A post was split to a new topic: The Dark Horse: Main Character Throughline
A thought occurred to me this morning regarding this request for “steps” to correctly identify a storyform and a “coherent process.” I believe someone else mentioned storyforming felt more of a guessing game, and that perhaps these steps would help ease the discovery process.
The problem with focusing on the Prerequisites is that it makes the quality of your Analysis DEPENDENT upon the quality of those steps and the way in which they are presented in order to arrive at success. Looking for steps creates a co-dependent relationship between the analysis process and those “essential steps”.
When I suggest immersing oneself into the 300+ analyses, and the Users Group podcasts and videocasts, and the hundreds of articles and analyses I’ve written on my own site, I’m suggesting a Strategy for learning Dramatica–a strategy that worked for me and has worked for many others. Strategy and Analysis sit in a DYNAMIC pair relationship meaning they can tear each other down, OR in this case, make each other better (1+1=3).
For example, in the Mentorship Program I take students through the entire model by looking at films that share similar elements of structure. In this way, the student develops an intuitive understanding of narrative structure within the context of Dramatica. I suppose in some respects it is a juggling process–especially when it comes to balancing out four different perspectives at once–but that’s where I’ve found having that intuitive sense helps you figure out an accurate storyform quicker.
This is why I prefer discussing an overall Strategy for learning Dramatica, rather than simply listing out Prerequisites. (For those new to Dramatica, the ideas of Strategy, Analysis, and Prerequisites sit under the Concern of Gathering Information–or Learning–which is essentially what we are engaging in here. You can find a model of their relationships here: Dramatica Table of Story Elements
For the sake of clarity, I was thinking I should split this discussion up into a couple of different topics. Please try and keep comments and posts limited to the topic as best as you can. I know sometimes you might have to refer to the other topics, but at least this way it might be easier for someone to follow along and hopefully learn something about Dramatica.
This one will remain solely about the Main Character Throughline of Captain America: Civil War. The others will be:
- Domains and Throughlines of Captain America: Civil War
- Protagonist and Antagonist of Captain America: Civil War
- Goal and Consequence of Captain America: Civil War
- Relationship Story Throughline Captain America: Civil War
Let me know if I have missed anything, and I’ll create new topics.
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OK. So Main Character.
(and I’ll get back to The Dark Knight, Contender, and Serenity examples later).
In my estimation Tony Stark is the Main Character of Captain America: Civil War and his personal issues surround the guilt and responsibility he feels for creating Ultron and for killing many innocent people in Sokovia and most importantly–the guilt he feels for not saying goodbye to his parents before they were killed.
The character I believe who impacts and challenges Tony to think a different way and adopt an alternative perspective is Mr. Goody Two-Shoes Steve Rodgers (Captain America). I refer to him that way because I believe the story is specifically positioning him in a place where his Fixed Attitude impacts and challenges everyone else to reconsider their point-of-view.
I believe it his Feelings for Bucky as a friend (though occasionally it seems to border on something else. Google “shipping Bucky and Steve”…) that drives Steve’s throughline and eventually is the thing that forces Tony to stop Avoiding conflict and start Pursuing.
If you have an argument for another arrangement, please list it below and be sure to include references to where you see the Domain, how that Domain works in context of the Throughline, and the particular Problem at the core of that Throughline.
I’ll step back on this one and let others put forward their arguments for or against as I’m really keen to get your take on the issue of main characters knowing things the audience doesn’t as applied to Dark Knight, Contender, and Serenity, and I think that’ll have a strong impact on informing who the main character for Civil War is.
Actually, it would be great if you could put out your arguments for Main Character and Influence Character because that will lead into my explanation for your Dark Knight and Serenity examples.
OK so I’ll get to it. I think Cap is the MC. Tony is the IC.
Starting from the beginning, I feel the roles need to be flipped. Cap is still Fixed Attitude and Tony Situation.
Cap isn’t actively trying to get anyone to do anything. He just cares about his friend.
Tony on the other hand shows the team a digital dossier on the murdered boy I Sokovia. To influence their decision. Widow see’s the sense in his argument and immediately takes sides.
And with the theory, the IC is usually bothered with influencing the MC the most. Which is why Tony keeps going on about Cap signing the Accords at least once every act. Cap refuses, and Tony gets frustrated,and so he tries again and again. Steadfast resolve.
