Mythcreants Posts for April

See what Mythcreants has been up to lately.

View this email in your browser   April Newsletter You can give us feedback via the contact form on our website. (If you reply to this email, we might not see it.) Have a wonderful month! Q&A, Worldbuilding, Technology Can My Characters Use Less Efficient Transport? By Oren Ashkenazi on 03/29/21 Hello. While I was worldbuilding, I noticed that my characters do not really use technology to do things like travelling – however, there are things like trains/cars/flying vessels in big cities. My characters come from a small town, where there are some bits of technology […] Read in browser » Worldbuilding, History Six Principles for Becoming a Better Worldbuilder By Oren Ashkenazi on 03/27/21 Worldbuilding is a complicated craft, and with so many possible settings out there, it's difficult to give advice on the subject as a whole. Fortunately, there are some principles that are useful across the board. That's what we're talking about today: best practices that will […] Read in browser » Storytelling, Conflict, Plot, Tension How to Pace Your Story By Chris Winkle on 03/26/21 While stories use multiple methods of engaging audiences, conflict and tension are probably the most essential for longer stories. What we call pace is the timing and intensity of that conflict and tension throughout. A pace that’s too low will put an audience to sleep, […] Read in browser » Q&A, Villains How Do I Keep a Redeemed Villain Cool? By Oren Ashkenazi on 03/22/21 Hello. How are you? I was wondering about antagonist personalities after they make a change. From Amity of The Owl House to Peridot and Yellow Diamond of Steven Universe, some people (myself not included) believe that they became “less likable” and “lost what made them […] Read in browser » Analysis, Bad Advice, Social Justice Taking the Politics Out of Six Popular Stories By Oren Ashkenazi on 03/20/21 You know what I can't stand about speculative storytelling? The politics. I know, it seems like I mostly object to poorly constructed plots, underdeveloped characters, toxic messages, and so on, but really it's the politics. You just can't have a good story if there's politics […] Read in browser » Storytelling Understanding Conflict & Tension By Chris Winkle on 03/19/21 In 2014, I wrote a primer on the basics of conflict, with a few notes on tension thrown in. Whereas conflict is easy to spot and a central topic of most writing advice, tension is subtle and rarely defined even when it is mentioned. Given […] Read in browser » Commentary, Q&A, Characters, Disability, Social Justice Is it Ableist For a Character to Impersonate Someone With a Disability? By Fay Onyx on 03/15/21 You’ve mentioned that characters faking disabilities can feed into the ableist misconception that disabled people are likely to just be faking for benefits. Is it less ableist if an abled character impersonates a specific other character who happens to have a disability? The example I’m […] Read in browser » Storytelling Five Problems With Focusing on Internal Conflicts By Oren Ashkenazi on 03/13/21 In most speculative fiction stories, the heroes face down some kind of external conflict. These conflicts take many forms. In some stories, an advanced battle station is blowing up planets. In others, a bigoted politician plans to pass new laws targeting people who are already […] Read in browser » Storytelling, Characters Why You Should Watch Out for Hindrance Characters By Chris Winkle on 03/12/21 Occasionally, the pressure to make our stories compelling can encourage practices that don’t actually give us the results we want. One such pattern is the hindrance character. Let’s go over what they are, the problems they can cause, and how to avoid them. What’s a […] Read in browser » Q&A, Villains Can My Villain be Cute? By Oren Ashkenazi on 03/08/21 Hi! I am not too sure if this is okay to ask, seeing as it doesn’t really have to do with writing, but how can I make a villain that is threatening while also making them have a pastel/cutesy theme? Especially if it’s a guy […] Read in browser » Storytelling, Plot Five Common Story Fragmentations and How to Consolidate Them By Oren Ashkenazi on 03/06/21 In an ideal world, every story would function as a unified whole, with each aspect working together for maximum engagement. In the real world, many stories suffer from fragmentation: disparate elements pulling the story in opposing directions, leaving the audience bored rather than engaged. Fortunately, this […] Read in browser » Analysis, Social Justice Space Sweepers Shows Us What Excellent Messaging Is By Chris Winkle on 03/05/21 Space Sweepers, the new Korean blockbuster on Netflix, is not a flawless movie. Some portions are incredibly confusing, plot twists come out of nowhere, its pace becomes exhausting, and jarring tone changes make important events feel contrived. But along with a strong set of heroes […] Read in browser » Copyright © 2021 Mythcreants LLC, All rights reserved. You are receiving emails from Mythcreants because you signed up on our blog. Our mailing address is: Mythcreants LLC · 19712 50th Ave W · Apt 3 · Lynnwood, WA 98036 · USA Want to change how you receive these emails? You can update your preferences or unsubscribe from this list.

Mythcreants Posts for March

See what Mythcreants has been up to lately.

