Captain America Civil War Analysis - Main Character Question

Some really interesting points here, and maybe the basis to find some universal points of agreement?

I agree with all of this.

I could be wrong about this, but my reasoning is that both Steve and Tony suddenly find themselves in the uncomfortable position of being forced to represent the two sides of the conflict. Neither asked to be the leader (Steve doesn’t want to lead the opposition – he just wants to go find Bucky, and Tony doesn’t ask to lead the pro-accord side – Ross forces him into the position or threatens to have Steve imprisoned/killed).

Again, I might be misapplying Dramatica terminology, but note that it’s about how to minimize casualties. Ross/Tony/Accords say that you do this by forcing superheroes to become soldiers under the command of a committee, Steve says that would likely increase casualties because they wouldn’t be able to go where they believe they’re most needed.

Let’s test that:

Exactly. They believe the Avengers need oversight regardless of Steve’s arguments to the contrary. In what way are they not in a fixed attitude?

Actually, I don’t think this is true. This is an aside as it doesn’t strengthen my argument one way or another, but note that T’Challa breaks the law to go after Winter Soldier, and when Natasha says they’ll catch him as directed by the U.N., he says, “Don’t bother, I’ll kill him myself.” T’Challa doesn’t support the accords – he believes in his right to do what must be done regardless of anyone else’s rules or opinions.

Mostly I think that’s fair, but note that they went to the trouble of having Tony ask Peter why he does what he does. Peter replies that someone with his abilities simultaneously can’t do what they want (it would be wrong for him to play football now because he couldn’t before), and yet has a responsibility to act (if someone with my powers sits back then I’m to blame for what happens.) I’m not saying this is strong evidence that the OS is in fixed attitude, but it is interesting that the writers felt this was necessary to include as Tony’s litmus test for whether to recruit him: it’s only after Peter answers this way that Tony tells him he’s in.

I wouldn’t confuse setup with Storyform. During this initial time we’re getting all the warnings and debate over what will happen if they do or don’t sign. That conflict (and it is a conflict: the avengers are breaking up over whether to sign) then gets derailed by a new conflict in the form of the bombing.

I wonder if the Russos desire to have the audience able to switch sides repeatedly might be evidence of dual storyforms?

As to Zemo, the argument for him being the protagonist is the same as the argument that every single Bond villain is the protagonist, along with the villains in all Dan Brown novels and movies, and almost all horror films. It’s the villain who’s got the plan, who’s trying to move the story forward towards a particular end, and everyone else trying to stop them. I don’t think that’s a compelling argument when the story goal seems to be to stop the evil plan in all those cases.

I can’t see how to defend this proposition. Steve reacts to every problem by running out and trying to fix it externally. He even says to us early on: “If I see a situation go south, I have to deal with it. Sometimes I wish I could just sit back” Tony then says, “No you don’t”, to which Steve smiles. “No, I guess I don’t.”

Where is there any evidence whatsoever that Steve tries to resolve problems by changing himself internally?

Tony, on the other hand, reacts to his guilt by changing himself: I guess I can’t be a superhero anymore. I need to let other people tell me what to do. Yes, he fights Steve and the others, but only because they give him no choice. It’s not his preferred way of dealing with things.

So, given that we’ve all written the equivalent of a book debating these questions now, am I right to think that this is a very challenging movie to analyze?

Truthfully–having done this for over twenty years and preparing the hundreds of storyforms found on Dramatica.com and my own site–I found it one of the easiest to analyze. That’s why I was getting so frustrated in the beginning because it’s one of the more common and prevalent storyforms in Western culture.

Problems of Avoidance and Solutions of Pursuit play out everywhere–more so, in films and stories from the mid 20th-century.

One corollary that I wonder if you’d agree with is that a failure on the part of the writer to make problematic within the story that which is problematic to audiences in our world can create an inability for them to become immersed in the story. Write about drunk driving, sexual violence, racism, or other issues pertinent to the audience as if they aren’t problems and you get in all kinds of trouble.