And with the RS being in psychology it makes sense. It has to do with Friendships. Tony and Cap predominantly. We see the downward spiral here. Cap and Bucky had no deviation or drama per se, so it isn’t so much about them.
Also for a movie so grand, we do have much more screen time with Cap. Usually it’s the IC that stays offscreen the most.
We see Tony directly influencing Spiderman. Cap was never shown trying to convince anybody. Night wing called on his behalf.
Hope this lends some clarity?
Sure, no problem. I’ll preface here by saying I’m going to include in my reasoning things that hopefully align with Dramatica principles but also things that are possibly completely irrelevant from a Dramatica point of view. This will allow for separating out the non-Dramatica considerations (or re-stating them more accurately within the Dramatica model.)
1. In this movie, MC and IC are sometimes muddled.
I’m starting here because I think it helps explain in part why there’s so much debate about this. Despite being called “Captain America: Civil War”, you could just as easily (and possibly more accurately) call it “Avengers: Civil War”. The Avengers movies, like the comics from which they’re derived, tend to be that most dastardly of things, “ensemble” stories.
In some scenes in the movie, the main character appears to be Steve Rogers: when he’s at the table seeing the footage that makes Scarlet Witch start to cry, “Enough,” he says, both troubled by what he’s seen and trying to look out for his people. We’re not watching Cap through Tony’s eyes, we’re right there along with him. The “I” is Steve Rogers. What is Tony doing here? Pressuring him to change his approach: “I can live with whatever restrictions they want to put on us. Why can’t you?”
Other times, the main character appears to be Tony: when he’s confronted by the woman who’s son died because of the Avengers. We’re seeing the story through his POV in that moment, wrestling with what Tony’s wrestling with.
So, all I’m saying here is that it sometimes appears as if the MC throughline ends up being a handoff between Steve and Tony as we varyingly switch to their POV’s. It creates confusion – not just in terms of analyzing the story, but sometimes just when watching the movie. I think this is actually intentional on the part of the Russo brothers: they want to make it difficult for us to empathize too strongly with the point of view of either character, so they obfuscate who it is by constantly switching the sense of who’s experiencing the problems first-hand and who’s pressuring the other to change the approach (i.e. “I” and “you” seem to get swapped around)
2. If I’ve got to choose, then Steve Rogers is the MC and Tony is the IC
Here are reasons, some dumb, some hopefully not:
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We spend most of the movie with Cap, not with Tony. This is a function of pure math of onscreen time (i.e. “turn off the sound and what do you see?”)
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Jim mentioned the idea that the audience knows what the MC knows. While I have issues with this (based on Dark Knight, Serenity, and The Contender), it seems to me that Tony keeps a lot more secrets from the audience than Steve does. Tony’s manipulated all these things in the background such as having Vision subtly hold Scarlet Witch prisoner (we don’t find this out until Vision is forced to admit it – Tony hides it from us), Tony puts together a plan to stop Steve from escaping with Bucky which we don’t know about until he suddenly ambushes them at the airport – unlike Steve who’s told us his plan to steal the Avengers quinjet to get them out of the country.
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The movie’s called “Captain America: Civil War” and in every one of those movies, the main character has been Captain America. It ain’t called “Tony Stark: Guilty Conscience”. Of course, a filmmaker can set out to make one movie but end up making another, but having unintentionally made Tony the main character would have to be seen a colossal failure to achieve their intent. This isn’t Sherlock Holmes – we’re not watching Steve through Tony’s eyes.
(by the way, I know this is a weak point and contradicted by the whole ensemble thing, but I wanted to include it for the sake of completeness)
- Cap isn’t trying to force Tony to change his position. He constantly says to him, “I understand why you feel that way, why you’ve made that decision. I just can’t make it with you.” It’s Tony who consistently pushes back, unwilling to accept anything less than Steve changing his approach. Isn’t this the actions of an influence character?
3. MC Domain of Activity, IC Domain of Manipulation
Let’s start with the internal/external: Steve is a do-er. I really don’t think there’s any possible way to view him other than as someone who tries to solve the problems by enacting his will on the external world. He doesn’t try to adapt to the Accords by “getting over himself” or changing how he thinks. He continues to do what’s right instead of what others try to force him to do.
My sense is that the MC is in Activities. I’m tempted to say the concern is in Doing, because Steve’s conflicts all come from the things he does: the fighting, running, helping Bucky escape . . .etc. However a strong case could be made that his overriding concern throughout the movie is to prevent Bucky from being captured and killed. We see that in most of Steve’s scenes from the moment we know Bucky’s in danger right up until the end of the movie.
