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WorldCon made me get all theoretical and big-picture-y. That can be fun, but it isn’t always helpful if you’re sitting at home with your fingers on the keys, looking for advice you can put to work right away. So, how about we go back to talking about something more practical?

Let’s suppose you’re “breaking” the story for your drama spec script. You’re in the early stages, thinking up the basic spine of the story, and looking for the act breaks – looking for the places where the story turns. So you come up with a nice exciting event for the end of the teaser, and other ones for the three or four breaks that follow — all the places where the story will continue after commercials.

Let’s say that the act breaks you come up with are compelling and suspenseful. What could possibly go wrong?

They could be duplicates, is what. Sometimes it’s very easy to end up with two act breaks that are way too similar to each other. If you end act one with your detectives at a dead-end, you shouldn’t end act three with another dead end. Or if an act ends with character one betraying character two, then it’s best to avoid using a subsequent betrayal of c2 by c1 as another act break in the same episode.

This trap is so easy to fall into that I’ve been on staffs where no one notices that we’ve broken a story with this flaw for a strikingly long time. Then finally, someone points it out, and we all slap our foreheads in comical unison. Sometimes, it doesn’t even get fixed. You can probably find produced episodes that do exactly this. Maybe it even works, if the two scenes are purposeful echoes of each other, or if the second of the two breaks is presented as existing at an order of magnitude greater than the first. But unless things work out just right, and you can bury the similarity, you’re taking a risk of turning in a script that feels circular and repetitive.

In an extreme case of repeated act breaks, you can look at the story for an episode and realize that nothing would really change if you removed, say, act three. This is a very bad sign. Test your story against this property before you begin writing dialogue. If you’ve got an act that lifts out like part of a sectional sofa, then something’s gone badly wrong. Change it now. Everything is easier to change in the pre-outline stage. And if no one sees you slap your forehead, does it really hurt?

Lunch: no new lunch since last entry

Hi! I’m back from WorldCon. Wow, that was fun! It’s a convention that focuses a lot on books, as opposed to comic books and games. This seems to lead to a more grown up and more female collection of attendees than at some other cons. The whole thing had a wonderful feel to it.

The Hugo Award ceremony went well. I got through my part of it, so I was already reeling with relief when I had the pleasure of seeing Serenity get the Drama Long Form award. How wonderful! It was a great night indeed.

I also participated in quite a few more panels, which was a lot of fun. In fact, several times throughout the weekend, I had mini-epiphanies (I call them piphanies) about what it is that I do for a living. Here is a thought you might enjoy. Or disagree with. Or both.

There is a big division in the nature of television shows. We talk about shows that are character-driven and shows that are story-driven. King of the Hill, to pick a show more or less at random, is character-driven. Law and Order is story-driven. Other shows exist somewhere along the scale.

But what if there’s a third division? It seems to me that the shows which we are most liable to call “Sci Fi” are often driven by something that is neither character nor story. The Twilight Zone, original Star Trek and Trek:TNG, the Halloween episodes of The Simpsons, maybe even a show like Quantum Leap… I would contend that these are (drum roll) idea-driven.

You know what I mean? I would even include some of the earliest monster-of-the-week Buffy episodes in this category — the ones with the strongest metaphorical underpinnings. Like episodes of The Twilight Zone, they function as sorts of little parables, with a point to make about the world. A point made by an idea-based show might be something like: racism is random, human obsession creates a barrier as strong as any wall, greed eats away the soul, vanity makes you ugly. There’s a moral to these shows, as in a fable.

Have you ever noticed that there are a lot of people out there who declare “I don’t like Sci Fi” and “I don’t like Fantasy”? Have you ever questioned them on what they mean… do they mean that they don’t like Frankenstein, Brave New World, 1984, A Handmaid’s Tale, Harry Potter? They don’t like Star Wars? Indiana Jones? ET? Splash? Big? Lord of the Rings? Sliding Doors? The Natural? Field of Dreams? Heaven can Wait? Defending your Life? The Incredibles? Batman? They don’t like Buffy? Quantum Leap? Charmed? Medium? Bewitched? Sabrina? Lost?