It depends on the skill level of the writer—you can make anything palatable if you tell a convincing enough argument. History is full of examples of people taking advantage of and subjugating others through telling a compelling and convincing story.

That said, you’ll probably sell more books and more tickets and more subscriptions to Netflix the more socially acceptable your story.

It all depends on your purpose in telling a story.

Am I correct that there’s often both a set of problems unique to each throughline (e.g. OS might be about a war while the MC might be dealing with their own leg wound) as well as a perspective on the OS itself? In other words, in the classic Dramatica example of seeing a war (OS: from the top of the hill, MC: from the soldier’s POV, IC: from their opponent’s POV, RS: from the relationship between the two) we’re really looking at “a war” (the OS) from four different perspectives.

The “war” is the inequity at the center of it all. The four Throughlines are what that war looks like from different points of view.

Think of it this way—the real inequity of a narrative sits at the center of all four Throughlines. It can’t be described accurately because an inequity is not a real thing—it’s an imbalance between things. So the four perspectives draw a clear enough picture of the inequity that the mind appreciates the meaning of the problem solving and justification going on around the inequity.

Right, but if Cap’s throughline isn’t about Tony, then why would him withholding the fact that Winter Soldier killed Tony’s parents violate the “I know what I know” principle? Or am I reading this backwards, and what you’re saying is that because Cap withholding knowledge of the death of Tony’s parents isn’t central to Cap’s throughline, therefore Cap can’t be the MC?

I would say closer to your “backwards” example. Cap withholding knowledge isn’t central to Cap’s Throughline so it’s not endemic of a problematic personal perspective for him. It does however reinforce the idea of Tony as I because of the guilt he feels around his parent’s death.

And Cap’s Throughline is not about Tony—it’s about impacting and challenging others because of a Fixed Attitude about how the world should work.

what’s a simple way of expressing the Dramatica principle on what a Main Character is allowed to withhold from the audience while still being the Main Character?

If withholding plays into the perspective of their Throughline (like the examples above), then by all means do it. Personally, I think the less you do this the better as it by definition isolates your Audience from a point-of-view you want them to take. But if it can amplify the inequity in question, then I would say go for it.

I’ll address the idea of the OS in Manipulation as others have suggested the same here and in email. In short, the problems of the narrative pursue the characters as they would in either a Stop/Good story or a Start/Bad Story—the odds being overwhelming rather than surmountable if they were chasing the problems—as described in my article How to Tell If Your Main Character Faces Overwhelming or Surmountable Odds. In addition, the manipulations are not problematic in and of themselves, the activities are.

The problem with Cap as a Main Character is that I have yet to hear a convincing and sound argument (concerning all four other Throughlines) about any personal problems that warrant a different storyform. There might be pieces of storyforms from previous films or setup for future storyforms or we may be passing through his storyform–but we’re not talking about those storyforms–we’re discussing the complete one that was presented in the film.

To correct some of the inaccuracies above:

I wouldn’t confuse setup with Storyform. During this initial time we’re getting all the warnings and debate over what will happen if they do or don’t sign. That conflict (and it is a conflict: the avengers are breaking up over whether to sign)

This is not Dramatica’s definition of conflict, this is your definition of conflict. Breaking up is not a problem–there is no actual inequity in deciding what will happen if they sign or not sign. I can see a writer thinking that is the definition of conflict because it helps them subjectively understand what each character is thinking–but from a Dramatica perspective there is no inequity there, no conflict as portrayed within the Dramatica storyform.

Only clearing that up because you use the word Storyform, but then use it incorrectly.

As to Zemo, the argument for him being the protagonist is the same as the argument that every single Bond villain is the protagonist, along with the villains in all Dan Brown novels and movies, and almost all horror films. It’s the villain who’s got the plan, who’s trying to move the story forward towards a particular end, and everyone else trying to stop them. I don’t think that’s a compelling argument when the story goal seems to be to stop the evil plan in all those cases.

