not always or maybe not even most of the time. I'm not sure I'm trying to I think this can be true sometimes But this is not some definitive law. That's why it's wrong is that he's made a definitive It can be it can't be It's probably Often correlated mostly Often not really Willing to push on that one. I'd rather just say it's uh, yeah, that's why I say it was such with such inflection You put it as a question and that means it's thought provoking. Yeah, there are so many subjects like Between the difficulty of answering direct correlation between difficulty of answering the them a thematic question, by the way, meaning what exactly Basically, is it is the real question here is like is the difficulty of answering any question necessarily more thought provoking which is like I Maybe but I don't know but maybe to the point where I think that I feel like we're tackling a completely different question that's separate now we're getting into the element of parsing out what your sentence means in the nature of these two comparisons Is this the caveat provoking needs to be broken down? I think because I mean like I find the the tortoise and the hare thought provoking in that Like what else can this be broadly applied to? You know like like this idea of being consumed by your ego and you know Being overconfident like and that being your fault overconfidence and rushing creating good outcomes is a possibility And so what would that say in contradiction to an asops fable that relates to it? And maybe the the fable itself doesn't contradict that notion It presents the alternative or something to just develop it like those are all arguably thought provoking But when you say a thematic or the thematic question Does he mean is there ever a time to kill? Like okay, I guess that's a thematic question But how far can we go before it's no longer a thematic question like is bored better than oudie like well You know like for me, uh, maybe not rags, but for me, I'd be like I have no idea how to answer that question It doesn't make me think Because I don't care about the cars at all like I don't I don't even you don't mean like I'm just like what is what? Yeah, it's it's one of those Like there can sometimes be a direct correlation, but not always And if you want to say that just the more complex the thematic question the more thought provoking And it's like I that might be built into the nature of the words you're using maybe If something's more complex, maybe it's necessarily more thought provoking depending on how you want to use those words But now i'm trying to interpret what this sentence means when this shouldn't be a sentence that Is up for that much interpretation This should be a pretty Like clearly defined and easy to understand like boom. Here is the rule Dot dot dot dot. There it is Yeah So, okay Let's say we're writing a story with a theme is is kicking puppies wrong. Um, that'll be a pretty crap theme because yes Uh, no, it's actually a lot more complicated than that Well, you necessarily you'd have to explore all the times where maybe it's okay to kick a cup You have to get every perspective so people who despise dogs people who dogs have killed their family And then people who need to kick a dog in order to save the life of somebody What about like when your mom was killed by domination? Exactly You know, what if a dog is running towards you and he's he's gonna bite you and then you kick him and you're like no Get away He's so bad at this like If you'd said is it ever well, he would ruin the question if he said is it ever justifiable to murder a dog But then that would be like we would be back in the When you find cool or jiddy wall that war when someone gets the dog kill streak You lose negative points whenever you kill the dogs to try to attack you Hey, when Ellie killed the dog in the last of us everyone was complaining. That was a sad moment This is such a stupid baseline The answer is yes, obviously what is there to be explored in that question? I don't know why we have mixed Wait, wait, wait, just like I was just because I was memeing because I'm trying to stay in character But is he actually like you can't think of any morally questionable times and what if a dog is attacking your Child Yeah, exactly Am I supposed to join in and also what's funny is There there are things you can go to but it is actually difficult to make a definitively moral statement. That's like not long But you're like, you know When you choose a word like murder it's much easier because it's all built in What do you say like is it ever bad to push an old lady down the stairs after she's begged you for help? You're like, well, it may be Unfortunately, maybe they could be a time for that is moral It could be I mean these kinds of weird questions could be the premise to a Crazy misunderstanding that kick starts the plot of a story. Yeah. Yes. Okay. Here's here's the story It's a short one, but you have a man who some asshole comes by and he kicks his dog And he has to go get revenge on this guy for kicking his dog But in the process of trying to hunt this guy down and get revenge Uh, he actually he has to kick that guy's dog in self-defense. And so now he's like, oh, how am I different? Have you just You just described the killer monster that I've been hunting kind of a little bit didn't I I felt like you did that on purpose, but maybe I don't It was not on purpose. You know sometimes I act happy accidents. Oh, yeah, because you are correct completely correct. That is uh What an awful way to start this sequence, you know, like he's There's a there's he's got a Last bit of the sentence he could pull out and he can retreat. He could be like ha ha. I was just meming But I don't think he is He could have said if the theme is you shouldn't kick a dog that's literally doing nothing to harm you or anybody else And it's just minding its own business then. Yes, that's pretty obvious. But even then though Why that lesson? I mean it wasn't long ago that people thought dogs were actually like automatons That they didn't have a motion. You could you know, it's just it's a basic trolley problem again Like the trolley is coming down and on the tracks you've got 15 like poor People and you've got one dog on the bridge and the only way to save them is to kick the dog off the bridge It's an innocent dog, but it's still probably right to kill it That the dog is on the train tracks and you can kick it off the train tracks Exactly, yeah I gotta kick it. I can't just throw it. That's the quickest way to get Drop kick it You know what he you know what he wanted to say, but he couldn't because it would be retarded. Is it ever okay to kick a jog? To kick a dog jog it. I would like to kick lots of joggers No, no, no notice. Just keep going the sentence would be is it ever okay to kick a dog unjustifiably? That's what he wanted to say Which is like built into the question Yes, obviously what is there to be explored in that question, but if we leveled it up to a far trickier to answer question It was okay Listen, this is a crazy self-report here, but okay Such as you know is murdering people always wrong in it. Nice. Yes Oh, you made it worse It's actually worse. Yeah Because the other one was just the case if there's a lot of there's a lot of reasons why someone might end up kicking a dog If it's like trying to attack them or their family or their pet Uh, but now you've changed it to and it's just wrong. It is. It is Justifiably murder. That's That's why we have the word murder. It's built in that it is unjustified. You idiot. You're a writer You're a writer Guys, you could never kick a dog in a justified scenario. Not possible, but you could justifiably murder This is what we called the odds Well execution is everything right because in that hypothetical story about The gray area where it might actually be okay to kick a puppy in the face You could execute that really well and it would be more thought provoking Than something like gareth edwards is the creator Which ostensibly is about you know complex notions about Artificial intelligence and what it means to be a person and a human being but it does it so poorly that it leaves you with very little to think about Yeah, I think that's fair Ah trickier to answer question such as you know is murdering people always wrong in every circumstance Suddenly it's a lot more interesting that there's more meat to this issue that we've got to grapple with There's less meat to finish it There's no meat It is a closed It is a bleached white bone in the desert But I can dig out which really isn't a part of it Is the you know that killing the person is justifiable But that could never be proven and thus you will be convicted of murder But will you conduct that moral act anyway? Like that's the I'm trying to find a way in But that really I don't think that's included in what he said because he's nailed it so so tight You've changed it into something different That's what I'm saying like he's he's he's made it so that we can't even with our crazy contrarian hypotheticals come up with anything to save him Right and it's just come to mind for me But Freud or Dostoevsky's crime and punishment has exactly this question as its theme The second thing you want to bear in mind is you should decide I don't know if I would describe that as I I don't know if I would just Yeah, like I feel like you could describe it more accurately I doubt the question is is murder justifiable because I'm assuming Dostoevsky knows the definition of murder Well, not if he's a writer apparently What is it with writers not knowing about words that's kind of weird His crime and punishment has exactly this question as its theme the second thing you want to bear in mind You should assign each of your characters a stance on this theme Whatever start assign them a stance on the theme as opposed to make sure they're built with values Like make sure your characters have wants needs and values like just the simple advice that everyone always gives Because of course what if their position on the theme is going to be emergent from the values Well, what if the character is agnostic on the situation that is they don't have a stance? What if they're und, what if they're undecided? What if it's about them going this way that way exploring not knowing in the end What if you what if the theme is you know what sometimes maybe I don't know is just the way to go Like you've already said I don't know man like you didn't have to Mmm. I have higher expectations from writers Once you give your protagonist you want your antagonist to disagree and the You want your antagonist Agree but disagree on a smaller like subset of it You know like the easiest one is the ends justify the means versus no I don't believe that even if we have the same end goal that we want You could also have an antagonist who agrees but he goes against what his values are for some You know for some particular reason you could hate him personally but agree with his goals, right? You fuck my wife I saw I hate you, but I agree that we should take down whatever I was about to say as well Doesn't this come up earlier where he said the diametrically opposed thing? It's like you don't need them diametrically opposed. That's just a potential as one option Whatever stance you give your protagonist you want your antagonist to disagree And the disagreement between these two characters on the theme Causes or at the very least underpins the entire conflict of the story not necessarily You can have the antagonist not know anything about the person who's pushing the story like the protagonist They could just get in the way You know what's interesting is that the tortoise and the hare They agree the tortoise and the hare both want to win victory is good. They desire it They desire the same thing and agree on it So he's basically saying that tortoise and the hare is shit is what he's basically saying Here's a power tip for you that's vaguely related if you ever have conflict that feels melodramatic or even just not that Melodramatic don't call this melodramatic. Are you calling marriage story melodramatic this? I hope not Is he calling Troy melodramatic I don't know You said that with power. I'm not sure if he's just like Achilles powerful Just not that compelling There's a good chance the reason why is because there is nothing about their conflict that plays into the themes of the story You don't think there's anything about their conflict that plays into the themes of marriage story I I don't know. How do you not? I don't get it I don't understand this is we're coming up with the problem again Like how can I trust you as an advisor when you don't even know what the themes of certain stories are? In a in a in a video about themes for me, I don't know what am I supposed to do with this? I mean the most Charitable thing would just to be to assume that oh, I need a scene of melodrama People yelling marriage story and that he gave it no more thought than that. He didn't consider the implication Even a little bit to call it melodrama is already like oh, that's a big black mark And then also to say that oh the themes. I don't know what's going on. It doesn't have anything to do with anything It's the different uh, did you guys say you had him on your show? Yeah, one at a time Okay So he I was under the impression that he didn't have a body of work that he was just pulling all this out of his ass, but like it's is he like an accomplished Author written stories and he's got a lot of film analysis. I don't know Like obviously we on eFab don't require any kind of like he needs to have a PhD in flimflammery I'm just in fact it helps if you don't we've often discovered I mean this guy is a I guess this guy is a published writer and everything and this video's this video's pretty shit. So who knows Yeah, I mean whether he did or not it's fine. It's just I think you can frame all of this in a less sort of Our good way. Yeah. Yeah, you can frame it less incorrectly. Ah, yeah Right, you should make an asops fable about that. I might it will be called Your writing themes wrong you brought Oh He's specific. Ask a question Video titles one thing But then you have like points that are made that are highly contestable spelled out in front of you You know, it's like typed out letter by letter as if it's gospel like I don't know Does it really warrant this um superimposition? I don't know That plays into the themes of the story into the different ideologies the characters represent I'd argue the highest quality conflicts you can have in a story is when