From Ideas to Stories 2/2

I especially love reading or watching an original idea developed into a great story, which is a big reason why I love science fiction. Several such stories come to mind, a few of which came out -- or saw new light -- this year. A few, slightly older goodies (note: these are all movies).

First, a slightly older one: The Incredibles. According to the 'making of...' on the DVD, this story came to Pixar with a few similarities to the final incarnation, but much more generic. Essentially, a super hero story, where all the heroes were in the same family. Pixar, in their genius, developed the story much further, using some of the tried and true tropes (villain is created by hero, for example) but delved much more into the family side while adding their own great twist of heroes being outlawed (admittedly, this last one quickly became overdone in the superhero world, and almost all major superhero franchises incorporated such a story around this time). I particularly liked the way the kids dealt with, but hid, their powers at school, and the middle-aged, fat Mr. Incredible working for the man at an insurance agency. Overall, a strong idea made stronger by good story telling.

This year saw a UK production 'Attack the Block' released. I'll admit I debated seeing this because the characters in the trailers weren't very sympathetic and were, frankly, a bit annoying. But I did see it. And I really liked it. There were two things done particularly well in this story. The first is to take very unsympathetic characters (they mugged a woman in the first scene) and develop a story were they become sympathetic (the unsympathetic 'posers' were killed off). Even more interesting because it was an alien invasion sci-fi story, yet the character developement didn't suffer.

The second thing 'Attack the Block' did was to develop an original alien invasion story. Without giving away spoilers, it was a credit to the writers/producers to create this story line an to develop it in a manner consistant with setting--especially without resorting to gratuitous nudity. As you might gather, the story line is not 100% original, but it's rare enough to be uncommon, especially when previous attempts turned largely into farces with attractive, naked, killer women having sex with everyone.


Cowboys and Aliens, a recent movie based on a comic of a few years ago. I feel a bit bad commenting on this as I haven't seen it, so don't have first-hand opinions. The story seems inherently interesting, bringing in the ideas of aliens in the wild west.The imagination goes crazy. Unfortunately, according to the vast majority of critics, professional and casual, was that the movie (and book) stories were very poorly developed, not promising on almost any of the potential.

A movie just out which, again, I haven't yet seen. In Time poses the interesting and highly alegorical idea of time being a literal currency with salaries being paid in time, marked on your arm, and purchases being made in said time. Again, overwhelmingly, all critics have suggested that this was a great idea that simply wasn't developed to it's very high potential.

These examples lead directly from the last post and the realization that a great idea does not, itself, make a great story. Great writers will spend time analyzing their ideas from all angles, constantly asking themselves 'what if'. They will brainstorm how those ideas will affect society, then throw-out the first thoughts and dig deeper to more interesting ideas. They will also look at what have been called (by Charles Stross at the last Eastercon) 'secondary effects' of the idea. As one example, the rise of the smartphone with excellent large-screen image and quality camera gave rise to the highly unanticipated 'sexting'.

So the take home message is that, a great idea by itself can lead to a good, although more likely, mediocre, story. But with a bit more thought, that great idea can lead to an amazing story. Professional sci-fi authors will say, time and again, don't be satisfied with your first thoughts. Always dig deeper.