It’s not the same argument that every single Bond villain is the Protagonist. You’re confusing villain for Protagonist and Antagonist and you’re making broad sweeping statements that simply aren’t true when it comes to Dramatica. My article The Tragedy of James Bond the Antagonist addresses Melanie’s inaccuracy in regards to a practical application of Protagonist and Antagonist.

Melanie is the only one putting forth the idea that every single Bond villain is the Protagonist. No one who has actively worked with Dramatica for two decades agrees with this notion. I don’t. Chris Huntley, the co-creator of Dramatica, doesn’t. No one does. And the reason why is because Melanie is making a blanket statement of motivation without even looking at the context of the actual narrative. She’s simply looking at the motivation to pursue–or Initiative–as seen from the context of theory creator–not within the context of the story being analyzed or created.

You identify the Goal of a story by looking towards the initial inequity. In Captain America: Civil War this is Scarlett Witch’s inadvertent killing of humanitarian workers. The pursuit to resolve that inequity by Stopping the Avengers is led by Zemo. There are other people leading the charge for the Accords and so on, but the true driver to resolve the issue of superheroes doing whatever they want is Zemo.

That is why he is the Protagonist from an objective Overall Story Throughline perspective.

Not entirely certain I agree with @jhull 's assessment that Zemo is the Protagonist but he does seem to be the only one to have the Pursue characteristic. It would explain why the Russos wanted you to be able to switch sides and side with either character with regards to what is the best course of action by having the villain push the story forward. Thus depending on which side you believe in will determine how you believe the Zemo threat could have been observed, stopped and how similar scenarios could be prevented.

It’s not what side you believe in, it’s all about the inequity of the Overall Story Throughline and who is working towards resolving that inequity and who is working to prevent it.

The drive to prevent Stopping the Avengers from doing whatever they want and for everyone to reconsider is Captain America. The entire scene of him fighting against German SAS in the stairwell is nothing but Prevent/Avoid. Everything he is doing is to prevent Bucky’s capture while preventing loss of life for the police. While I was watching it I was thinking this is an AWESOME display of “good guy” Antagonism. It’s 100% Avoid from an objective point-of-view. It’s nothing near Pursuit in context of the inequity driving the story.

I’ll try move this over to the discussion about Protagonist and Antagonist within the film as well as moving the bottom into a discussion about the Relationship Story Throughline, so we can stay on track with the discussion regarding the Main Character Throughline. I realize discussing this occasionally requires looking at other areas of the storyform, but it will keep down on the mileage for each post if we can stick to the topic at hand.

I could be wrong about this, but my reasoning is that both Steve and Tony suddenly find themselves in the uncomfortable position of being forced to represent the two sides of the conflict. Neither asked to be the leader (Steve doesn’t want to lead the opposition – he just wants to go find Bucky, and Tony doesn’t ask to lead the pro-accord side – Ross forces him into the position or threatens to have Steve imprisoned/killed).

This is not a Relationship Story Throughline of Situation. There is no problematic external situation described here within their friendship. “Representing two side of the conflict” does not describe Situation, it describes the Main Character Throughline perspective and the Influence Character Throughline perspective which is already accounted for in the Dramatica model.

This is again looking at the word Situation as something the characters discuss and think about–“Neither asked to be the leader”–rather than understanding how Situation works as an inequity within a story. The very best way to understand a problematic Situation in context of a Relationship Story Throughline is to observe the several analyses online at Dramatica.com and my own site, Narrative First, that describe this dynamic in greater detail.

Circling back to the idea that there are “two” storyforms within Captain America: Civil War, it’s really clear what the storyform is around Tony as the Main Character with his personal issues, everyone with their own drive to prevent (Avoid) the Avengers continuing on, Cap with his influential attitude driven by his feelings for Bucky, and the dysfunctional friendship going on between Tony and Steve.

If there is a second complete storyform between Steve and Bucky, what is the nature of both their perspectives, who changes to adopt the other’s point-of-view, how do these individual perspectives differ from the Overall Story Throughline perspective, and what is it about their friendship that is problematic that exists outside of the Overall Story Throughline perspective?