there's an Ideological cause to it people give out the advice all the time saying the highest quality conflict that but like conflict comes in so many forms So if he wants If he wants to make a position on like I if he's like, oh, I think that the highest quality conflicts are because of ideological things And then he explains why they'd be like, okay, I guess it's how you feel and that could be interesting But it you have to build that up. You can't just like say it, you know Do the two characters expressing differing ideologies is one thing But one thing that would elevate that is when it manifests in their actions throughout the story that we see You know The easiest one would be maybe the villain has an easier time of it because the hero has uh Like higher moral commitments that make his life more difficult But you need to show that like saying that the characters have an ideological opposition. It's like, okay That's that's a starting point But like it has to it has to play out throughout the whole story You can't just have the character state. I believe x and then villains like I believe y and then they fight Like that's not going to be that isn't that interesting um It's again execution is going to determine just how Interesting it is when the characters have an ideological clash though I do agree, you know, like having characters who actually disagree on things Is just uh, generally worthwhile, but when done well the idea that you can have Yeah, you can have you know a character two antagonists or a protagonist and an antagonist Who just don't like ideology has nothing to do with it. It just might be I mean like I said, they're they're too many testants in a Yeah, what's the ideology of the terminator? He doesn't have one. Yeah, he's a soldier for skynet so Or any sort of man against the elements sort of thing one sports team against another one competitor against the other What's the ideology of the thing compared to all of the humans in the thing? Someone wants to do the thing of like it's ideologies. It believes it should be able to absorb and consume everything. Yeah It's hence why it chose terminator It's like you you're not going to ascribe an ideology to it's it's a robot running on a program of kill this person It's it's as simple as that. It's also that's an ideology. It's like, yeah, that's just broken at this point You make something I don't like the ideology of the t-rex in Jurassic park. I mean Right. Yeah I don't like the idea of like quality of conflict I don't like that term because you can measure that in drastically different ways Yeah Is as a high quality conflict Just the amount that it makes each person on each side go ger at the other person Or is it like because they have such common ground but yet differ on some ideological point You know, I think we've maybe that's a high quality conflict Provided examples of very well-loved storytelling conflicts that don't even require an ideological aspect But now let's go the other direction of what's an ideological complete Disparity conflict that most people thought was like well like iron man and iron monger. It's there's a lot like they are Sold to us as completely diametrically opposed the companies at stake try to kill each other They're so different but they spawned from like a similar area and it's like how interesting is that and it's like Not very by the end. It's kind of uh awkward embarrassing a little bit I mean two people Interpreting a holy book differently is like they have the same ideology essentially and they're gonna be opposed to each other or Like there's a lot of different ways to take this and if he wants to say that he thinks that this is the highest quality thing Is like yeah, it's fine If you have that opinion and you could explain it could be interesting But if you don't frame it as like this is my opinion Then you're gonna have to probably work really hard to say like this is why this is the best You know the highest quality element of conflict that you can have or theme that you can have so I'm eager to hear what he has to say and I hope it isn't just a thing He is posited to just be the case with no justification I wouldn't want to highlight Batman begins too because uh the execution or the realization of their ideologies Batman's coming across as the one that can provoke a lot of questions in terms of execution But razzle ghoul's one is just stupid like the I'm gonna blow up gartham with water expansion. It's like no and so You know you like well What's interesting is they come from the same core, but they've developed and now Dwell the conflicts like the I'd say the better vision of this could be like a civil war where Iron man and cap agree on most things But now presents a situation where they absolutely do not and it's caused a schism now that'll destroy the avengers It's like oh shit That's interesting and they're not even diametrically opposed. You know, I mean I'm just thinking about a family guy bit where peter inadvertently creates an evil clone of himself called retep And he just has inverted clothes and a goatee. It's like I am retep and I Is that a high quality conflict? Like obviously it's just so stupid In characters need to want different things and oh god, they don't do that. No, they don't need to want different things True Dude competitors in a sports competition want identical things Yes The tortoise and the hare want the identical things. They want to win the race To be the rat. I mean rat racing. It's a mad mad mad mad world. They all want the same thing No, people want the ring How many people want the ring? Yes, to be to be pedantic wouldn't the tortoise want them to win and the hare want them to win Are those technically two different things? So at that point though If I said, you know, I want the whole world to be fed or something that someone else is like I want me to be fed. I guess we're entirely different It's like well, I never said it about whether or not I would want you to be happy too Like the it depends on how broad you want to go Let's see how he explains it then let's see if he uh, he accounts for the nuance of this subject Advice all the time saying characters need to want different things and it is good advice It's good if you do it But the issue is I've seen one or two people give out this advice in the context of theme And if you try to use mere want as the base for your theme that will fail that will that will fail That will fall flat. No No, no, obviously also, he's Also, he's using a picture from the showdown at the end of the good the bad and the ugly where all three characters want the same thing Well, I guess he's saying that that's all well and good, but it doesn't generate us a theme But like or it's key that means surely by definition. That means you cannot have a theme about greed Well, why don't we just go with all the rings again? It's like you have if you built lord of the rings with the start of being like I'm gonna have a character who desperately wants the ring The power or rather desperately wants the ring will do anything to get it Someone else wants the ring a lot, but won't like kill people for it Someone else is like stays away from the rings. They know what that means if they put it on Someone else who's like immune to any interest in the ring at all just doesn't care about it It's like, oh, shit. So what's the unifying part of all of these people wanting or whatever the If we take out the one that didn't want it to stay on Topic for this idea What what connects them all and you're like, well, it's too late. You've just defined what they want You can't make that key to a theme is like I can still generate a theme and it can be power I can then you know skew everyone so that they're interested in the power or that the ring corrupts the ring Sort of invites everyone through a notion of power and then thematically speaking You're a fucking you you can write whatever you want in terms of what that represents Or what you want it to answer in terms of a question or explore I don't know why we would say this is this is destined to fail Also, we can we can keep things Uh thematic to this video I mean two you could have a courtroom scene and both the defendant and the plaintiff, right They want to they both want like both those lawyers and everything both sides. They want justice You know like the lawyers do But and they you could have a case where each of you know, they believe that their side is right and they're fighting for justice so It's it's weird to say that yeah, I just don't know Yeah, when you see what they want we go in from how hungry they are or like a want for a notion of an abstract concept Or something more specific like winning in a sport. There's like It's so broad. So does my me and my my my uh my opponent. We both want to win It's competition Even in his example of like super high quality conflict where they have different ideological disagreements Like both sides want their side to win You know, they want to win the argument. They want their political system or whatever it may be You know, but you can still derive them from once You can still derive the theme the sort of clash between different world views from their wants Yeah, ideally you want to boil it down further but like when you're First deciding about a theme to write about desire is not a bad place to start I think as well what is not highlighted is you can write up all of these characters Then you can see at the end what theme is sort of arising out of it because of your writing Then you can go back and change it I've had a brain blast one of the examples he said is you know is does power necessarily corrupt? It's like what the fuck do you think that stems from it stems from a want for power So once is key to the theme of power corrupt surely if you're going to explore it That's what little platoon said right you like remove the concept of greed if if once aren't going to be coming into So like yeah, like I mean if you wanted to explore anything related to concepts of like property I mean, yeah, how are you going to explore that if if once isn't key to theme And and he said it would necessarily fail. How silly is that necessarily like completely destined to fail down it goes Okay, sure. Whatever you say, buddy A far better approach is to have your characters believe different things I mean I mean a belief may manifest in a once for the way that the world ought to be or the way that your life ought to be So I don't well. I feel like in most situations This actually doesn't change anything because a sports analogy team a I believe I want to win The other side I believe I want to win Though a belief is the acceptance of a proposition Yeah, well, that doesn't actually change anything and probably the majority of circumstances You've done very little You can put the word belief after the facts and get a good ideological conflict as a theme as well by saying I want x and believe y is the best way to go about getting it and another character says I want same thing But I believe that z is the best way to go about getting everything. Yes Or The reverse would be oh god, don't lose it Um That they that they believe the same thing or no, sorry that they God, I fucked it up. I lost it You have to believe in yourself believe in yourself That's gonna give you the inverse you have to want to remember Uh, this this by the way, like this feels like yet another video in the notch of you read writing books and didn't understand them or Like it whatever's happened. It's made it's made you actually like less capable of being an impressive writer Did we know you have been brainwashed in a sense and it's kind of uh, it's it's diminished your uh, your your spark Yeah, oh absolutely The the idea that belief is key to theme and had we removed belief and he said all right What is the key to theme? I think in our opening discussion We talked about how it's like well I guess you need to see what the story considers to be the good outcomes You need to see what the outcomes in general even are You need to obviously check what characters want need and have by the end versus what they did By the beginning and I feel like I've covered a lot, but I'm still like no It's probably a lot I haven't covered in terms of what can like divine How do you divine a theme out of out of the story so many elements so many different variables? The idea is like no it's belief I'm just like um Belief can be key to some themes Yeah, I would include it. Yeah. Yeah, but if the theme is uh, the pitfalls of ideology And you can say what belief is absolutely the key to unpacking that as a theme But if your theme is not got anything to do with belief Then belief applies much more strongly to character across all the bases than it does to theme across all bases Yeah, and there is an element to the you know the element of belief that everyone believes things It's just it's not even a thing that you you know decide what you believe So it's not really going to change much. You're just basically saying all those things that we had before Yeah, those are things the characters believe But but it was always that that was always the case Yeah, belief itself could be the theme of something You know people get locked in a you know a perception of the world and just yeah I mean it's about a conviction in like if I just had this thing Or if the world was just this way then this thing could happen Yeah, why do you believe it? You believe how did you get the knowledge to believe certain things? Yeah, epistemology and Why do you bring up piss all the time Just because I drink a lot of water. Okay When you do that it all clicks into place, especially when these beliefs are directly in Disregard everything that we've said. Sorry ladies and gentlemen. Just carry on. You made the word turn green. It's green now It just works. Yeah, he he chatted BTF odus with his green text ignore our discussion prior, please Compatible when this is the case Not only will their differing beliefs cause differing wants which is good because that causes or could their differing wants cause different beliefs Yeah, they're different beliefs will cause different wants What I feel like knowledge is that it's either downstream or upstream, but it's it's gonna be there So you've changed nothing wouldn't one define that um Defined golem by like his want for the ring has basically controlled his beliefs about the world Yeah Yeah, because you're what finds him. He is like the embodiment of just obsession with uh with this item I don't know which comes first a want or a belief Uh, I think