MORE PLOT THOUGHTS

Last time I talked about plot, using as an example the conundrum story of the fox, the duck, and the bag of grain. Now I want to get more general.

When Alexander Dumas fils decided to try his hand at playwriting, he asked if his dad had any advice. The old man did: "First act clear, last act short, all acts interesting."

The traditional three-act structure of stage drama can easily be adapted to the writing of stories and novels. Generally: Act One is the setup (location, period, characters, their goals); Act Two is filled with complications (answering the question: why can't the main character achieve his goal immediately); Act Three is the resolution (the MC succeeds or fails, and the consequences thereof).

When Dumas pere said "first act clear," he meant exactly that: a reader should come out of it with a clear understanding of who the main characters are, where they want to go, and that they're on their way. Leave no doubt. (Doubt may be something the MC experiences at some point toward the end of Act Two.)

At the end of Act One we're off! We're in motion! We're at the beginning of what is tantalizingly called "rising action."

The complications of Act Two represent more rising action. Each obstacle should be bigger and nastier and harder to overcome than the one before. Rising action. The man faces three assassins at once. Then: five!

If your MC defeats five major fighters all coming at him at once in a rabid pack, but is later confronted by two mediocre fighters causing a minor sweat, you have a problem. Falling action.

Falling action is a signal to the reader (or audience) that things are winding up (or winding down), that the story is chugging into the station.

On the other hand, maybe it's like this. Your guy defeats five, then barely defeats two, the MC disastrously running out of steam. That could indicate something bad is happening to his powers—which is another, perhaps more insidious complication. And that's okay.

But the overall threat level should be going up all the way to the climax, where it maxes out, demanding the utmost effort from the MC.

Don't have your guy defeat the most powerful evil character, only to face the guy's lame sidekick. Unless it's meant to be a joke, the sidekick slapped down without effort. Or as an indication of the hero's newly developed talents. (Having the sidekick slaughter the MC and run off with his chick—with her eager consent—is a joke played on the reader.)

The senior Dumas wants the last act to be the shortest because it deals with but one major event: the climax. The lead-up to that event is all in Acts One and Two. And once the climax is concluded, the goal is met (or lost) and it's time to quit the stage.

Sometimes there is room for a denouement ("unraveling") to indicate how the world is now different after the success (or defeat) of the MC.

Plot structure is most explicit in books on screenplay writing. Here's the version from Michael Hauge:

Act One covers 25% of the total movie (script pages or film minutes, either way). There are two stages of Act One, the "setup" and the "new situation." Setup gives you the main characters and their place in the world. Hint at a defect or a yearning for change. The New Situation grows out of a turning point called Opportunity, which is to occur at the ten percent point. Something has happened in the world. The MC responds to the New Situation by launching himself into Act Two.

Or not.

In Joseph Campbell's book The Hero With A Thousand Faces, the "opportunity" is the Call to Adventure. The hero may respond in the negative: Refusal of the Call. There the action ends. The quest is over. The Wizard has said: "Go thou to the Belly of the Beast and retrieve the Golden McGuffin!" And the hero says: "Yeah, that doesn't sound like something I'd ever do." End of story.

Screenwriters often include the Refusal as if it were a part of the official process. Rocky is offered a chance to fight the champ, and refuses. But he changes his mind. In Campbell, there is no changing minds. The Call has been refused, the Quest est fini.
If, in a movie, the hero refuses the call, that can't be the end, because there's another hour and a half to fill. Something else has to change, forcing the hero onto the preferred path. Luke says no to Ben Kenobi, then finds his aunt and uncle have been slaughtered. Now it's off to Mos Eisley.

In Hauge's view, Act Two occupies half the script pages (or movie time) and is broken in two by a turning point called the Point of No Return. The first half is labeled Progress, the second Complications and Higher Stakes. It ends with another turning point called a Major Setback.

If you're writing a tragedy, however, the second act ends with a Major Victory. Followed in Act Three by Ultimate Defeat. Major victories spur flawed characters to attempt the impossible (for him), leading inevitably to doom.

Hauge says Act Three has two phases: Final Push and Aftermath. Separating the two is the Climax. (The final push becomes the climax.) Rising action has reached its pinnacle, an event that takes place somewhere between 90 and 99% of total time (or total script pages), depending on how much aftermath is needed to make things clear.

Novels tend to have more complications and set-backs for the hero, but the pattern is the same: short take-off, long bumpy flight with engines afire, ending with a sudden crash-landing (which is usually found to be a triumph for the MC).

There may be a subplot, usually involving secondary characters. Sometimes the subplot invites the audience to compare and contrast its elements with those of the main plot, leading to some notion of theme.

Parallel plots are more common in novels than in movies, because they take up a lot of room and involve multiple sets of "main" characters. Hollywood likes to keep things simple: one MC on the hero path, with a recognizable "character arc" changing the MC for the better. It's not about a situation, see? It's about a person who is dealing with a situation.

If you need another take on plotting, the Internet is packed tight with advice. Go get it!

Then get back to work writing!