Harsylka: Steve is a very clear Be-er to me so Tony must be a Do-er.
Seb: I can’t see how to defend this proposition. Steve reacts to every problem by running out and trying to fix it externally. He even says to us early on: “If I see a situation go south, I have to deal with it. Sometimes I wish I could just sit back” Tony then says, “No you don’t”, to which Steve smiles. “No, I guess I don’t.”

It’s easy to defend because Steve’s reaction to running out and trying to fix problems externally is problematic to everyone, so therefore it doesn’t apply to either a Main Character or Influence Character Throughline perspective. His comment “No, I guess I don’t” is a problematic Fixed Attitude that impacts and challenges everyone uniquely–especially Tony and his point-of-view.

Where is there any evidence whatsoever that Steve tries to resolve problems by changing himself internally?

There isn’t, because Harsylka was not talking about Steve’s Be-er approach to resolving his personal problems by adapting or changing, he was talking about his problematic impact as an Influence Character. Well, really he was on the fence, but he was speaking of problematic within one of the individual perspectives of either You or I.

Tony, on the other hand, reacts to his guilt by changing himself: I guess I can’t be a superhero anymore. I need to let other people tell me what to do. Yes, he fights Steve and the others, but only because they give him no choice. It’s not his preferred way of dealing with things.

If you want to use Dramatica correctly, you need to start seeing story points as problematic from an objective point-of-view. The subjective view you continue to present bounces around to the point where a cohesive and solid argument for all four perspectives can’t be made at once.

It’s not about his preferred way of dealing with things, it’s what is problematic for him personally. His approach to those things personally will naturally fall into an external or internal approach because that is where his point-of-view sees the problem.

I’m also not certain that Tony is defined by Situation, not certain how he resolves his personal issues by doing but Steve is a very clear Be-er to me so Tony must be a Do-er.

Tony is the guy responsible for building Ultron. His parents died before he can tell them goodbye or that he loved them. He is stuck in a Situation he cannot get out of–a situation that causes him great personal anxiety and requiring some sort of inequity resolution.

Building a machine to help him revisit that painful memory so that he can work through the traumatic guilt he felt for the lack of respect he showed them is absolutely the kind of thing a Do-er Main Character would do.

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I’m going to refrain from commenting on the other points because they’re all clearly stated and, at a certain point, my inability to fully wrap my head around the is my own personal issue and not necessarily illuminating for anyone else.

Since you asked . . . :wink:

I’m assuming this second storyform within the movie has the following throughlines and domains. I fully expect you to expertly show these as flawed, but do know that I’ve tried at least to follow the principles you’ve laid out, however flawed my conclusions.

OS of manipulation (Zemo manipulates everyone into self-destructing: “An empire toppled by its enemies can rise again. But one which crumbles from within? That’s dead… forever.”)

RS of activity (Almost every scene with Cap and Bucky in it is about the two of them fighting either against each other or together: note the big end clash against Tony where they fight seamlessly together as brothers-in-arms).

MC of situation (Steve is a man ripped from his own time, forced to live in an era where nothing is familiar and everything integral to his life and experience is at odds with everything else around him. His friends are all dead except for Peggy who they make a big deal of killing off in this movie, and Bucky. Take Steve out of 2016 and put him back in his own time – or even back in the ice – and he’d be unstuck.)

IC of fixed attitude. You and I have discussed on a number of occasions that it needn’t be the IC who is themselves trying to push the MC to change, but that the very fact of their existence or the way others see them can create that pressure. Everyone believes that Bucky is an unredeemable assassin – even Bucky believes that at times. This constantly challenges Steve’s view of his oldest friend as a decent and heroic individual.

To now answer your question directly:

[quote=“jhull, post:120, topic:719”]
If there is a second complete storyform between Steve and Bucky, what is the nature of both their perspectives[/quote]

Steve’s perspective is of the Bucky he knew, and the utter conviction that no amount of brainwashing and conditioning – or even all the terrible things Bucky’s done – can change the essential nature. Bucky’s perspective is coming from the memories of having killed all those people (“Do you even remember killing my parents?” Tony asks. “I remember everyone I killed,” Bucky replies.)