Usually they’ll admit that they, in fact, like a great many of those things. They just don’t put some of those works in the category of things they dislike. I’m starting to wonder if what best characterizes what they don’t like is the category of idea-driven works.

The types of stories written by Ray Bradbury, the types of filmed stories presented by Rod Serling… these appealed to me as child even without the presence of characters I knew and was already rooting for. I loved the fact that each of them was a neat little package with an idea inside. But others dislike this. Maybe it feels artificial to them, like a little puppet show that they suddenly realize is there not to entertain but to educate. It’s about vegetables! It’s a trap!

They may, in fact, have learned, from the example of the Trek shows, that the sight of spacecraft is a warning signal that ideas may soon follow. I’ve heard from a number of people who were pleasantly surprised to discover that Battlestar Galactica was about people. I think they were afraid it was about ideas. (Which is not to say it is idea-less, but I wouldn’t say it is idea-driven. It is character-driven.)

What does this mean for you, the humble and earnest writer of spec scripts? Figure out the category of the show you are specing and make sure the episode you write is of the correct type. And if you are writing an idea-driven spec pilot, be aware that you are battling some strong headwinds. If you are twisting story and character in order to create a sort of parable, you may be letting an idea drive your spec. Watch out for this, my friends. I love ideas, you love ideas, but something there is that does not love an idea. They simply are not in fashion in the television world right now.

Lunch: A hot meatball sub from Togos, delivered by mistake in place of a turkey sandwich, but cherished nonetheless.

Greetings from WorldCon! I’m in Anaheim, gentle readers, where I’m appearing on panels and mingling with other SciFi fans and – get this – presenting the Hugo Award for best Short-Form Dramatic Presentation. I will get to open the envelope on stage and everything. I’m nervous about it, but I think it’s one of those things, like rewriting, that after it’s over, you’re glad you did it.

I got to share a dais today with the great Melinda Snodgrass. She’s the writer with the best claim to fame that I ever heard of. She wrote a wonderful, classic episode of Star Trek: The Next Generation called “The Measure of a Man.” It was about a challenge to the sentience of Data, the android character and it was one of my all time favorites. And here’s the kicker. It was a spec script. This is the only case I have ever heard of in which a spec script was purchased and produced. Now that’s impressive. Kinda makes you want to polish that spec a little more, doesn’t it? You know, just in case it falls into the right hands?

I can think of one other case that was similar to this. Steve De Knight got hired onto the Buffy staff on the basis of a Buffy spec. Unheard of! You never even submit a spec of a show to that show, right? Well, in fact, he didn’t. It was submitted to Angel. But Joss loved the script so well that he grabbed De Knight for Buffy. I never got to read the script myself, but I understand that it was about Xander and Buffy and how they are affected when Buffy loses her Slayer powers and Xander gets them.

Melinda and Steve did the same thing with their specs. They both took strong, well-established characters that were central to the show, and they put them through a trauma that drove at heart of how that character is defined. What does it mean for an android — this android — to be sentient? What does it mean for Buffy to be the Slayer? These questions are big pointy hooks. Throw them into the ocean and drag them around on the bottom for a while and you’re going to dredge up some stuff.

If you can find an idea for a spec that cuts as close to the heart of a show as those two did, you’ll be on your way to winning the show-biz lottery like they did.

Lunch: seared ahi tuna salad

So, if I understand this internet thing, I can just swear, right? Right now, I could just cut loose with a barrage of inventive and obscene language blue enough to change the color scheme of my site? I’m tasting the freedom!

This is not the case on network television. There are rules. Now, you might think that as a writer of spec scripts, these don’t apply to you, but it’s a good idea to adhere to them anyway, just to demonstrate that you’ve got some professional savvy. Besides, joke writing is a lot easier with dirty words, and you want to prove that you can be funny without them.

Of course, if you’re spec-ing an HBO show, please, swear with abandon.

Now, you know the obvious rules. You’ve watched television. So I’m just going to talk about the ones that I find surprising. These, believe it or not, are generally considered unacceptable: Chrissakes, goddamn, non-reverential uses of Jesus, Jesus Christ, Christ.

