The Imploded Narrative

Odd for me to talk about writing here, but February is a month of randomness, so here goes.

I want to point out a plot style that seems to never be utilised often, but should definitely be. You could call it the "imploded narrative."

The way it works is a simple bait-and-switch. The script begins with one storyline and winds up contorting in a million different directions, so that the resolution is on the surface appears to be from a completely different story, yet for the audience who has made the entire journey, it makes sense.

One of the main reasons it is rarely done, is because it takes vast amounts of planning in order to do so. Planning which often runs contrary to carefree spirit required to write dramatic text, but it needn't necessarily be stifiling.

Before I address that aspect, first I'll cite an example of an "imploded narrative:" the seminal anime series Neon Genesis Evangelion. A more thorough analysis of the show can be found at the link, but for purposes of this post, I'm dealing strictly with the show's structure (irrespective of whether or not it is intentionally structured this way).

In its initial episodes, Evangelion appeared to be essentially a "kids fighting monsters with giant robots" show or what's often called "a villian of the week" show. These shows require minimal investment in character development, because basically the interest is in seeing how many cool ways the hero can save the day. Although there were tacit clues at the inner lives of the characters, it was not until midway through the show that the main characters' psychological lives took centre stage. And when they did, the story became more abstract and also more intriguing.

By the show's final episodes, the focus was more on the ongoing psychosis affecting the characters rather than the survival of the human race plotline that the show began with, although both were undeniably intertwined. This is where the old axiom of "show, don't tell" comes in. The latter half of Evangelion incorporated many scenes of monologues, flashbacks, and dreams depicted in both an aural and visual way that the viewer is brought into the psychosis and it is made personal.

All too often many writers--especially playwrights--believe that people will be swept away by monologues and just mere character interaction. Not necessarily.

While good dialogue is critical to any script, it is increasingly difficult to just merely grab an audience's attention with just words and infrequent action. Many think that this should be left up to the director. I believe that to be a sign of laziness. The writer can best serve their work by being willing to go into the fantastical world of dreams and inner reality. Our dreams would not make sense if they occurred in reality as they do in our minds. Likewise, our emotional reactions to traumatic events are not just fainting, laughing, and crying. That is merely surface, inside the reaction is much richer and much more overwhelming than a simple physical act.

The audience, however, does not see that; however, they can. The writer needs to be willing to take their story into the world of abstract to convey emotion, particularly in this day and age where subtext is not enough.

Yet, a story that is completely abstract can be as dull as a story that is completely set in stone-cold reality. This is why I pointed out Evangelion's structure. I feel comfortable in saying that Evangelion would not be as jarring or as stirring if it did not have its initial setup in the familiar. To paraphrase George Orwell, "it played by all the small rules, so that it could break all the big ones." Likewise, think of Thornton Wilder's The Skin of Our Teeth. What keeps us interested in the beginning part of the play is that so much of it is rooted in familiar understandable surroundings, yet at the same time there are many things going on that are quite frankly, absurd.

The current crop of plays (not to mention films and television shows) seem to be more focused on creating these moments that are so deeply set in reality that they kill our connections to the characters themselves. Everything is a situation, and we are never allowed access to the inner lives of characters--even when they are serving as narrator.

That is why, I'd like to suggest that all writers out there start imploding your narratives. Be willing to go into the abstract. Don't be afraid that the audience won't follow you, if you have anchored yourself with enough reality in the beginning, they will come along for the ride.