Bucky changes to adopt Steve’s point of view. He sees how different he is from the other Winter Soldiers that are still in the tubes at the secret compound (the ones Zemo kills) Bucky goes from believing he has no value as a person, to looking towards a future where maybe he can overcome the terrible controls that were put on him – as we see in the scene in Wakanda.)

You might – might – choose to argue the opposite, I suppose, and say that since Bucky goes into the tube at the end and Steve accepts his decision that it’s Steve who’s perspective has changed, and he now sees the situation through Bucky’s eyes as someone who can’t trust their own mind.

Neither of these perspectives is about the Civil War or Zemo’s broader manipulations. Both of those aspects of the OS are like looking down at a chess board: who is on what side, what pieces are being moved. Steve and Bucky’s perspectives come from the “I” (I’m stuck in the wrong time and I’ve lost almost everything that was integral to me) and the “You” (The way you insist that the person you were died threatens to take away my one connection to the past).

Let me know if any of that is actually a reasonable application of Dramatica principles!

OS of manipulation (Zemo manipulates everyone into self-destructing: “An empire toppled by its enemies can rise again. But one which crumbles from within? That’s dead… forever.”)

For an Overall Story Throughline to be in Psychology, the actual process of HOW people think needs to be shown to be problematic.

Instead of Psychology—or Manipulation, which is less accurate and leads to all kinds of misattribution as you can see, it can be easier to think of the Concerns underneath the Domain. In other words what is problematic about developing a plan, playing a role, changing one’s nature, and conceiving an idea, that everyone contends with throughout the entire story?

One man manipulating is not an Overall Story Throughline of Manipulation. It might be a Main Character Throughline of Manipulation or it might be an Influence Character Throughline of Manipulation, but for an Overall Story Throughline to be concerned with Manipulations that would mean everyone in the story is going through some kind of psychological dysfunction.

This doesn’t sound like Captain America: Civil War to me.

MC of situation (Steve is a man ripped from his own time, forced to live in an era where nothing is familiar and everything integral to his life and experience is at odds with everything else around him. His friends are all dead except for Peggy who they make a big deal of killing off in this movie, and Bucky. Take Steve out of 2016 and put him back in his own time – or even back in the ice – and he’d be unstuck.)

This would mean that Captain America: Civil War is all about Steve Rogers trying to get back in time.

Like Marty in Back to the Future.

As a Do-er, this would mean Steve specifically tries to resolve this personal problem by taking external action. What does Steve do to try and get back in time?

So I won’t belabour the points because I think if I were looking at this correctly you’d probably have already indicated you saw a way in which an OS of Manipulation might be valid, but to answer your question:

I could see several of those being viable concerns: the plans people develop to prevent civilian casualties are all inherently flawed and create conflict between the characters, the conflicting ways people think of how a superhero should behave or the role they play in society, . . . I’d have to go deeper in the other throughlines as well to identify the concerns across all four. But on its face I’m not having trouble seeing how people think being the source of the conflicts.

I was being needlessly reductive in my effort to be direct. I figured saying, But one can see the way people approach the problems of civilian casualties: jumping to conclusions, allowing fear, guilt and self-doubt to lead them to draconian solutions, being pig-headed like Steve. There are so many points in the movie where if people would just stop and think instead of rushing to judgments about what to do that they could develop a better plan.

To me it looks as if they are: they continuously arrive at the wrong answers and that makes a mess of things. I’d draw a parallel with Tootsie (that famous superhero film ;)) in the Dramatica analysis that describes:

Michael thinks that holding to his exacting standards and never compromising is the key to being a successful actor; Jeff thinks that writing issue oriented, quirky plays are the only type worth writing, but his plays are commercial flops; Sandy thinks once she has sex with her men friends they’ll leave her; John Van Horn thinks as the leading man on “Southwest General” he should kiss all of the actresses, and makes sure to manipulate every situation to accomplish this; Julie thinks by not demanding more from her relationships she won’t risk being lonely; Ron thinks he can charm any woman he meets.