it can go both ways. It can be both. Yeah, I think you go both ways too I believe that the bible is true. So I want these things I Want food so I believe I should eat food Or I believe that eating food will satisfy my hunger. Yeah, I feel like it does go both ways Because in a way both of those things are things you can't really change But you can affect your ability To believe certain things or to desire different things so Even though You don't yeah, even though you don't have complete and total control over the things you believe or the things you desire You can engage in conversations You could read books you can put yourself in positions where you will open up to new knowledge That will then change the things that you believe and want. Yeah, they're almost Yeah, this is a weird thing to say I wonder like if you sat down with him and you asked which comes first the one toward the belief I guess he'd just be like, well, obviously comes this way and then you want to Like press him on it. It's like really like Yeah Yeah Like I want to find the answer to the I want to find meaning in life So I picked up the bible and now, you know, I found meaning in my life because God and Jesus and all that is like so It can go both ways Very strange to just say that so um, I mean, maybe he'll elaborate on it here shortly So but it's saying but But like man to say it so confidently like that when like man, just stop and think Is that true? Can you say that so confidently? As our much needed conflict it will also render this fight a proxy for the different belief systems one can have So as they fight we're seeing both ideologies get tested as the story tries to answer Which is the superior one? It's funny he says this, uh, what about the times where Ideologies are fought against each other like in a broad sense for the story But the two individuals representing them have the opposite result in their combat like their actual You know like the person loses the fight, but that they win the war so to speak Well, I mean I was thinking with the luke one isn't this a bad example because Darth Vader won that fight But like in his ideology Is bad Yes, the film is Many I would say most when they portray two different ideologies most stories will be like yeah, this is the bad one Yeah, in fact, yeah, how does he square away like um in any film like how does he square away any of the deaths in saving part of it? Ryan, you know up until like barbie Barbie died so that's right. The orcs had a pointer, right? They're actually on the right side of history Yeah, you can get all kinds of results in terms of the difference between the ideological battle and the physical battle Yeah I don't know if the difference Go ahead. Oh damn now. Sorry. I oh wait People get antsy about spoilers because I don't think about red dead redemption I'm thinking about how like the Well, actually it'll be spoiler free on that one. Um that when characters die In terms of like a representation of ideology It presents both one where the death means kind of like the death of a way of life and an ideology But that another one actually means like kind of the it lives on In a way that's kind of like oh, it's a little bit pessimistic So yeah, there's plenty of examples of ways that like a character dying can represent a lot of different things in terms of its theme Yeah, it's kind of funny that he would put mad max fury road here because I feel like to the degree that there's an ideological difference between fury ossa and um, whatever his name is joe the big one joe Immortan joe, uh, it's very much Once driving things not belief necessarily because the morton joe just wants to control everything You know, I mean he it's not like a strong belief in the utility of like authoritarian. Yeah, like more joe's ideology What is it? It's like well? He wants to be in charge It's a want it's a want. Yeah If you can pull that off that is when conflict is that it's most engrossing Next if you can you want to assign Substances to your side characters You do not need to do this. It is not vital But it can help if you assign all of your characters a different stance on your theme all of which subtly different You will find each scene where these characters interact is suddenly oozing with juicy fun Well, no, that's dependent on your writing it depends. Well, it depends on their stances They could have you could have two side characters that agree But you what I'm also getting at is just like he's he's doing the thing again Where it's like see now that you've made it so everyone has a stance on it. It's like it's good Like well, no now we need to get into like Are you actually Explore character can have a stance that's contradictory to like their life and experiences and the things that they say You could have you just write a character with a shitty stance given the context I'm fine with you Why would you show the Lord of the Rings like Frodo and Sam don't have wildly different ideologies? Unless he's talking about by the time Frodo is corrupted by the ring or something Which is I don't know that feels like it doesn't capture the point. He's trying to make does it? Yeah, I don't really I'm not really sure there's a giant ideological distinction happening in Casablanca either There is I mean But it seems to be more like by the end it becomes a lot more close and resolved. Yeah at the beginning. Yeah Yeah, but like, you know Victor Lazlo is portrayed as like he's the good one He's the one who's you know has the good, you know the good fight in him and so he's who rick eventually, you know Yeah, uh, yeah, that one's closer. Yeah, but I that was actually you you would probably think of it better as The difference between Oh him and the police chief rick and the police chief They end up basically cooperating, but they are they have different like stances The chief is a lot more like he's in it for him And he wants to get you know, he wants to get his and he'll go along with things and he's if anything He's actually not really ideologically, you know motivated by a lot of stuff. He's a lot more pragmatic and selfish in a way Um and a lot of the times he'll just he'll avoid conflict if it works in his favor So but they still but he and rick still end up cooperating. I mean, it's the famous line This is the beginning of a beautiful friendship It's it's two people with different ideologies essentially in the moment working together and cooperating And a lot of it has to do with their personalities Like they have different ideologies, but they have personalities that allow them to mesh and they walk off into the fog roll credits Boom, one of the most famous lines in movie history I mean, you can have basically every result once you execute it well I'm flex because of their ideological Disagreements as a super quick example the matrix has several themes one of which being should you accept reality? Well, wait, what several things that's that shouldn't be doing that, right? Yeah, they fucked up. Yeah Yeah, several's too many several's too many we got one matrix You should have watched that shit down. I always knew matrix was shit. It was all those several themes If you didn't be there's like that's what they fucked up. It should have been the matrix not the matrix A matrix Accept reality no matter how dark it is This is shown by neo's choice between the two pills and we have pretty much all of the crew of the nebuchadnezzar believe That yes, it should be accepted with one notable exception that being the character So they failed we need more supporting characters with different points of view That's right. Everybody needs to disagree or at least they would have made the story better. So, yeah That is true if the matrix reloaded, but that's a worse film Well, what's what you can argue is they all have a different perspective on the nature of neo But they don't seem to have a different perspective necessarily on the nature of uh being brought out of the matrix, right? And that's one thing that the movie seems pretty I don't know almost didactic about you know what I mean? It's pretty From his perspective, I might I might agree with that wouldn't he call this happy-handed In how like obvious it makes the the lesson here You know, I mean that you should accept reality no matter how bleak rather than living in a like the comforting lie Well, yes cipher is a cowardly piece of shit who backs tabs everybody and dies horribly So it's yes and all the heroes make the correct decision So is that like a mature exploration of a theme for adults? I guess he agrees with it and that's another problem with theme is uh, You've got to check your own biases and check it against everyone else in the world You can't just decide like if I said working together is always the best thing ever And you could never do anything on your own. There's plenty of people be like, what do you mean? You could never do anything on your own. This is what are you talking about? I'd be like, oh, right? Like uh, I should I should probably you know, you can walk into things Instead of cooperating with the machines and betraying everyone maybe you should You know not do that Well, we work with them at the end of the third one. So there we go. We get a piece going How dare you have that reaction when the fourth one exists? That's the true There is a fourth one The second and third ones too. I understand me cap some people some people don't even like the first one That's not wrong. Ooh, we should organize him and theo to have an argument. It'll be great And that being the character cipher he believes Ignorance is bliss and this differing belief causes plenty of fun conflict through fun It's just funny to show that one tag again Also, he said that the more difficult it is to answer the question the better the theme is And this is an obvious one that the only person who would make that decision is a cowardly piece of shit Who murders everybody? Yep Could you also not make the case that cipher is that his belief is forming off the back of a want? Like he wants to be peaceful safe and well fed and his belief has formed off the back of that Which makes want the key to the and not believe. Yeah Oh my god It's also the fact that this is not even really the the main theme of the movie, but that's fine It's one of them, but it's not the big one Man This video, you know Throughout this film why why didn't I take the blue pill? Now there has been a flaw in all I've said so far Because I outline all my stories So for me planning for theme isn't terribly tricky But what if you're a pancer where you like to improvise your way through? Well as a pancer you should try to figure out what your thematic question is while you're writing draft one And if you why can't you do it before during or after is it impossible to do any of these? Yeah, why don't you just write a story? The people who don't do it with an outline the people who just jump in and go Yeah, fuck it at least as far as it comes to theme. Yeah, especially with how Naturally emergent themes can be and how subjective they could be You might be like, you know what I'm gonna write my book and then I like about the halfway mark I'll sit down and I'll really think about themes and I'll think about What's being set up by the characters their motivations their actions the goals The world and the plot and then I'll see maybe I need to work the theme more strongly now that I'm getting into the second Half of the book and where it's gonna lead and what I'm gonna say Like that seems like a totally valid way to write a story I just don't blame people for not focusing on theme ahead of time or even doing I just I I understand To write stories I understand and it's fine And but I you know, I would always advise them to consider and look into it because it's with while but like If they finish this story you gotta get the basics before you start getting into like themes I think It's gotta be right out there who say they don't give a shit about themes that have written really good stories Oh, it's gotta be like it was a that's kind of joking. But like if you write it themes will come I think that's there's a lot of truth to that Finished rough one still not knowing that's okay Just sit back and take a long look at your story to realize what thematic question is the most prominent What's funny about that is why is everything so woefully like just I agree with him, but I'd be like well redraft everything make sure you're checking out all of the things Pacing dialogue the construction of this world What you were trying to get from in terms of the arcs of the characters your themes, of course It's like all of it Why are we just like, you know, just take a look back and make sure your theme is is in line I guess in relevance to whether or not you're nailing your theme is for sure. But again As a lot of us is so narrow and I feel like the more important part even of constructing a theme is to nail it In the minutiae of everything that's happening in your story Remember that a story where a character learns any kind of lesson is a story that inherently has a theme if you're Inherently has a theme do things in Inherently has a theme as complicated That is that's that's a complicated question that I almost feel like we should skip and reframe This there's a story Yes, I think oh my I think it can It could be confused and muddled and even contradictory, but like Those that aspect of the story emerges almost always I would say Yeah, it's like saying kind of Can a story inherently have Han Solo is like yeah, there's a character named Han Solo This story is inherently it has Han Solo in it I think I mean we all pretty much agree that uh It's almost impossible to have a story from start middle to finish that doesn't have something can be drawn out of it thematically One of the big Key driving factors is where the story seems to sit in terms of what the right thing in the world was Whether it be through events or characters so like I guess my confusion was almost like I wonder if it even requires a lesson For a character as opposed to just showing us events and then having a tone for whether or not they were Good events or bad events. Well, that would be the difference again set out right at the beginning between like your theme as the author And the theme which is the takeaway from the by the audience I think the audience will always take away a theme that aspect of themes is inherently in the thing Whether your theme is ever in the thing because you delivered it incompetently or you never realized it while you were writing it I