How to know when a story doesn't have a storyform?

writing
#1

Do you have any advise how I can see what my story is lacking when it seems impossible not finding the right storyform?

My problem: I have written a 1st draft for a Road Movie month ago based on a storyform which I want to change now. When I developed the story form, my Dramatica knowledge was much more limited.

But after trying to get a new storyform (to start the 2nd draft) it always goes like: Yes, I have it - but the next day its like - oh no, the issue doesn’t work or the problem or its something else but not …

I am close to throw the story away …

…but to have also some fun at my desk, I started to rework the storyform for the 2nd draft of a Comedy … here, every single item works well. It goes like: Yes, thats the conflict, yes thats the issue, yes, thats the solution … even the next day, its still ok and works and I am able to find meaningful illustrations without contradicting myself.

Obviously - if you look at with Dramatica eys - there is something in the Comedy story, what isn’t in the Road Movie story.

But what is it? Could be the genre or missing story points?

BTW: I just could write the 2nd draft of the Road Movie and doesn’t care too much about Dramatica Storyforms. But my plan was, to make it fit, as the Road Movie is my first story I wrote with Dramatica.

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#2

I’m sure this is going to sound like heresy but does what you have work? If so, screw the storyform.

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#3

Ditto…and putting it aside for awhile was recommended to me in the past.

#4

@jassnip After the first draft, use the software to give it a proper skeleton(storyform). It’ll fill out nicely because you’ll have a detailed sense of direction.

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#5

I think the 4 throughlines are the key. Do you have em? Which leads to the question: how do you know you have them?..

I think there is a spectrum. Some movies technically have all 4 even though you have to squint and turn your head sideways to see it. You might have one of these “barely there” storyforms. These are not better or worse than the “more widely explored” stories. I only mention it because I often say there is not storyform when in fact there is a “barely there” storyform.

Many of these have an emphasized throughline and in some ways the other throughlines all look directly tied to it even though from a certain perspective they could be distinct. For example, I would call The Fugitive, Spotlight, The Usual Suspects, and Hamlet “tightly intertwined” stories that focus mainly on one throughline while the other throughlines are technically there beyond that throughline’s focus–but it’s not as obvious to me compared to other stories.

At the other extreme, some stories have really distinct throughlines that are harder to conflate. For example, Michael Clayton, Groundhog Day, Rocky, To Kill a Mockingbird (the book more so than the movie), Witness, Lone Star, Field of Dreams, and Silence of the Lambs. In these stories, it’s clearer to me that, for example, Scout’s annoyance with Calpurnia is clearly the MC throughline while the trial with Atticus, Tom, and Ewell is the OS, etc.

TL;DR If you can make a case that you have 4 throughlines (the most essential part of a complete story that separates it from a tale), then you probably have a storyform. The rest is for the DUG!

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#6

But if the story is told satisfactorily, already, then nothing else is needed to be done. Also, it was recommended by experts not to use something very important to one as a tool for practice and learning.