Steve thinks that holding to his extreme sense of personal accountability and independence are necessary to fulfilling his duty as a hero; Ross thinks that superheroes have to be reined in and operate like soldiers; Tony’s guilt leads him to think that anything is better than what they’ve been doing and, as a result, accepts orders he has trouble with just because he’s so determined to go along with the accords, T’Challa thinks that Bucky running means he must be guilty…etc.

Am I incorrectly applying the analysis of Tootsie here?

You make an excellent point, but could it be then that in regards to the MC throughline that Steve is a be-er – trying to adapt himself internally to this new time rather than running around trying to find a way to use technology, magic, or one of those tesseracts to find a way back to his own time?

Even if I’m wrong about that, I’m interested in whether you think it’s viable that a character like Steve, who in almost every other way is a do-er who tries to go out and solve problems externally, could be a be-er in terms of his own personal problems?

Oh, for sure.

Consider Jason Bourne (Matt Damon) in the first movie, The Bourne Identity. As Protagonist he certainly goes to out to directly solve problems externally, but his personal problems center around his failing memories and evidence that he’s quite capable of doing horrible things.

I’ll explain the problem with seeing the OS in Manipulations later, but in short–“inherently flawed plans” do not describe an OS Concern of Conceptualizing (Developing a Plan). There needs to be conflict in the actual planning in the conceptualizing or in the envisioning. The actual process of how they think needs to be inequitable - not the plans themselves.

As with Impulsive Reponses and the Preconscious, I think this is a matter of the new “easier” terminology furthering a misunderstanding over what these terms actually mean. Developing a Plan sounds like the plan is faulty and causes conflict–but that’s not a Concern of Conceptualizing.

Same with “conflicting ways people think of how a superhero should behave or the role they play in society“–its not how they think people should behave or the role they play, it’s the actual process of behaving that needs to create conflict. Being probably communicates this better than Playing a Role.

The new and improved “easier” terminology moves one step closer to Gists and therefore one step closer to storytelling–which is, I think, where a lot of the confusion here is coming into play.

If nothing else, this is definitely motivating me to return to the original terminology.

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I tend to agree in that “Developing a plan” has a pretty specific meaning and yet it’s only one possible example (or aspect) of “Conceptualizing”. I’m not sure about preconscious because it kind of goes in the other direction: introducing a word that has almost no generally understood meaning but refers to a psychoanalytic term (and probably doesn’t quite reflect that meaning either.)

One of the things I’ve taken away from this is that I really don’t have a handle on the difference between storyforming and storytelling. In my mind, it was about defining the broad categories of sources of conflicts, but, as with the term “inequity”, I think it refers to things that are actually quite difficult to describe as statements.

I’m also constantly finding myself experiencing cognitive dissonance with the idea of the storyform having a kind of primacy and being seen as concrete or objective compared with the storytelling – the latter feels infinitely more real, concrete, and objective to me. A similar issue I know affects certain literary authors, for whom the individual line of prose – the specific word choices, ordering, and punctuation, is as concrete and integral to what gets called “the story” as any character or plot.

So, back to the fundamentals of Dramatica for me, I think!

11 posts were split to a new topic: Conceptualizing Conceptualizing: Understanding Dramatica’s Term Developing a Plan

11 posts were merged into an existing topic: Conceptualizing Conceptualizing: Understanding Dramatica’s Term Developing a Plan

2 posts were merged into an existing topic: Conceptualizing Conceptualizing: Understanding Dramatica’s Term Developing a Plan

Hey guys,
I finally took the time to watch Captain America: Civil War. I’m a “virgin” viewer for this series, since I’ve never seen any of the Avenger or Iron Man or Captain America films before.