The influence character through line is in Manipulation. We see Tony trying to manipulate people into choosing his side all the way through the movie (unlike Steve who often warns them that siding with him will get them in trouble.) He tries to manipulate Steve into signing the Accords with false promises (in the pen scene), he uses Spider-Man’s star-struckness to get him to join his side, he gets Vision to try and hide the fact that he’s actually holding Wanda prisoner.
If it’s Ok with you I removed the RS portion of your response and moved it to another post so we can focus the discussion to the topic at hand.
In your response you forgot to include the Problem at the core of each Throughline. This is key to understanding the relationship between the Main and Influence Character Throughlines.
In addition, your description of the Main Character Throughline:
My sense is that the MC is in Activities. I’m tempted to say the concern is in Doing, because Steve’s conflicts all come from the things he does: the fighting, running, helping Bucky escape . . .etc. However a strong case could be made that his overriding concern throughout the movie is to prevent Bucky from being captured and killed. We see that in most of Steve’s scenes from the moment we know Bucky’s in danger right up until the end of the movie.
This describes Steve’s function as an Overall Story Character.
The Main Character Throughline describes those issues unique to the Main Character that exist separate from the Overall Story throughline perspective. Steve is not the only one fighting, running, or dealing with Bucky, etc.
What personal baggage does Steve have that he could carry with him into any other story and how are these uniquely related to Activities and related to him alone?
The influence character through line is in Manipulation. We see Tony trying to manipulate people into choosing his side all the way through the movie (unlike Steve who often warns them that siding with him will get them in trouble.) He tries to manipulate Steve into signing the Accords with false promises (in the pen scene), he uses Spider-Man’s star-struckness to get him to join his side, he gets Vision to try and hide the fact that he’s actually holding Wanda prisoner.
This describes Tony’s function as an Overall Story Character.
The Influence Character Throughline presents a problematic alternative approach that challenges or impacts the Main Character to reconsider his or perspective. These can be through direct, or indirect manipulation that either influences the Main Character or influences people around the Main Character.
How do Tony’s attempts to manipulate specifically impact or challenge Steve to reconsider his point-of-view? What kind of problematic conflict arises in Steve or in the others because these manipulations?
Lastly, a Concern of Doing in the Main Character Throughline suggests a Concern of Playing a Role in the Influence Character Throughline. How do Tony’s manipulations specifically impact and challenge concerns with Being?
Okay, I’ll bite.
I think ZEMO is both protagonist AND Impact character.
He is the one affecting everyone else by manipulating them, by implicating Bucky and exposing him as Tony’s parents murderer.
He’s pushing Tony’s Buttons (and by extension Tony’s team)
He’s pushing Cap’s Buttons (and by extension Steve’s team)
He’s pushing Bucky’s Buttons
He’s pushing T’Challa’s buttons
He disrupts the accords
He murders willy-nilly, anyone and everyone is expendable
But ultimately he explains it to T’Challa, I couldn’t go toe to toe with the Avengers, all I could do was break them apart.
I still think Steve is the Antagonist trying to keep the status quo of with great power comes great responsibility and you can’t surrender your judgment or responsibility to anyone else. (I supposed you could make an argument that he is the impact character, because he’s the one pushing back against Tony.)
I think Tony is the MC: his is where the emotional heart is, and (TO ME) the thematic heart which is as I said before
Throughline wise I see it this way.
OS: Manipulation (Everyone is dealing with the fallout of Zemos revenge)
MC: Situation Tony is drowning in his own guilt and is looking for an external solution that will absolve him of his guilt. With his creation of ULTRON he IS the winter soldier, only worse because his hubris killed so many, he doesn’t have Bucky’s rational of not having a choice.
IC Fixed Attitude: If it’s Zemo, the bastards must pay. If it’s Cap, one cannot give up their autonomy, you have to follow your own conscience not someone else’s.
RS: Activities Tony vs Cap You bring yours and I’ll bring mine, let’s dance. (Big people hitting each other) Seriously, you could have left everyone else out of the airport fight and the effect would have been the same emotional note.
Anyway, that’s my take.
Forgot this one.
I never once said Steve was trying to “force” Tony to change his position, only that his particular problematic attitude impacted and challenged Tony’s drive to Avoid conflict.