View this email in your browser   March Newsletter You can give us feedback via the contact form on our website. (If you reply to this email, we might not see it.) Have a wonderful month! Q&A, Writing What Exactly Is a Scene? By Chris Winkle on 03/01/21 I guess this is a noob Q, but what IS a scene? And how do you know when it ends? – Taliah Hi Taliah, Newbie question or not, I’m sure some other people are wondering too! So a scene is a section of film/narration/whatever that’s […] Read in browser » Storytelling, Magic, Social Justice Ten Justifications for Oppressed Mages and Why They Fail By Oren Ashkenazi on 02/27/21 The oppressed mages trope is a personal bugbear of mine, as longtime readers of this site can no doubt attest. The trope is incredibly popular, even though it makes no sense. As with most popular things that don't make sense, people come up with all […] Read in browser » Storytelling, Writing, Lessons From Bad Writing I Tried to Praise The Eye of Argon and Ended Up With These Lousy Writing Lessons By Chris Winkle on 02/26/21 Originally published in a 1970 fanzine, The Eye of Argon by Jim Theis is known as the worst story ever written. The Eye of Argon readings are a favorite at conventions, where readers compete to read the story without laughing. Since it’s already been torn […] Read in browser » Q&A How Do I Portray Cosmic Horrors in the Open? By Oren Ashkenazi on 02/22/21 Hi, I’m Josem from Spain. I am and write in Spanish but found your site a trove of information for any aspiring writer in any language. That said, my apologies if my English is a little rusty. My question is about setting, or rather the […] Read in browser » Analysis, Villains Five Antagonists Who Never Stood a Chance By Oren Ashkenazi on 02/20/21 Captain Kirk's adventures would be a snoozefest if the Klingons just rolled over for him. No one would care about T'Challa taking back his throne unless Killmonger could match him blow for blow. Batman's investigations would be pointless if the Joker just turned himself in.1 What's […] Read in browser » Roleplaying, Worldbuilding, D&D, Disability, Social Justice Ridding Your Monsters of Ableism By Fay Onyx on 02/19/21 People create monsters that reflect the fears of their society, including fears about disability. Because of this, ableism has been incorporated into our depictions of monsters. In some cases, disability is used to make monsters seem dangerous, unsettling, or unpredictable. Other times, it's used to […] Read in browser » Q&A, Storytelling, Disability How Do I Portray a Deaf Protagonist Overcoming a Musical Villain? By Fay Onyx on 02/15/21 The monster villain of my story uses music to hypnotize and kill victims. My protagonist is deaf and loves music, but he’s immune to the hypnotic tune because he can’t hear it. How do I depict this respectfully? – Anon Anon, Thanks for the question! […] Read in browser » Writing, Movies Five Bad Habits Writers Learn From Movies and TV By Oren Ashkenazi on 02/13/21 While the foundational rules of storytelling are the same no matter what medium you're using, the story's format still has an impact. Books and films are noticeably different, if the whole moving-picture situation wasn't enough of a clue. Nevertheless, a lot of new writers first […] Read in browser » Storytelling, Characters, Likability Five Ways to Make a Selfish Character Likable By Chris Winkle on 02/12/21 Character likability is generally created through three characteristics: sympathy, novelty, and selflessness. For a main character, I recommend aiming for at least two out of three, so not every protagonist needs to be selfless. However, selfish behavior counts against a character and can make audiences […] Read in browser » Q&A How Quickly Can My Hero Gain Power? By Oren Ashkenazi on 02/08/21 Hi! How are you? I have a character who starts out knowing very little about magic (as they just got theirs), but by the end of the story, I want them to be one of the best magic users in the story (even though they’re […] Read in browser » Storytelling, Plot, Travel Six Ways to Make Fantasy Travel More Interesting By Kellie Doherty on 02/06/21 As a reader and writer of fantasy, I've found the travel aspect can be… tedious. Either it's pages and pages of scenery with characters walking, walking, walking, or it's one quick scene where nothing happens. If your story includes travel, try these tips for making […] Read in browser » Storytelling, Characters, Likability, Romance How to Get Readers to Feel Those Emotional Twists By Chris Winkle on 02/05/21 Nothing evokes emotion by default. Every bit of triumph or heartache has to be built up by the storyteller. So if you’re wondering why your big emotional scenes aren’t emotional to your audience, it could be because you’ve invested too little in the elements that […] Read in browser » Copyright © 2021 Mythcreants LLC, All rights reserved. You are receiving emails from Mythcreants because you signed up on our blog. Our mailing address is: Mythcreants LLC · 19712 50th Ave W · Apt 3 · Lynnwood, WA 98036 · USA Want to change how you receive these emails? You can update your preferences or unsubscribe from this list.