don't think it inherently has to have your idealized theme in it But there is always going to be a theme just because that's the natural way we read stories like you were saying like Does the world seem to confer morality on one set of decisions or another? Or do certain characters meet and ends that could be you know deemed deserved because they've done bad things That's always going to come out of any story in which decisions are made So yes, there is an inherent theme, but it's not necessarily the authorial intended one People will be naturally inclined to extract a singular thing over From a sequence of many things. I wonder if like in the case of movies scenes Right. So and that as in as far as that I agree theme is sort of inherent to Part of a way to help it be understood maybe is the as long as you have Characters doing things there is characterization Right, like some people maybe an author would be like well, I didn't intend for that characterization It's like yeah, but it's there When you have them run away when someone needs help that's characterization You're like no, they're just trying to get out of there. You're like no That means that they put themselves over that person. That's a characterization Yeah, it's not just what they do. It's what they don't do If a theme is a uniting idea then any story that feels like one thing instead of like a random Like mix of things that totally disparate elements that have nothing to do with each other If they have anything to do with each other there's probably a theme in that Learns any kind of lesson is a story that inherently has a theme if your protagonist undergoes change Look there for the fragments of your theme once you've real you can't have a theme with static characters I think you just said that's an option for finding your theme is in character ox Entirely wrong, but like I said you can draw it from I feel like pretty much everything in the story almost What is the theme posed as a question of the first star wars movie? Do you mean star wars episode four a new hope? Yes. Okay. What is your responsibility to reject oppression? Will you also family? Yeah, it makes it so powerful. Um, yeah, it's like yeah, the willy it Probably mostly fairly basic stuff, you know, like You know trying to you know fight back against Oppression and being heroic and well that could even be the thing is the question is that are you a hero? Because most of the the moral content of star wars is carried in by way of assumptions It's not making an argument about the rights and the wrongs of resisting An empire because those things are sort of baked in as the good thing to do Um, and it holds so closely to every step of the hero's journey that the thematic question is really just is luka hero Are you a hero? That's too broad you gotta make it more specific for me I just if you have laia luke and haan they're all from different backgrounds and they all have different levels of approach to Opposing the empire like certain questions on answer. I feel like laia is the most cleanest like yes Everything I do is to destroy the empire haanz is like i'm doing it for myself, but at the end realizes the Better alternative and then luke goes from x to y in terms of learning like I need to be the person who does oppose the empire in the most effective way Like they just feel like there's a lot of journeys that would match it But that there's a lot more going on in star wars and I don't think that they Are particularly heavy about it. I think that that is one of the stories that a lot of people would watch and be like I don't know what the theme was. I was just having fun. I really enjoyed it Does death star is bad? No, we like death star Realize this question I like the way you put it mauler because like You know that first act break where like his parents are dead and he's on tattooing and it's just like well now What the fuck do I do? Like do I just sit here? Or am I driven by revenge? or You know just for the death of my parents or is this about You know Eliminating this giant Evil force that's sort of taken over the The universe slowly Like got to do something about that like what is it exactly that's driving him or and doesn't even matter You know as long as it results in him blowing up the death star um Yeah, I don't know Your theme once you've realized this question revives for that theme cutting out all of the fat Unrelated to it and adding in new scenes and characters that further explore it providing fresh stances on the theme That didn't exist in draft one Okay, well if you did that with the matrix and let's say you took the whole idea of whether you should live in the cold Hard reality of the truth or the comforting lie and you got rid of everything that didn't have to do with that You would lose the main theme of the movie And if you did the opposite if you took the main theme of the movie and you just got rid of everything That didn't have to do with that you'd be cutting out so much of the film Like I I don't think he's accounting for movies that have Main themes sub themes or like multiple themes at the same time His advice seems to be well if you have too many themes you got to just pick one And then you're just throwing out so many good movies I don't understand it. It's really based on how you will personally categorize everything too, right? Like it's What what if you said like there's four themes going on in the matrix and several characters relate to them And someone else says well, no, there's just the one and they all relate to it Like oh now we're where they yeah, we're different themes intersect and And characters that have it on several themes rather than one Yeah, because because I think the one sort of I guess Thing to recall is themes don't necessarily have rigid borders They're very fuzzy on the edges and many themes can sort of converge in the same point. So that's true I do think in the case of the matrix the whole idea of whether you should Live in the bliss of like a comforting lie or the the truth of like, you know Reality as ugly as and are you willing to accept uncomfortable truths? Yeah, that is kind of a bit distinct from the old the other idea about like destiny and fate and all that sort of stuff which Preoccupies the rest of the movie or most of the movie like those They're kind of related there. They all fit the story, but you know I don't I don't think they're one thing. I think they're a couple different things and I think it's a Good movie. So like if you just streamlined it, you'd be cutting out a lot of good stuff Everyone needs to be thinking of theme at some point in the process Look, there are no exceptions to this like There are no exceptions To what end if you're talking about making a good story. I don't believe that actually Yeah, I think you can absolutely make a good story Without considering theme. You could just say you know what necessarily the advisable thing, but you're not necessarily advisable Yeah, but you could totally just be like, you know what? I'm really good at writing plots and characters and world building And you know, I'm just gonna write a good story and the themes whatever they are, you know, that's all right, man Yeah, it's just whatever they want to be if you have a game Um, you know like a reservoir dog style story but in an alien world and someone says so what are the What are the politics of this world and they're just like, I don't care. I've never thought about it and never will and it's like I guess you can do that. Yeah In the same way, there's a lot of things you cannot think about it's just the Like I said the advisable part You can create really good stories when focusing and ignoring portions of storytelling that most writers would tell you not to ignore at all not impossible And I just at this point we're dealing with the comfort level of writers like some writers be like I've just I just don't like writing from a point of view of themes or willed or Some people are like, I hate characters the writer that hates characters. I only talk. I already write in terms of world events Misanthropic depressed, man. It's a story. It's all the characters No, it's funny that you mentioned reservoir dogs So I just watched that last night and like you could I could totally see a movie like reservoir dogs being written without much if any attention being paid to Theme like you could just start off by saying, okay A heist or not a heist but like a robber. I guess heist. I don't know. It's like a they're robbing jewels and it went wrong One guy figures that somebody sold them out because the cops are waiting right outside suspiciously and it's like What do you do with that? How do the characters sort of behave from then on out and then it's like whatever the ending Whatever the ending sort of manifests itself as I guess that's my theme, right? But then at the same time it's like I look at the ending of reservoir dogs and it's just like, oh, okay so it's like No honor among thieves crime. Does it pay that sort of thing like You sort of live this life and everybody just ends up shooting each other like Yeah, um, I don't know what exactly to draw from it But I just really like the ending of that and I can totally see That movie being written without much attention being paid to theme just the plotting of it I'm not convinced that David Lynch has ever like actively thought about the themes of any movie. He's ever made like explicitly He's he's like an all feels vibes guy and sometimes it works Not all of his movies are great, but like blue velvet's a great movie. I would never imagine David David Lynch sitting down to be like, oh this theme is about You know I ain't gonna tell you what my fucking movie is about or whatever like that's his Yeah, that's a famous. Yeah moment from him. He's talking about eraser head. He's like Sorry, my dog's barking in the background. Uh, he says eraser head is my most spiritual film He's like, can you elaborate that and he says no No Right None like like if you do not want to use this specific technique of thinking of theme was a question That's okay. There are what I thought that was the No, but you just said like that's like you the thing of this whole experience the title is your writing theme is wrong That's the theme of this video Maybe he's going to provide us alternatives. Come on a lot of stories out there Which are great stories that don't use this technique But it but you've got to be applying like some he's acting like He's acting like every film that uses its theme as a question Just doesn't have a rewording of it. That's a statement Or vice versa. Yeah, they'll do like that's just that's just that's how language works. There are multiple ways to express the same thought Technique thinking of another family guy bit where he's on jeopardy. He's like diarrhea. Oh, oh, sorry. What is dire? You've got to be applying like some technique here Like if I asked you right now What is your technique for tackling themes as you write and you can't immediately rattle off your reply as to how you approach themes Which other than just oh, I wing it like that is not good enough like I can practically I think you I think he'd be shocked at how many Famous and acclaimed writers don't have like a systemized approach to themes Would the criticism apply to all of it though? If you said I wing it to anything in terms of writing with none Yeah, I wing it. It just I just I just the story writes itself. It's intuitive. You know, I just do it Yeah, but would you not want to advise like don't wing it when it comes to wheel building don't wing it when it comes to plot Right, I don't bring it and it comes to character values don't wing it when it comes to thematic through lines You know like oh, yeah, you can say that Definitely though. He seems to be like if you can't tell me immediately what your system is Yeah, yeah Let's think what system to write a character someone might be like I guess I have all kinds of ways to write a character I'm not entirely sure and he's like wow. What's wrong with you? My brain. Yeah, my brain doesn't necessarily work in terms of systems when it comes up with these things If I'm sitting around and I want to write something or if I'm just entertaining a daydream for whatever reason I don't think about what's the what's the system if I want to if my buddies want to play dungeons and dragons I don't think I don't have a system for making a character. I'm just like well, I just Oh, la di da. I'm just gonna think of things. You know, what could they be? They could be this they could be that like It's not a system. It doesn't have to be a system It could be a lot of writers can pull this stuff off without necessarily You know appealing to their big book of how to do a thing This reminds me of the the the whole thing about where do you get your jokes from? Yeah What's your system for writing jokes? It's like, I don't I don't have one I just think of for I just think about funny stuff Yeah, if I said I think of characters and he's like, yeah, but how you're like Just people well, I just like take templates based off people I know or fictional characters and I think about what to change and then I think about Well, that you like sometimes I don't sometimes it's just a blank slate and I throw stuff at it I don't know. Yeah, sometimes I think about the plot in the world I want to create and then I put all the characters into that You know That world and that plot that I've created and I think well How would the world affect the things that they would think and what they're willing to do and What they'd stop at to get what they would want and then it just sort of happens and it's all this Self-collaborative process remember the dice Last thing I wrote privately it was I think the theme probably emerged Just before the third act Whereas I'd been writing all the time and it's just characters on a journey interacting as characters do to get from point a to point b And there were basic like things that were starting to emerge as I was writing it Not systematically saying this is the theme of this scene But like there were certain bits that were clearly coming through which I could kind of say You could say that's thematic, I guess But it wasn't until I got to the point because I wanted to have one of those scenes Where you have effectively the conflict divisions between the protagonist and the nominal antagonist just laying out Not adversarily like in terms of fighting each other But just laying out to each other where they stand because they don't necessarily know at this point that they are