The Influence Character’s impact does not have to be direct. But it does need to specifically target the Main Character’s Personal problem.
Okay, I’ll try to address your points and the missing points you identified in my argument here.
Only if you presuppose that the OS is the hunt for the Winter Soldier, which you do in your argument, but I don’t take that position. I believe the OS is the Civil War itself: the choosing of sides over whether to live under new rules or not and the way that puts all the characters in conflict with each other.
Surely this isn’t strictly true, is it? In The Fugitive, the Dramatical analysis is that the domain of Activities comes from “Dr. Kimble is tracking down the murderer(s) of his wife”. This puts him at odds with the killer and with any number of people along the way. Wouldn’t you’d agree that what distinguishes the MC from the OS in The Fugitive is that, really, Kimble is the only one who actually cares about finding the real killer?
In Civil War, the MC throughline is that Cap is trying to protect Bucky. Yes, other people are working against that, but only Cap’s problems come from the effort to protect him. Other people come along for the ride at times out of loyalty to Cap, but no one ever says, “I, too, am determined to protect Bucky.” To the contrary, they’re only concern is looking after Cap as he gets into trouble because of his activities. The people opposing cap aren’t concerned with protecting Bucky either. They’re concerned with enforcing the law. Tony is sent to stop Cap not because he believes Bucky is guilty but because Cap is getting involved in something he has no business interfering with given the new rules of the Accords.
Doesn’t this language: “personal baggage” imply that the MC would always have to be internal? The Fugitive’s MC domain of activities being “Dr. Kimble is tracking down the murderer(s) of his wife.” wouldn’t carry over into another story unless it was another story in which his wife is murdered. Similarly, Cap’s MC domain of activities being “Steve Rogers is trying to protect his oldest friend from capture” could apply to any story in which, for whatever reason, someone wants to capture or kill Bucky.
I thought I effectively addressed this with the example of the pen story: Tony tries to convince Cap to sign onto the Accords with promises that “we can fix the problems later – Just sign it for now, trust me.” He gives him the nostalgic pen story, trying to get Steve to ignore his conscience and instead play on the temptation to get out of trouble by signing. At the last moment, Cap sees through the manipulation, using the act of handing him back the pen to show him he won’t be bought with false promises and attempts to get him to ignore his conscience. [Note: as I mentioned earlier, I’m not sure if the MC is in Doing or in Obtaining, and here I’m using Obtaining as the MC concern: preventing Bucky’s capture.]
As another example, Tony’s manipulation of Vision and Wanda – with him getting Vision to act as her jailor while pretending he’s just spending time with her – creates a rift in their otherwise growing relationship.
Per the above, I think the MC concern could be Obtaining (preventing the capture of his oldest friend), and thus the IC concern would be Changing One’s Nature. One of the aspects of changing one’s nature (per the Dramatica dictionary) is “giving up a part of oneself”. That’s what Tony is pushing Steve to do: give up his most defining aspect – his unerring drive to do what he believes is right regardless of the consequence. You mentioned Steve’s “do-gooder” approach. Throughout the movie Steve talks about that in terms of his conscience: “I just couldn’t live with myself if I didn’t do what I think is right”
I understand completely that the IC’s impact doesn’t have to be direct, but in this case I think Tony’s is both direct and explicit: he’s trying to manipulate Steve into not following his conscience, but instead giving into the temptation of just signing the Accords so he won’t have to deal with the consequences of fighting the new rules.
Lastly:
Identifying the problem at the core of each throughline requires drilling down quite deep, and I’m not sure I’m able to do that with precision given I’m still wrestling with effectively excluding possible domains from a particular throughline. That said, here’s what teases out from my points above:
MC Resolve: Steadfast
MC Problem: Conscience
Steve’s drive comes from his conscience. This is true in the first movie, the second, and the third. It’s the defining quality of Captain America and why he’s always considered the moral authority of the Avengers. He explicitly states throughout the movie that he can’t stop following his conscience no matter how tempted he is to give that up.
IC Problem: Logic
IC Solution: Feeling
Tony’s massive frustration throughout the movie is that Steve can’t seem to see the obvious: of course the Avengers need reining in. Who cares what moral principles they have to give up if it reduces the possible casualties by just one person? Tony is a futurist and an engineer and this is pure math: count the number of lives saved.