Maybe you’re not startled by those, but I forget them all the time. I find myself typing “goddamn” into scripts, thinking of it as a fairly mild curse, as these things go. But no. “God” is fine. “Damn” is fine. “Goddamn” – go wash out your keyboard with soap! And “Jesus” as an exclamation – a fine earthy outburst that conveys a certain type of character? – nope. So watch out for these.

And here are a few delightful distinctions. On the list I have, “eat me” is listed as never acceptable, while “bite me” is fine. Interesting. And “jerk-off” is acceptable as an insult but not as a reference to masturbation – but isn’t that at the heart of the insult?

When I started out as a writer, “Oh my God” was sometimes flagged for removal, at least on TGIF shows. Some writing staffs made a practice of spelling it “omigod” — I can’t imagine it made a difference, but they seemed to think it did. Now it seems to be universally accepted.

When I wrote my first Buffy, I had Buffy’s mom say “screw you!” to Buffy. I was certain it would be removed. But, no! “Screw” is hunky-dory! Go for it! Also, “bitch” and, surprisingly, “son of a bitch” are generally allowed, although I’d be careful about these during kid-friendly, early-evening shows. And “pissed” is usually fine, meaning angry. Or drunk, if a British character is saying it.

Which brings us to exotic swearing. As long as it’s not in common US usage, you can get away with all kinds of stuff. “Berk,” “Merde,” “Scheiss” — all perfectly acceptable, although presumably sometimes bleeped when the episodes are eventually exported.

Be more conservative if you’re spec-ing an 8PM show than if you’re doing a 10PM show, since the rules do loosen up throughout the night. And study your sample scripts for examples of where your show draws the line. But, there you are. Reverential Jesus! That was fun!

Lunch: Chinese Avocado Salad from “Nature’s Pantry.” Healthy and good!

Hello again! I’m just back from a weekend trip to Las Vegas. It was 113 degrees there! I was outside for less than a minute, but the experience was very similar to being ironed. It was fun to laugh and exclaim and run from the air-conditioned interior of Treasure Island to the air-conditioned interior of the Venetian, but if I’d been outside any longer, the fun would have evaporated, along with all the moisture in my eyeballs.

Fun often depends on the amount of time spent doing something.

Shelah from Studio City writes to talk about the evaporation of her fun. She actually asks another question in the letter, which I will get to in another post, but along the way she makes this observation about what happens as one writes more and more spec scripts, and I just had to comment. She writes:

“… quite frankly, this whole experience has sort of made me lose confidence in my skills. Instead of getting better, I feel I have regressed. When I wrote my Sopranos, I didn’t know all the rules, just the basics, but at least I was having fun. But now, knowing the rules, I am always second guessing myself.”

Raise your hands if you’re with Shelah. Holy cow, that’s a lot of you. I went through this same thing myself. When I wrote my Star Trek: TNG scripts it was like writing Fan Fic. There was an almost guilty pleasure in the doing of it. I can control the characters and make them say whatever I want? I can make anything happen? *Anything*? Whee! It’s like making your Ken dolls kiss each other!

Then you slowly start to realize how much you don’t know. And you second guess yourself. And everything you write starts feeling formulaic and stilted, while your original stuff had this great original chaotic surprising rhythm that you’ve lost.

Well, the horrible truth is, if you’re writing a spec of an existing show, you’re not really being asked to demonstrate an original chaotic rhythm. You’re supposed to capture the existing rhythm of the show. A spec pilot can have more chaos in it, but it still will benefit from learning about structure and act breaks and all that. So some of what was lost was an illusion to begin with. What felt like unrestrained exuberance to you might have looked like an unmade bed to a reader. I’m sure that’s of tremendous comfort. Ah, well. There’s always real Fan Fic if you want to run wild. (If you don’t know about Fan Fic, google it. An interesting subculture or subgenre.)

But can it still be fun, coloring-within-the-lines? Yep. It sure can. When you get more comfortable with the skills and techniques, you stop second guessing yourself because you’re confident in your choices. And then you can have creative fun while still playing by the rules.

Be patient. Everyone goes through this. I think, in fact, that this is the bit of the process that separates the writers from the dreamers. Push through this part, and it’ll all get better. Really. Every script I write has at least a couple scenes in it that make me genuinely joyous.

Lunch: One bite each of every kind of food in the world from “Cravings” buffet at the Mirage. Try the bao.

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