Irrevocably going to hate each other and I got to that point And I suddenly realized you know what the protagonist who I've always known is completely naive and young and doesn't really know What's going on but seems morally right Is actually incredibly naive and probably not morally right because he hasn't taken account of everything The villain is I say the villain is actually got a much more compelling and convincing case Even though he's doing things which are morally wrong So the theme which emerges basically at the end of the entire story is There are no real solutions to this problem There are just trade-offs and one of them is more aware of this than the other But that that is a thematic message It's just I didn't sit down before I started writing and say this is how I'm going to arrive at this theme and this is how I'm going to set the theme out It's just that is the emergent theme. That's what happens when you have fully at least I hope fleshed out characters sitting around doing what they do and interacting with each other naturally And then you learn all of a sudden what the moral of the tale happens to be Which can be that there is no moral to the tale at all There's so many different ways the dice I mentioned earlier right of discovering a theme through just having words You throw dice and you go that's it. We're working with that everybody as a challenge I could just picture him being like that sounds like you wiggled it. I'd be like yep Yep Well, you're not supposed to Yeah, I don't know if you know if you're sitting down and you're writing and you're good at writing characters and you're good at writing plots I don't know how it's possible that at the end you're just like, oh, there's there's nothing thematic about this There are no themes to this story that I've written Yeah, you could have wiggled it in the sense of I'm sensing this we'll throw that in there In fact, I won't even change anything people will get it Exactly like oh, I've written this story out and it's just by nature of it being a well written story There are just things you pull from its consistencies and its pathways I find it frustrating when anybody tries to prescribe one way of doing it because one of the way one of the things I've learned about Writing is just everybody works differently and everyone has their own little weird rituals And ways of thinking that you can't just nail it down to one process and part of my Time spent educating myself on screenwriting. I got this series of dvds Uh, there's Mike DeLuca. He's like this guy. I think he's he was an executive at New Line Cinema I can't remember what he's doing now, but he was interviewing all these screenwriters And uh, they all have these weird little rituals the one is like I gotta sit in the bath and smoke a cigarette and like Or I don't do outlines or I have to do an outline every time One that stuck out to me was Jim Ulls. He's screenwriter who wrote Fight Club And um, he just Went into the straight into the screenplay and just started writing scene by scene based on what sounded right to him at the time Like no outline Yeah, you could argue he had the novel that by Chuck Palinick at whatever his name is uh to work off of But I don't know how well that novel directly Can be adapted to a screenplay like a film form But like even if it was easily adaptable, I would have done an outline anyway It's just because I find that step of the process so helpful But there's people like him who are just like no fuck that. I'm just gonna do the screenplay write what sounds right I don't even think he did many if any additional drafts like he I think he might have just turned in his like His initial draft of the screenplay and it's just like here it is and they probably just more or less shot that Um, but like yeah, everybody has their own process You know so everybody's mind works differently very differently It would be easier though in the case of like an adaptation like that wouldn't it because what you're trying to do is to Find the most concise and efficient way of putting on film The theme that someone has already put into the book and so that that's an act of like editorial judgment and abridgment when you're Sorry to say like what is the is you don't have like thousands of pages in which to do this like you would in in the book of Fight club or dune or lord of the rings that you are aware that what makes that thing what it is is largely the thematic element to it So it's really just a case of how do I transpose that from one medium to the other and you don't necessarily have to Unless you're doing like a complete reimagining you don't have to sit there thinking I wonder what the theme of this story I'm writing is because Which is another way to do it Right you guarantee you you are not writing at a professional level if you don't have a proper answer to that question Where does that even mean professional level? I don't care. I think ryan johnson was writing at a professional level Well, I was kind of gatekeeping gatekeeping, isn't it? You need to do it this way or else you'll never be writing at a professional level and you'll just be a loser Writer who's going to be stinky forever. You'll write ace up's fables in the dirt with your children So like I said, if what if frank herbert never found that 21st publisher who's like, yeah We'll give this a shot Then he'd just be a failure right that we'd never know about maybe I kind of know what his history was But you know what i'm talking about Oh, you mean the the logical conclusion to this video has to be that he has since had a manuscript accepted and published by penguin Though because otherwise he's also not. Yeah, this must be otherwise. What the hell is he talking about? That's what I was saying that they should that narrative he should be like I did eventually get it accepted And here's what I changed that would be a way better video by the way It would be Yeah to illustrate why this isn't all gobbledygook Let me give you a few examples from pop culture that have taken exactly this approach to theme Oh, here we go. Shawshank redemption the theme of this all right can hope survive in even the darkest situation to explore this That is a theme Not the theme Assume you What would you point to is the theme and uh, sure shank um If it isn't I I don't know what I'd point to Yeah Uh, I think it's basically best encapsulated by the lion and he says to red get busy living or get busy dying That's like the point of the the the film to like sort of like That that you only have like two choices Which is to like embrace life to the best of your ability or you're just going to be whittling away Until you you know wither away into nothing and that you have to like aggressively Pursue what it is that you find valuable in life Yeah, don't I mean you could do stuff like don't become entrapped by the systems around you or become complacent Uh within them Uh, there could be how I mean, well, you could do the whole power corrupt thing, right? Like the warden is particularly corrupted and uh and uh clancy browns character as well the God that they kind of like thrive on uh having lauding authority over people and once that power is taken away Then what happens to him, you know look at him now It's a the hope the hope thing is definitely one of the big ones, but it's not the only one It's definitely the the approach though because like he's inferring from this that the approach He's advocating was taken in the writing of this film, which is why it works But that he has no idea what the thought process was because you can just take the statement on the screen right now And turn it into hope survives even in the darkest situation full stop And that was their approach to writing theme and that gave the shawshank redemption in which case Yeah, it's kind of irrelevant. Yeah, or maybe his approach was cocaine because it was steven king Um, so also, yeah if I hope this segment contains a lot of things like interviews And Like memoirs of the people who wrote them so that we can get into their mind And they could tell us what their process is because if you don't This is all just this is all conjecture Situation to explore this question they throw andy into an exceedingly dark place a prison for a crime He didn't commit again and again He is beaten down and we watch him struggle with not losing hope entirely We have rays of hope like when they drink beer on the rooftop when andy finds purpose by giving a man an education So we can get a job when he gets out or when that very man turns out to know Who actually killed andy's wife offering a glimpse at being proven innocent only for that kindling hope to be promptly snuffed out We have characters with distinct stances on the theme We have brooks a man who was succumbed to the darkness all possible hope having left him so much So even after he gets his freedom, it's too late as he chooses to end it all He represents where andy will be one day if he carries on the way he is Raising I don't I don't know if it's a matter of like a lack of hope but because it's it's you know The whole terrible thing to live in fear Thing it's it's that when you've spent so long Like, you know, you've spent so long in prison that the Like the freedom of life is is like it's not just dizzying. It's like terrifying You're on your own now move through. I don't I don't know if I'd say that's hopelessness. That's more so like um It it feels to me like it is that kind of you know, embrace the the Embrace life fully or um or with or or you know, you're gonna wither away Yeah, don't uh, but he was who I was thinking when I was you know, saying what I thought the theme was and it was different than What he's saying is so it just I guess it just goes to show that the problem is where We're sort of mixing wires on hope Because with andy different it's like the hope of getting out whereas with brooks. It's like very different I mean he gets out right it's like, oh well It's not a matter of he had the hope of getting out and now he's got out It's it's like he got out and he doesn't know what to do um, because it's the same thing that uh, that uh Red has as well, but then it's like through friendship Is what uh pulls him through rather than like hope for a better tomorrow It's it's friendship that he's you know, he made a promise to a friend And that's what keeps him going and then he adds on down to good ol ze wata naho to hang out with uh, andy God, I love the ending on that movie I you've already mentioned you've already mentioned family guy. There's a good joke at the Oh, yes, you're a revenue diver in town shit You being obtuse All right, you know three months in the hole or am I being obtuse nope now you're beating cute Awesome good jokes That one had a bit of a groundskeeper willy kind of like running gag of joe kept getting his legs are broken You know like how grounds keep well it kept getting hit in the axe. He kept getting his legs broke I think it was uh, what was it? Oh, damn. What was the first one? Without the kids go on the uh, damn I can't remember what the name of where his legs got run over by a train Stand by me. Yeah, that's the one and then Misery it's that stewie shoots his legs. He's like Thanks towards the end we have our dark night of the soul where andy seems to have been ideologically defeated Well, wait, that's no, but that's that's him out of it Like he's that's him past the point of the dark night of the soul. This is him being resolute He this is him being correct All right, he's about to escape He says before we learn he's acquired a rope we fear the worst fear not just that he's going to end up like brooks But also that the theme is going to end on a decidedly dark note saying that hope Cannot survive in the darkness But everyone is shocked when he makes an escape instead and the film says quite conclusively Yes, hope can survive no matter how dark the situation and it's incredibly cathartic when this happens The film says you can wallow all you like and stay in that darkness forever letting it consume you Or you can choose to fight your way onwards to something What i'm sitting here wondering is uh What is any of this how does any of this support what he said like throughout this video? He's just describing a great film. How does yeah, i'm i'm kind of at a bit of a loss. He is sort of just I think actually say the next wrong thing It contradicts itself doesn't it because i was thinking back to the the three sort of sub elements of theme when he said Yeah, you know do all the way with two of them and just keep the one And i'm pretty sure sure shank has at least three going for it And if you'd actually taken the approach that he sets out earlier And we'd have had to get rid of large parts of this film to make it tighter and therefore worse So the approach for the video is wrong Yeah, if we're seeing clips of stuff I feel it should be like behind the scenes writing stuff where it's just like well This is what I was this is what I was thinking when I came up with this scene or this idea for I started thinking about my themes in terms of questions Isn't that long Because we have no idea what the process was of these authors unless he actually presents Like evidence that that's what they were thinking instead of just saying wow this movie's good. They must have used my idea Right. I know it's silly Also, this is a good still for what we're doing Cruel three pipe filled with shit in all that together, but once you do How you know the things to me that's most scary about that is imagine getting stuck Not just like the smell but just oh shit. Well, I'm stuck Damn rip me Filled with shit in order to get there But once you do how Andy feels as he reaches towards the sky is exactly how you'll feel once you've reached that better place I have heard quite a few people say that the shawshack redemption has helped them with their depression The core of andy's struggle the question can hope survive in one's darkest times is something those who struggle with depression Ask constantly so for these people this move. Thanks to our sponsor better help I'm wondering how any of this supports any of the very strong claims he's made about how you ought to write Because all he's doing is describing the movie Yeah, he's describing the movie Not describing it accurately like he's doing a fairly good job of just you know breaking down this film But like how does this support? The reason he's describing the film is because he said yeah I'm right and look at shawshank redemption and i'm waiting for him to tie these points together or