I hope I’m not confusing things here, but I actually agree with Sebastien that Cap is the Main Character. :scream: Here is my reasoning:

  • I went into it expecting Tony Stark to be the MC, since I figured Jim would be right
  • Yet I couldn’t find a single moment in the film where I felt like I was seeing things from Tony’s perspective. I felt like I was always looking at him – the You perspective.
  • The holographic thing about his parents at the beginning did not feel personal at all. I felt like I was one of the MIT audience members, looking at Tony.
  • Even at the end when Tony saw the 1991 video with Bucky killing his parents, it did not feel personal. At first I was confused, it seemed to come out of nowhere because I’d forgotten Tony had lost his parents (since it hadn’t been mentioned since that forgettable MIT scene). Then I was afraid of his reaction, but it felt like “crap, what are You going to do now?”.
  • I felt like I shared Cap’s perspective throughout the film, especially at the funeral and in regards to Bucky. I always saw Bucky with Cap’s eyes. Whenever Bucky was fighting Cap, I was scared of him. Whenever Cap was trying to protect Bucky, I was afraid for him.
    I think “protecting an old friend” describes Cap’s throughline pretty well. Other characters helped him out in this, but none of them did it out of a personal connection to Bucky.
  • I don’t think “not telling Tony that Bucky killed your parents” was a secret kept from the viewers at all, because that “not telling” wasn’t a part of this story, it was part of the backstory. Cap could have told him that years ago, couldn’t he? Unless I misunderstood, nothing actually occurred during this story that was kept from viewers…

I don’t think the dead parents were part of Tony Stark’s issues/perspective at all. That was part of the OS, the thing that Zemo’s plot hinged on.

That said, I definitely agree 100% that OS is Activity/Obtaining. :slight_smile:

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@mlucas @decastell @jhull

I know its got to be incredibly frustrating at times and might seem like this discussion is going in circles but its highlighting things for me that are still very hard to pin down in dramatica and even if things sometimes seem they are just being told in a slightly different way its giving me a lot to chew on.

@mlucas I appreciate you going out to watch the film, I’m planning on rewatching it shortly as its been too long. I do see where you’re coming from.

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@mlucas Nice. Exactly what I said earlier in the thread. Not exactly point by point but I was of the same opinion as you.

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I re-read some of the older posts and can see that how I described Cap’s MC Throughline (my previous post) is basically the same as Sebastien’s description, which Jim argued against as not being separate enough from the OS.

It may be that I suffer from the same misunderstanding of Dramatica as Sebastien, but I still think this “protecting his oldest friend” works for the MC Throughline. (Not as MC Activity, but as a general concept for the throughline.) To me, it’s all in the story-weaving:

  • You as author create an MC throughline “Cap’s need to protect his oldest friend and relative, Buck Rogers”
  • Then you create an OS that among other things involves, “everyone is trying to find the supposed bomber, the Winter Soldier”

Then when you go to weave the throughlines together you realize the story would be a lot cooler if Cap’s oldest friend was actually the Winter Soldier, and toss out the Buck Rogers idea (but keep Buck(y) as a nickname for the Winter Soldier just to remind you :wink: ).

The MC Throughline in this story thus ends up very tightly woven into the OS, but it can still feel like a separate “I” perspective.


I’m certainly willing to believe I’m wrong here… But if Cap is the IC and Tony the MC, that means the film utterly failed to communicate those throughlines properly, since I felt the opposite even when I was trying to see Tony as “I” and Cap as “You”. And that’s strange, because the story felt pretty solid for a superhero flick.

The only thing I can think of is that, because the story’s message was essentially that Cap was right (the Accords were “bad” or misguided), certain viewers like @decastell, @khodu and myself sensed that from the beginning and naturally aligned ourselves with Cap’s perspective. While @jhull was able to remain impartial.

I think it would be great for the Dramatica community to see this film analyzed at a user’s group meeting!

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@mlucas I definitely second that Idea. A Dramatica users group analysis is in order. The story is full of really good lessons.

Oh no…

LOL.

How is protecting his oldest friend separate from his function as Antagonist in the Overall Story of Activities?

How do those issues tie in with the secret information he withholds from us the Audience?

