Comments | sartorias: Payoffs and Reader Expectation

sartorias

Payoffs and Reader Expectation

Oct 17, 2008 06:17

The other day I made a post about story payoffs. burger_eater made a comment to the effect that he's disappointed when the character he's invested in doesn't gain respect from the story. I asked him to explain that, and he did.
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payoffs, writing: characterization, reader expectation, tv, links, discussion

Comments 110

ursule October 17 2008, 15:38:48 UTC

Reminds me of these old musings:

http://ursule.livejournal.com/27272.html

sartorias October 17 2008, 15:56:21 UTC

That is awesome, especially your point about grieving, something I've instinctively responded to but not been conscious of, except as reactions. (I hated sixties films because no one reacted to deaths, for example.)

I'm going to edit to add a link.

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Re: beware of the tl;dr! sartorias October 17 2008, 15:49:16 UTC

The ending of Avatar was disappointing for that reason, and also the emotional arcs pointed up another way--and blam! We're shuffled into what seems to be correct alignment, with no emotional payoffs at all.

I too think that tragedy can be powerful and great. Hamlet--Macbeth--Aristotle had some good points to make about why tragedy works. But like you said, there needs to be a sense of justice. Arbitrariness may be cool and postmodern, but I find it dramatically disappointing.

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Re: beware of the tl;dr! sartorias October 17 2008, 17:23:39 UTC

Yeah...the emotional high point of Avatar was not Aang's epic battle and his final realization what he could do to win (that just seemed like "Finally!") but Zuko's hug with his uncle. that was the peak of the entire series for me. I thought he'd earned the right to stand there beside K at the end--a match that symbolized unity of all the peoples--but nope.

Thread 19

rysmiel October 17 2008, 15:43:49 UTC

Several people admitted to disappointment in Joss Whedon's penchant for sudden and pointless character deaths. It is argued, "Hey, real life has pointless death all the time!" to which I often see the response, "Yeah, but none of this is real life, it's drama. Therefore I find such stuff at best pretentious."

It depends on the context, really. There are books in the world with perfect Swiss-watch plots where every little piece fits in correctly, like Bridge of Birds and Dirk Gently's Holistic Detective Agency, but a lot of what makes those work for me is that the tone is not, necessarily, entirely realistic - Bridge of Birds feels to me to have a variety of fairy-tale structure to it ( ... )

sartorias October 17 2008, 15:52:04 UTC

Oh, I thoroughly agree. If the tone and setting signal realistic treatment, I'm ready for postmodern pointlessness, angsty misery and failure, yadda. I also get bored if the hero and heroine are wafted past the dangers just because they're heroes.

But if a story setup and tone signal one thing and deliver another, the writing needs to be so powerful it transcends expectations and delivers something better. Not something from another storyline, one I wouldn't have chosen. Some like that shock, though. I guess, as always, it depends.

kalimac October 17 2008, 16:07:43 UTC

You are perhaps the exact opposite of the people who scream in pain when a beloved character is killed off. I think they identify with the characters more than they love the story.

The absolute bottom of this was reached with the people who accused George Lucas of "betraying" the Star Wars universe (whose complete nature they had inferred from just one movie) because Luke lost a hand in battle in the second movie.

I mean, there are good reasons for critiquing there (for Vader to be Luke's father feels like a clumsy retcon), but to demand the heroes should be immune from bodily injury seems ridiculous. Besides, Luke immediately gets a perfect artificial hand (played by the actor's real hand), so no foul.

This connects to the reason why I always read the ends of books first... anderyn October 17 2008, 15:46:54 UTC

Back when I was a tweenager, I got this science fiction book from the library. I no longer remember the title or the author, but it was touted as the "coming of age" type of story. It began with the protagonist coming home as a young boy from some kind of trip to find that his family/home/colony had been laid waste. The rest of the book was all about his growing up, gaining vengeance, and then finding a new home, complete with wife, two point five kids, dog and rose-picket fenced cottage. All good, right? Nope. Because the end of the book featured him coming home to find that his home and family (and colony?) had been laid waste. Mirror scene and words to the first one of the book. I was so ANGRY and disappointed. I'd spent the whole book rooting for this person and then... their life and achievements were wasted ( ... )

Re: This connects to the reason why I always read the ends of books first... sartorias October 17 2008, 15:53:08 UTC

Me too, and that is exactly why I will read endings. (And I have trouble remembering about spoilers.)

Re: This connects to the reason why I always read the ends of books first... anderyn October 17 2008, 16:02:54 UTC

I don't mind spoilers myself. I prefer them, particularly for visual media such as movies and tv, because (a) I can't see so well, so knowing what's happening ahead of time can help me make sense of the murk on the screen; (b) I have some particular squicks and I prefer knowing ahead of time if they'll be triggered, so I can close my eyes. With books, it's more of a lessening of tension knowing what will happen so I can just relax and enjoy the story without worrying if things will go WRONG this time.

Re: This connects to the reason why I always read the ends of books first... asakiyume October 17 2008, 16:25:04 UTC

Precisely--this is how I feel, too.

Thread 16

kalimac October 17 2008, 16:01:31 UTC

When I read the bit in burger_eater's post I too thought immediately about Whedon's penchant for killing off semi-major characters unexpectedly, just to prove that in a deadly environment these things happen. A lot of viewers get very upset about these, but perhaps it's because they love the characters not wisely but too well.

I agree with your point about the expectations aroused by a comic tone: indeed, I just wrote a review of a work by Sir Arthur Sullivan with the observation that "you can’t possibly worry about the impending execution of most of the characters, because this is a comic opera, so everything's got to come out all right in the end."

However, the unfunniness to some people of black humor has nothing to do with the boringness of Kafka. Kafka isn't boring because his humor is black. Kafka is boring because he's boringI also have to agree with your strictures about Austen. I like Austen, but her biggest flaw is a tendency to tell a summary when she ought to show the event happening. She's capable of the most richly detailed ( ... )