else We're just wasting time Yeah, the movie really strikes a chord And and also this is oh, I'm just now interested in that You know how he said like the hero in the village should be ideologically opposed Is it's his perspective that the warden is like hope does not survive in the darkest place? That's my that's my belief. That's my water. I eat hope for breakfast You ain't hoping how you're andy. Whenever I see a woman named hope I beat her Maybe the best of things And no good thing ever dies If that's not enough for you, let's do some rapping. Oh, okay. What do you mean enough to write a movie? You you specifically said in order to In order to show why this method of writing is so good I'm gonna tell you about this movie and he just told us about the movie And we have no idea if the makers of that movie used his process He just said this is a great movie. They must have used my process Yeah, wow, maybe friend Darabont got a book rejected by pengwin Pitfire examples Juno is abortion wrong. Sorry. I'm I'm still stuck on like it's why Wait, what we about to do one question per film somehow proves his point I maybe that's Yeah, are we gonna do but do bleed red bleed red doesn't ask one question All you need to do anyway is when he says can hope survive in the darkest place You just say I think you said it before platoon just say hope can survive in the darkest of places It's like you can easily turn a question into a statement of fact, but you know from the perspective of the film You can do this any other fucking good movie where you retroactively decide like oh, they must have just thought of it as a question To the theme. Yeah now I need to give me so good Examples of films that do not do it For you, let's do some rapid fire examples. Juno is abortion wrong blade runner. Can a robot be human? Oh What is a human would be the number one, right? Yeah I would say so if you had to boil it down to a question. What does it mean to be a human? But like blade runners asking all kinds of questions throughout The moral nature of every action that's been taken by all the different actors of this this universe Like why why did you do that? It's so gross. Stop it. Put it down. Yeah. What is it like to be human? What is it like? What is it? What's it like? What is what? What is it nice? Is it nice? Is this owl real? All right Because of course, yeah, they can but that's not the question that the movie is trying to answer It's so much more happening in this film Yeah, because nemo isn't Haptured because his father was overprotective, right? Kind of he drove him away Yeah, it's kind of it's kind of like an idea of moderation that there's like a healthy middle ground between Protecting your kid but allowing them to explore the world on their own in terms to some extent Yeah, see whatever His own shit through nemo's decisions, right, especially in the third act Like this The point that you have the absolute inversion at the beginning of the film nemo is like, all right Time for school. Let's go and then you know by the end of the film. I was like, all right, get up time for school Um and you know waving him off as he goes on his adventure rather than being but but it's Yeah, I don't like I don't like these reductive. It annoys me because like don't do this Don't be this reductive about fighting nemo. The theme of finding nemo is fish or friends not food. That's right Me like a huge Like it's not can a parent to be overprotective because like yeah, they can Like the the the story is about facing your fears primarily Like, you know, like the one the reason he wants to cling so tightly to nemo's because he's afraid for him He's afraid of the world and then that drives him away And then he has to go on an adventure and he has to face all his fears about the world And then he has to face his ultimate fear of just letting nemo Trusting Yeah, yeah That's his real ultimate fear that he'll have to like let him go out into the world You know, like that's what it's about But then he can do with a smile on his face The protector because he loses all the eggs in the beginning, right? So then it's oh, yeah I cannot lose nemo like exactly but then realizing that in being too overprotective He kind of makes it, you know more of a possibility that he will lose Obviously the more I guess grounded less dramatic one would be alienation But then in the you know, I'm finding nemo. So he actually gets taken Yeah, I think the theme of finding nemo is don't coddle the disabled Before we let him say the one for toy story. What are your uh, what are your takes on this before he's gonna say Predictions or the actual theme? Do both if you want anyone So just toy story one, I presume that we're just focusing on toy story one Yeah, like his point is probably going to be related to like being uh replaced or the nature of getting uh becoming Which again feels like missing the point Well, there's there's so much that the film is about again Like none of these films. I don't think I've ever struck by a film. I consider pretty damn great I don't think like oh, it's just about the one thing. It's like no never usually is Yeah, even even in talking about how focused a lot of the uh classic golden age Pixar films are It's usually never just about one thing. There'll be like smaller elements of it What do you You do when your identity the very way you find meaning in life is undermined for woody andy's favorite toy This question is presented when buzz comes along Replaces him and gives him an existential crisis when he realizes he is no longer andy's favorite And what do you think like identity do you think that's addressed specifically with syd? Or do you think maybe there's a lot of other things going on with that exactly And you know like what is the purpose What's the purpose of a toy, you know, what what is that? That feels like something that gets more strongly explored in Toy Story 2, but Certainly there in Toy Story 1 as well Toy you can even go back and apply this to the classics Romeo and Juliet has the question can love conquer all as its theme Can love conquer all I guess because of the difficulties between the families But I don't know the I would phrase it that way but fine, you know in terms of I don't want to get into Especially choosing this visual. I don't know how many people here have seen this interpretation of Romeo and Juliet, but it's the The Yeah, as learning when the guns have the names of the swords, right? It's a wacky film Wacky wacky wacky. So I even think Baz would be like how fucking dare you summarize my movies till just My movie is about gaudy visuals. He would probably say like I have a thousand themes A thousand themes before I left this movie die I'm half convinced that Shakespeare saw a few sappy romances about love conquering all where everything ended all happily ever after and he thought to himself Does it though like does love really conquer all What about teenagers high on hormones, you know to love can turn them into blithering idiots when they start to feel it and Oh There's a play in that I guess but it's Shakespeare's play of course ending in disaster when both lovers kill themselves immediately upon thinking the other was dead When if they just been a little more level headed both of them would have lived and been perfectly fine saying quite conclusively Nope, love can absolutely cause tragedy. Love for a fact does not conquer all This proves that hey if you have a thematic, that's true Hitler loved Germany and he did not conquer all I don't know what to make of this like The comparison of hope would be this one and shawshank redemption being like You know you what? I don't know. Just just what is I thought he said the correct one was the more nuanced, right? Like that's the always the better one But like these Also the simpler the better But yes, right. He said that a lot of it is answer, but he's answered these pretty effortlessly it seems He said the best up the highest quality conflicts come from a difference in ideology Yeah, that's right. He did We should be writing these down or else we'll never He didn't even tell us who the antagonist of robert juliet was and they don't believe in love Who is the actual antagonist of finding Nemo, you know, who would be pointed to as the singular bad guy and finding man Yes, man, who I guess the ideology in a position to mollard is They're not overbearing. They let all their kids run around do whatever they want like that girl who has the braces Yes, all the fish she Check question You can absolutely declare one side of the debate the winner in the end You've just got to do what any good student in a maths exam would and show you're working I What do you mean though because like that only addresses haven't shown any of the working You could easily have shown my working for love does conquer all if I wanted to He's showing the answers. He's not showing the workings Showing the work is like all the behind the scenes and the interviews and people explaining their process He's not showing the work. He's showing the answer his approach is putting on the maths paper like gravity is good question mark and that's Yeah, there are no workings going on there. There's no equations I don't understand why gravity works from applying this approach to maths at all Well, I just don't get like we want maximum nuance remember every perspective have them all clash and then have an answer Until you hear love does not conquer all what if I had said it does And I'd shown that it did Do I do I still win Or do I need to show that it actually doesn't throw the stories and supporting characters Or that it's 50 50. Well, definitely not 50 50. He doesn't like endings that don't have a definitive answer, right? One of the one of the ideologies has to lose Or win right he did say something like that. Yeah I find it pretty hilarious that Romeo and Juliet is an anti-romance It's setting up to belittle what most romances are Is it an anti-romance or why how come it's a tragedy. It's not about yeah, it's a tragedy So if you ask yourself like well, wait a second, let's do let's go to the maybe maybe let's get to the second Level of you know media literacy got forbid. Why did Romeo and Juliet? Why were they Why why were they star cross lovers? It's because the the montajews and the capulets hated each other these feuds these feuds that you have with other people cause Intergenerational problems the next generation That that that is after you they're going to inherit all of the problems That you have created and that may be you inherited from the people before you the feud between these two families It just gets carried down to the next person carried down to the next person Carried down to the next person and it potentially never ends because you can't resolve your issues And you know and let go of your hatred. It's not that love was the issue You know the monajews and the capulets were able to Like I guess love each other right and not have this hatred for one another then Romeo and Juliet They wouldn't have you know, they wouldn't have ended, you know tragically There's all under a mistake too. Like I don't know why we would see that as definitive evidence to love will fail or something It's like, why would you why would you assume the story's position is that? Or that it's making fun of romance Also every he's a writer and he's very good. I don't know. Don't are you supposed to like isn't studying Shakespeare one of the basic high school slash Uh like elementary school things that you do Here is this old play that's really fucking good and we're still talking about it after 7 000 years So we should probably look into why we still you know, this is a classic tale That's been done and redone many many times and you learn about it And instead he doesn't get it right. It's like not knowing how to do like a division If if you're purporting to be a mathematician on youtube It's worth mentioning definitely at the high school level. It's a little above the elementary level I think that a lot of the language is going to be hard to grasp Pretty much every Shakespeare comedy ends in marriage and like love winning in the end What should do about nothing? They all ended marriages like that. Yeah, a lot of he isn't just right tragedies. Yeah Out to say that love is infallible and always wonderful and somehow in spite of that or perhaps because of it It became the most famous romance ever told So it's not an anti-romance then is it? But also you have the additional part at the end of Romeo and Julia, which is that their Accidental sacrifice the thing that makes it tragic is also the thing that leads to the rapprochement between the capulets and the um The monster right like yeah, there will be no more Romeo and Juliet's in future because they've seen this tragic example of what hatred breeds and Arguably then you've said love wins just not directly And remember it wasn't just Romeo and Juliet who perished there was um What was his name tibble? He gets fucking killed does marcusio die as well So it's not like uh, I'm glad I could remember these names But I like I don't like they're not even the only tragedies of it But yeah, you are right. Their death is what gets the two families to be like man We're fucked up We're all here stabbing people Why recently but people As being the weakest movie Christopher Nolan's ever made It's fair stellar, but it's a fair choice. I don't mind people pick no, it's It makes sense too because of how much it fucks up a lot of what people believe to be the strengths of the Nolan trilogy, right? But in and of itself it's already a bit of a clown movie But I've never heard a compelling argument about why that film fell so flat as Really? Never not a single one really not one. I haven't seen it and I've heard compelling reasons It's a disaster. I don't the the question I would have is like where do you want to start for compliments? We'll go from there. I guess Especially compared to the dark night that came up before it which is arguably the best superhero movie of all time Not even close What do you think the best movie superhero movie of all time is rex? Oh That is a tough question not counting batman and robin um That's the obvious answer. That's the obvious answer, but yeah, that's right at the top We don't like to be generic for the sake of argument. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. I I know it's it's Who what would the best one be? Would it be Super hero movie I haven't seen that is Joker is that does that count it could be up there The best I think it would count for comic book movie. I don't know if it counts for superhero movie. Yeah, that's the thing I don't know Like one of the the the rhymy spider-man films or the old x-men films would they come close ish? I haven't seen them in so long. No, that's the thing Because when I think about when if someone's like rex as they often do rex, maybe a good superhero movie I'll be like artians of the galaxy um Captain america civil war the avengers iron man, um iron man um, let me see We can depart from the mcu into ones that are a bit less typical I do really like the first, uh x-men movie Hmm. I don't know if it's one of the best. I I can't remember exactly how well it holds together But I like x-men 2 as well. I thought those were both quite good I think it's the generally regarded as the strongest of that trilogy the second one, right? I think so too. Yeah, I can't remember. It's been ages since I the last time I watched these movies There was an fx logo in the bottom right corner. So it's just been ages I mean, I would say that batman What is the batman movie with uh denny de vito and I mean returns because it's it's difficult for me to keep the name straight a lot of times But batman returns. I thought that was I like unironically think that that's actually really quite good Yes, great I would probably say it's the best Batman movie that I've seen It's my favorite so Other than batman a robin, of course as we said we put that to the side, but um Yeah I think those are strong contenders for being good, but yeah, that that would be an interesting thing to think about What is the best superhero movie? Uh, yeah Okay, what would you always be freaky? Uh, the best superhero film damn I don't know. I'm not sure I feel like I'm oscillating between a few. Um, I feel like yeah batman returns really up there iron man adventures Uh, of course, I really like spider-man homecoming Um, and I wouldn't count joker in the mix except if it was like comic book That's fair. It doesn't feel Upped and I'd be tempted to rewatch like the old x-men films to see like how well something like x-men 2 stacks up Yeah, they might be better. I mean, there's like a there's a into the spider-verse. That's a really good one. Yes Good one too. That's up there for me. That's really good Um I hear very good things about mega mind, but I haven't seen it so someone might have If we're including yeah, the Incredibles is probably the best. Oh, you're right Yeah, I think that is the best number one probably is the Incredibles We did it We did it guys. There it is Um hellboy was pretty good I like director. Yeah, I just But I I think that uh, I think I think it does go to the it's the Incredibles. It is. Yeah I think it is what would uh, I was about to ask. Well, what other superhero movies has Pixar done? The best superhero movie of all time I've heard people say Bruce more or less teleported from the prison back to Gotham. That's really not at the top of the list What's wrong with this movie? Like it's oh, yeah, it's true though. All the cope about it. It doesn't matter. It's still true Which is a bit of a plot Explanation it just falls flat for me because the dark knight has plot holes too. Well, that's so that's just textbook. What aboutism right there? Well, this movie can't be bad because this other movie is also having problems Uh streamtrooper bumped his head, right? That's right. That's right a stormtrooper bumped his head. I am a smart writer. That's not even Bumped his head. What the fuck does that change about anything that he bumped his head? He's allowed to bump his head No, he isn't Fucking god damn it Charitably is what he's saying is that the plot holes aren't really what bothers people as much because the dark knight also has plot holes But people really like that unfortunately for him. He's uh, he's worded this wrong If that's what the point he wants to make he shouldn't have said I've not heard any good arguments I've heard this and I agree with it, but this is also present in the dark knight. So it's like So then have you not heard all the substantive criticisms of the character in the fucking plot line, not just he couldn't have made it from the whole to Gotham Like come on And so do most movies when you really think about uh boring I tried to help him out Then he was like no give me back that shovel god damn it I'm telling you guys, we are Andy Dufresne staring into the pipe of shit. That's us right now. That's what we're doing. We're getting there, right? Just three more minutes. Realize while writing this video. I can take my own grade. Thank you very much. Maybe only one, sorry. We've got a big old Nebula ad. Oh, yeah. Oh, man. I can't believe I'm just crying for these Nebula ads these days. Better help. Have a long day. Help it. Add the video. Dark Knight has plot holes, too. Oh! So do most movies when you really think about it. I realize while writing this video. Yeah, the thing is with some movies, you don't really have to think about it. Is it about to say the reason people don't like it is because it has too many themes? Please don't. It's really not the issue. Yo, that is theme. That's why this movie fell so flat. No, not even fucking close. The general audiences don't even care necessarily about whether or not it addresses particular themes. It's just like, have you never heard of the broad criticisms of the Dark Knight Rises? None of this shit makes any sense. The fucking star is weird. Bruce has retired, Batman. Why? That feels odd. And then immediately it's like his work over time has damaged his legs to a significant degree where he has to have a walking stick. Like, oh, shit. And then immediately it gets a brace that apparently undoes that, which doesn't make any sense at all. It's already like, it's just a really weird star. He gets like, taken advantage of pretty harshly by Catwoman. There's the, all this obviously everything to do with Bane. Like, building up such a fucking top tier villain in terms of his power, strength and influence over the whole world. And then he just all gets taken away like really easily. Didn't they build this whole facility and take advantage of it right underneath the tech portion of Bruce Wayne Industries? Sorry. Yeah, like that shit made no sense. Everything with the police officers going into the sewer makes no fucking sense. Joseph Gordon Levitt when he threatens to throw a bunch of children into a bomb on the bridge. That part that blows my mind. Like, whether they like do not cross this bridge or we will blow it. He's like, fuck you. That was, there's so many things. It's all, I need to rewatch it to be able to be more specific. But I remember I rewatched it like a year ago. And I remember thinking like, holy fuck, this film is awful. I remember feeling that it was, I would have destroyed the homeless. I remember feeling it was overstuffed, like too many things happening. But like, I wouldn't say I had too many themes in it. Like that's themes weird. Isn't isn't the generic theme about like resilience and like rising up to fight another day? Isn't that kind of the only thing that broadly works? I don't think people are thinking about the themes when they think about this film not working. Like does he breaks it back and then breaks it back to being back to functional? I think when people bitch about this movie, and I haven't seen it, I've just heard from everyone that it's bad. No one has ever said reference thematics. They're like, why did this happen? Why did this guy do this? Why would that or that something stupid that happens, you know? Or people don't typically say like the meaning of the film contradicts the meaning of that man or something. They can't, they can't even get there because the film seems to be full of stupid shit. Like they're not, they ain't even getting to themes. It's like that's the obvious. It's about to be dead by the end of it. And so, by the way, I don't think he gets the bomb far enough away from Gotham either. No, he doesn't, he doesn't. There's so much wrong with this. Nolan. I remember there being like a meme where all three movies were distilled thematically to like fear, chaos and pain. I don't know if that came from Nolan or like that was just, you know, fans coming together on Twitter or whatever. But like, I thought that was kind of interesting. But pain, like, that's suitable. I don't know. It was painful to watch. Pain, pain. It's why this movie goes out. I mean, I kind of get the relevance of pain in this. I mean, there's things about it that I like, but like, the movie felt way too busy and overambitious. Oh, flat. Nolan totally dropped the ball here when it comes to what the story is out to say. Yes, there are plenty of ideas there, but a little like, Oh, I completely forgot about all the stuff of the stock exchange. You guys remember that? How Bruce loses all of money? Yeah, I was so fucking dumb. And then you remember how Bane got away because that dipshit like guy in charge was just like, ah, no, you know what? One of you many, many cops. You don't need to peel off to chase the bag robin. Get that bad. Oh, my God. Tell me, get away. Like Harold and his novel about justice, they're terribly disconnected and don't build to a satisfying whole. So what I've done is I've created a video where I take all I've said in this Oh, here we go. Analyse what it does. He's gonna fix the dark knight rises. But there's only one place where you can see that. Nebula? Uck knight rises fell so flat, realizing what a movie looks like when the theme is half baked, what the specific points of failure are. And I suggest how it could have been fixed and made a far stronger story. If this video you've just watched was as insightful for you as I hope. Just listen, mate. This video is actually shit and potentially really damaging to writers actually. It was know that this was just theme 101 covering the basics of my theme 101. No, this was like negative 69.6. Like I don't know. I don't even know what number this should be. You should be the crazy person who's outside of the university. I think it's outside of the universe yelling in outside of the universe yelling in. I'm the God of storage. It was just for a minute there. The bottom left one just said B is key to theme, which is about as cyclist B. Can hope Sue. Well, I mean, that would have been better because if you just confuse people and they walk out of this video not knowing what to think and it doesn't impact the way that they write, that will be better than them being like, Oh yeah, theme themes can't be a topic. That's stupid. Which was very established in this video. Remember, a sample suck balls. Yeah, we we were in like kid shit technique in far more depth. You should absolutely watch this video and watch it only on Nebula. We're very good friend. Nebula upload the Bumble because they just wouldn't perform that well despite how these videos are the same quality. Your logic makes no sense. I will never upload them to YouTube because they won't perform as well. Oh, my God. They'd be better off on a platform that has a much smaller cap for how many people will watch it. Look, we have Patrick Willems and Anita Sanchez here as Nando, right? The last time we came across. Oh, yeah, that's right. Yeah, good to see you. But I just love that logic. I'm never going to upload into YouTube because they wouldn't do that well. So I'm going to release them on a platform with considerably fewer active users and more paywall. You have to pay. Yeah. These are my usual stuff. I did one and how to write great exposition. And you don't think that would that would be as potentially successful on YouTube? Nobody's interested in writing about exposition. Why games are better than movies? Oh, wow. Why games are better than movies? That's bold. That is bold. Why games are simply better at world building than movies? That's not what the title was. Simply better than movies at world building. Okay. Simply better. It's very simple, you guys. Simple. I also wanted to make a video case. This is really awkward when you got Children of Men, a film that's got some really, really good world building for a film. And then you compare it to what? Like Call of Duty, Black Ops Cold War or something. It's like, oh, yeah, see. No, this game has way better world building than Children of Men. I wanted to make the also ones that if I had uploaded to YouTube, the algorithm would have buried them. And it's, how do you know? Mister, you know what the algorithm is? That has a really provocative title. That would absolutely do well on his channel. People will be like, what the fuck? Video games are better than movies. Explain. Why would the algorithm bury that? Yeah. It wouldn't. That's just cope. You're just like. I'm just like, I know it will. So you have to pay more if you want to see it. Yeah, yeah. I think that, yeah. I'm just going to assert that I know this wouldn't be as good in the algorithm. So give me money or you won't see it. It's not just me. You've got hundreds of creators there. They're doing the same thing like Hello Future Me, Thomas Flight, Tale Foundry, Terrible Writing Advice. Now you see it. Oh, that should be the name of your channel. It's terrible. Just right, baby. Just right. Right, Wendover, LegalEagle and so many others. I dare not name them because we will be here for quite a while. This what I've done for the Dark Knight Rises will be exclusive to Nebula for the next six months. I got to say something that's really grim is how like these ads have kind of ruined endings because the ending must always serve as like a segue to the ad. So you can't just have it be the end. It's always got to be. No, this isn't the end. There's actually much more to talk about and you'll find it over here on this platform or I don't know. It's just like there was no clear ending there because I imagine having a clear ending is probably like not good because then people know, oh, this is the end. I can click off now where you got to you got to blend them together. You got to blend the ad into the actual content, which by the way, I mean, you know, like plenty of opportunities. It's just funny because newspapers have like a distinction between you know, editorial and advertising, you know, where there's like a clear delineation between the ad and the like the actual work and if it was like in this case here, it's like you blended them together. I don't like it. Yeah. Yeah, you're right. Because it's like if you want to know the true secrets to the thing you click this for, then you have to pay more. Like exactly. Okay. Oh, I'll just go watch someone else's video. If