If he is in Fixed Attitude, explain the Concerns from a Main Character point-of-view?

If I’m incorrect, I’m more than willing to adjust—I’m just still waiting for strong arguments to answer these questions beyond “feelings”.

Without wanting to reignite this whole thing . . .

My sense is still that there are two throughlines, but I’ve laid those out before so if they aren’t warranted then they just aren’t.

Assuming one storyform, then to me the simple fact that we see the story unfold primarily through Cap’s eyes to me makes him the main character. Again, though, I think there are enough important moments that we’re being forced to see things through Tony’s eyes that it keeps feeling like a second storyform in the same way as Jerry McGuire (to me, anyway.)

Given the whole thing about initial driver having primacy over defining the storyform, I understand why the OS has to be in Activities and why under that principle Zemo is the protagonist.

My sense now is that Cap is the MC and in Situation (“A man out of time”). His personal problems don’t stem from the things he believes (which are how he connects to the OS), but rather of the fact that he was pulled from his own time. He loses Peggy Carter - the one person he still had when he found himself in this time, and then is at risk of losing Bucky. There’s pretty much nothing for him in this time period except his best friend and the Avengers, and both are at risk of being taken away. In terms of his attitudes, they all worked perfectly fine in his own time. The emphasis made in the movie is that this isn’t World War II anymore. Steve’s living in the future now, and the future is too complicated for him.

Tony’s problems don’t stem from his situation of his parents being dead – they come from his attitude about the kid who got killed because of him in Sokovia. Furthermore, he’s a total be-er to me. He tries as hard as possible not to have to take action in the movie. He just wants to adapt to the new regime set out in the Accords and do what he’s told. He only takes action because Cap’s do-er actions (running off to help Bucky, chasing after Zemo…etc.) force him to.

To Jim’s questions:

Because him protecting Bucky has nothing to do with trying to stop everyone from ending the Avengers. The initial driver as you identified it is the Scarlet Witch incident. The story solution is to break up the Avengers. Capturing Bucky really doesn’t move that one way or another. They could have shot him dead in act 1 and you’d still have the conflict over the Accords.

Part of protecting Bucky is not admitting that Bucky killed Tony’s parents. This is a lousy situation for Cap to be in: his oldest friend is responsible for the deaths of his best friend in this time.

As I said above, I don’t think he’s in Fixed Attitude. He’s been pulled out of his own time and is stuck in the future. Send him back to the 1940’s and he’d be fine.

I just want to emphasize again that I think the decisions the filmmakers made to force the audience to see both sides (in effect, to make it sometimes feel like “I” is Steve and other times that “I” is Tony), creates cognitive dissonance between the objective storyform of the script and the subjective experience of watching the movie. If they’d made Whiplash with the intent that we see things from the teacher’s perspective half the time, we might still have the same storyform but would, I think, be confused as hell.

But it does—he’s protecting Bucky because Zemo is setting him up to took like the guy that set off the bomb. That would be part of the misunderstanding and disinformation of the first half of the storyform—with the OS in Activity.

Tony’s problems don’t stem from his situation of his parents being dead – they come from his attitude about the kid who got killed because of him in Sokovia

How is his attitude about the kid being killed problematic? If he was flippant about it and didn’t care I could maybe see that as being an influence character problem, but I’m not sure that was what was going on.

Except what does setting up Bucky as the one who set up the bomb really have to do with the story goal of ending the Avengers in order to end the inequity introduced by Scarlet Witch? If they’d caught Bucky right away, it wouldn’t have moved us closer or farther from the story goal. I can understand why you’d say the Scarlet Witch event sets up the inequity, but then that has to follow through. Bucky could have been shot dead, captured and tried, set free, or turned into a jelly bean and none of that would’ve affected whether the Avengers split up. This is what I mean when I say the Accords are critical to the story of how to resolve the inequity introduced by the initial driver.

Did Zeno have anything to do with Buckys original assignment in killing Tony’s parents? When do we see him first in the film? (I don’t remember…)