you want the secret of Mario's Jump, you're going to have to join Nebula. Off a year's time, I'm uploading this one to YouTube. So if you don't want to wait that long to see this why I thought it wasn't going to perform well, but it will in a half a year's time. Okay. If you don't want to wait that long, would bury them if I release them now, but in six months, yeah, what's the squeeze them for all their worth on the paywall side that I will make them free. Of course. And yeah, and you can see them firstly on Nebula. Let's look into this technique of theme. All you've got to do is click my link in the description Whoa, 40%. Oh, that's what a link 40% off. Yes. Wow. 40% off. What? What do you mean? The money I'm asking you to pay me. Oh, shit. No, something that I'm going to give you the free later. Let's let's be fucking clear. If you got a million subs and you're making hundreds of thousands of views per video. If you if look just be honest, you want more money. Yeah, it's fine. You make a shit ton. You just want more money. You got a lot of you got a lot of views. You got a lot of subs. I mean like come on, man, you just want more money. Making it $30 a year. Yes, it really is that cheap. What do you mean? What do you mean it's that cheap? What are you talking about? It's it's $30 more expensive than the thing we just watched. Yeah, I feel like I didn't extract $30 worth of value from the thing I just watched. So no. They do the same thing all of them. No, but I want to see the Nebula ad that's like, I wanted more money. I joined these guys, which you know, when we unite we get a lot of people interested in paying the monthly fee and then we all get a cut of the total monthly fee or more of a cut if they come in through our particular links. We get lots of money. I want somebody doing Nebula ad while wearing a big fat cat costume with a top hat and bags of money. Look, I wanted to make more money. So me and all the other social has got together. Though if you like and if you're quick about it, you can get a lifetime Nebula membership meaning that you can pay once. Yes. $300 and you get access to YouTube. The price of a play station. I could go to shitty YouTube because I have to pay for it. Why would I bother with a lifetime when you just told me that all the videos are going to be getting come available like six months later or whatever. I guess not all of all of sight, but at least yours, which is the reason why I'm notified by this thing in the first place right now. Look, dude, I'm not going to watch all the videos on YouTube in my lifetime. I can't even do it. If I started now and there's no new ones. Yeah, it's literally not possible. There's not enough hours in the day. I don't have enough life. If you feel like your advice is going to help people and is important. I'm sure you'll release it for free instead of making people charge. Right. It's it's I'll get it from you eventually. This has been insightful. I've really learned a lot on how to write themes wrong. Absolutely. And watch Nebula forever. We're using the cash from this one to fund a ton of. That sounds like hell. You'll watch Nebula forever. You're like, no, no, no, no fun projects, many of which I can't tell you about because I'm under NDA, but I can't. What? He's under an NDA. You can't even talk about the phone projects. He's going to make money. You'll make from Nebula. Wait, Nebula makes you sign an NDA. No, pay attention rags. He said he got the money from Nebula to allow him to make so much fun projects projects that he can't even talk about because of NDAs. Oh, so Nebula is funding the videos that he makes, but he, okay, not necessarily the videos that he could be. He said fun projects. So it's just fun, fun projects. Okay. Maybe he's going to space. So I don't, so I don't know what Nebula is funding, but trust me, guys, it'll be great. Okay. Yeah. So whatever he's interested in, right? That's like worse than Kickstarter's because at least Kickstarter's like, you know, allegedly what it's going to be one day, right? Instead of the mystery box, another family, I think, but, um, say that shaping up family guy thing. Yeah. Remember, do you want to take this or do you want to have the mystery box? fatal error. That was not family guy. That's the Simpsons. Oh, fuck. I thought that was family. See, burns. That's in the box. The box. The box. It's interesting family family guy did do that joke as well though. Oh, did they? What was the nature of that joke? Uh, it was like, you get a free boat or the mystery box and Peter picks the box and then everyone else has a boat like Cleveland has a boat. Joe, okay. Because I haven't actually seen that much of either show. So I was so excited that there was like a reference that I knew of these shows that I haven't really seen. So, but I guess in the end, I guess in the end, we have to go to Nebula to really find out you should make a video about it and put it on Nebula. I should their NDA, but I can say they're shaping up to be very cool. There's a second link below. If that interests you, did the fucking RLM be a very cool. Very cool. Very cool. The NDA, but I can say they're shaping up to be very cool. There's a second link below writer has improperly capitalized his title on skin. If that interests you, but this offer expires at the end of December. So do grab it quite quickly. Oh my gosh. Well, wait, that's not December. December has 31 days. Wait, they make a lifetime to me about. Oh, right. The offer for the lifetime as in like a cheaper. I'm assuming they put the lifetime thing on to be bought whenever they don't make that. They want it's fear of missing out. It's FOMO. Nebula wants foam. It's FOMO. Like, oh, I don't want to miss out on that. Keep your time. Nebula subscription for $300. I will continue to watch my scummy YouTube videos for children learning about the wrong way. Me and the plebs who like Aesop's fables will just hang out on YouTube with all the other losers and get all that free juicy content. Will not last very long. If you want to apply this technique to your writing, go for it. But I do suggest you watch this dark night rises video as well. I can't. I'm too poor to afford Nebula. Okay. I can't. I'm just a struggling writer. I'm a struggling author. Yeah. That's why I'm here for the tips. If someone said why can't afford to pay for it? So am I just doomed? You need to wait six months, I guess. This video is probably out by now. He's talking about when I get all starved by then. Oh, so you can understand this philosophy on a much deeper level. Uh-huh. Do click my link in the description if you'd like to see it. Anyway, thanks for watching. Keep writing and I'll see you guys next time on The Closer Look. He's the closest. God, that delivery is very strange. That was very, uh, it was very. The Closer Look. The Closer Look. The Closer Look. Give me money for my shitty videos. That was a really bad video. I don't know what to say. I think that was active. Like, I think that there's a lot of potential to her that's actively damaging to writers. That's just a mess. It's not my hearing. The best he ever does is saying things that are sometimes true, but he acts like they're always true and that's unfortunate. Well, like, there's so much else to say there is there. It's just like, that was a thing that happened. Good timing. I'm getting, uh, I'm getting hangi. Hey, everyone watching grief or not right now. If you want even more talk of themes, go to nebula. Subscribe for a lifetime and you'll receive videos. If you just wait for six months, but if you can't wait, you don't want to miss out with all the other cool people are watching early and go to nebulub. The glorious pastas was never even referenced. Oh, my God, to me. That's the thumbnail that bastard. He says don't do this. And he points to the phone. What does that have to do with anything? Don't call any. I think he just wants the visual of him pointing down to something concrete, whether it's the phone or something else where it's just like this. Oh, is the way to do story. That's the thumbnail. Yeah, I wouldn't have guessed in a million years. Do you think it's thematic? Because he's like phoning it in. Oh, yeah, maybe. What's the theme of Inglorious Bastards death? He does a question. Question mark. Oh, that was disappointing. Yeah, terrible video. I learned a lot, but it wasn't because of this video. It was because of our discussion in our little battering around of ideas, our brainstorming. Just doing and desperately doing what we can to pull some insight out of this video. Oh, boy, what a what a terrible video. Did you know that if you pay us here at EFAP $300, you get a lifetime all of our videos on YouTube for the rest of your life? We will make it so that every lost released piece of EFAP is something that you can watch on YouTube just for the low, low price of $300. We will also make that available to people to pay zero, but you'll feel special for $300. We can almost guarantee it plus added bonus after six months. All of those videos will be available on YouTube. So anyway, deal. What a deal. It's a steal really. A deal and a steal. Why don't we before we head out of this very cool stream talk a little about what everyone's up to little for tune. How are you, buddy? What are you making? What did everyone get to know you on your channel and what are you making? What are you covering? What are you ripping into? What are you being cruel to? Well, I was going to go away and carry on writing the June script that's going on. But having just watched that video, I think I might need to just take a break until I remember how writing is meant to work. So I might force that. Well, you need to make sure that your video has really strong themes, but not too strong and only in not several themes. One cut out two of them. Yeah. And remember themes are themes being topics is stupid. So if you view your theme as a topic, that's stupid. Shit, I have to redo the last 40,000 words. Oh no. And remember the highest quality themes are a result of characters with different ideologies. And the rule questions. And they are all questions. Yes. Right. You're writing this down, I hope, right? Yeah, I'm actually taking feverish notes right now. Yeah, yeah. I'm ready to improve this script. I also feel feverish. So let us let us proceed. Yeah, that was me. Whatever happens. Oh, okay. What's your newest? What is your newest video that everyone should go and watch? I really should remember what my last video was. What was it? What's come out recently? It wasn't Echo. It was something after Echo. Oh, why can't I actually remember my own last fucking video? Give me like two seconds. And I'll find out what that was the one. No wonder I forgot. Yes. Madame Webb is currently on the channel. What did I make? Oh, yeah, that's right. Yeah, y'all should see it. Yeah, you really should. It's it's better than Madame Webb. So, you know, there is that to be said for it. You even click baited and you fought and you lampshaded your click bait in just for putting some boobies on there. It did. Well, everyone else was putting boobs on this and I just thought I'll put boobs on mine to be honest that it's clickbait. So, yeah, there's this clickbait on the thumbnail and there's even clickbait somewhere in the video, but I think it's like an hour and a half in. So there are tits somewhere though. Oh, are there? Well, well, all right. John, what are you up to, my good man? I'm working right now on a new machinima series. And I wrote a whole season and I'm like about 70% done shooting for the first time. If only you had watched this video before you started. I know. I got to go back to the drawing board and start framing my themes as questions. Got to start cutting out themes and boy, the whole things ill conceived and fucked now. So, yeah, maybe season two will be good though. Thanks to closer look. Yeah, that's what I'm working on. We missed a Caperoni opinion. No neonolum. What about you? Well, this is coming out a week from now, right? So, well, it's currently releasing right now. It's releasing right now. It came out today. It came out today. It came out today, Cap. Well, we just been we're at the end. They were to chat. It's like, wait, I got to wait a week for this to come out. Not unless you pay us to watch it on Nebubula. Oh, Nebubbles. Well, in the past, we'll have done a stream talking about this sting in Ocean's Eleven to fun movies. You can check that out. And if you're watching this, then tomorrow from when you're watching this, we'll do another stream. But I don't know what it'll be on yet. But, you know, we'll be talking about movies and stuff on Sundays and in the future, you listening. Dev's episode four might be out. It's very, very close. So, depending on when you're listening to this, it may or may not be out. So, stay tuned for that. That show harmed me and Rags. Yes, it did. Dev's is fucking horrendous. I hate Dev's. Dev's was shit. Yes. Watch us talk about it instead. Yeah. Only on the capital O. Absolutely. Do not watch Dev's. Watch someone else taking a poop on Dev's. All right. Bring go Leo and regaggleton. What if anything you guys wanted to say about anything in particular? You know how to do just walking. Yeah. I don't want to make any promises or anything. So, I'll just leave it there. I'll leave it there and trail off into a nebula head. Ooh. As for myself, by the time you're listening to this, I will have completed one of the things I'm working on, which is no secret. Is it King Arthur, EFAP movies? I've been trying to get that done, which means the war arc is stable. Everything should release on schedule. The Lord of the Rings things are going to be coming out on schedule. And I'm trying to think of anything crazy, you know? Oh, by the time you hear this Stargift will have ended. I hope you enjoyed it, guys. It was a fun time, but it was just cut into my ability to make a hell of a lot of different things, which is still, you know, there's still lots of things coming out. I would say the output on EFAP has been fabulous in the past half-ish year and that Loki wrapped up. You had your war arc fleam and in mere weeks, you'll be watching the Halo TV show arc in the form of EFAP TV episodes. Enjoy that as well as a future EFAP episode where we will discuss the season in fall and the state of Halo. It's going great right now for that IP. Yes. Yeah. Other than that, thank you all for watching and we'll shall see you in the future. Bye-bye. See you, everybody. Goodbye, everyone. Toodaloo, see you later. The theme of this episode was sadness.