At the end of the movie (the end of the OS, anyway), Tony arrives at the secret prison where the Avengers are being held. While he’s seen some evidence that maybe Cap was right about Bucky’s innocence, it’s doesn’t alter the fact that he still logically thinks the Accords are the right way to go. Nonetheless, he ignores that logic and goes with his gut, telling Falcon he’s going to help Steve regardless of everything that’s happened.
By the way, I realize it can become a bit of a moving target if in one post I’m arguing for Doing as the MC concern and then switch to Obtaining. It’s not coming strictly from flakiness, I promise, but rather from trying to refine the argument based on the counter-points you’ve raised.
That’s the best part about the theory—Dramatica forces you to make a coherent and consistent argument. As you’re seeing, it’s really easy to say “all the conflict comes from their impulsive responses” because you’re only telling one side of the story. As you begin to try and narrow down the other perspectives, you’re bouncing around to different, incongruent areas that don’t hold up with your original argument.
Problematic Consciences and Problematic Rationale do not tie in naturally with the Preconscious. That filter of the mind where the Preconscious operates cares little about abstaining for fear of consequences or what is the most logical, or rational choice.
In our minds we can come up and justify all kinds of great examples for where we think the conflict is coming from, but when we actually sit down and try to frame that conflict within a structural narrative that tells a complete and coherent argument, we often have to rectify our assumptions with reality.
Part of the purpose of narrative is to show us what conflict looks like from different perspectives. One of the ways narrative does this is through the different perspectives of the Main Character and Overall Story Throughlines.
Many writers new to Dramatica experience difficulty separating the Main Character Throughline from the Overall Story Throughline, particularly if they’re used to blending the two together. Typically, this plays out in conversations about “Heroes” or “Villains” or notions that a Protagonist is a Main Character is a Point-of-View Character.
The same way its important to find a relationship that exists outside of any relationship within the Overall Story Throughline when trying to determine the Relationship Story Throughline perspective, its also important to find a Main Character personal issues that exists outside of anything seen from a They perspective.
In The Fugitive, the Dramatica analysis is that the domain of Activities comes from “Dr. Kimble is tracking down the murderer(s) of his wife”. This puts him at odds with the killer and with any number of people along the way. Wouldn’t you’d agree that what distinguishes the MC from the OS in The Fugitive is that, really, Kimble is the only one who actually cares about finding the real killer?
No, because caring does not create problems for him personally, tracking down the murderer does.
No one else in the story is tracking down the murderer. Kimble is uniquely positioned as the only one experiencing conflict through this very specific activity of “finding that man.”
From an overall story perspective, we do see an innocent man convicted of a crime he didn’t commit and all the conflict They experience comes from that Situation.
Tracking down a murderer is a different perspective than an innocent man convicted of a crime. He puts himself and only himself in danger by engaging in these activities.
That’s a personal problem.
In Civil War, the MC throughline is that Cap is trying to protect Bucky.
Cap trying to protect specifically requires beating the crap out of German police officers doing their job, engaging in car chases that endanger innocent bystanders, and fighting Iron Man personally at the end.
That’s not a personal problem, but rather a problem that They have to deal with.
Furthermore, there is no personal justification for these actions presented in the film that I can remember. Besides the obvious love he has for Bucky, I’m not sure the justification and or backstory that would warrant a Main Character Throughline perspective.
Tony, on the other hand, starts out describing in exact detail why he is driven to avoid conflict. It’s personal, it’s unique to him, and it is completely separate from the Overall Story Throughline perspective in that the conflict experienced there is his and his alone to deal with.
The people opposing cap aren’t concerned with protecting Bucky either. They’re concerned with enforcing the law.
Enforcing the law is an Activity.
Tony is sent to stop Cap not because he believes Bucky is guilty but because Cap is getting involved in something he has no business interfering with given the new rules of the Accords.
Interfering and trying to stop someone are both Activities and exemplify conflict for everyone. Therefore They.
Doesn’t this language: “personal baggage” imply that the MC would always have to be internal?
No, just that the personal justifications and reasons for the behavior need to somehow be contained within the narrative presented to us. That’s what is meant by personal baggage.
The Fugitive’s MC domain of activities being “Dr. Kimble is tracking down the murderer(s) of his wife.” wouldn’t carry over into another story unless it was another story in which his wife is murdered.
His wife being murdered does not create conflict for everyone in the story. It only creates conflict for him. Being convicted of a crime he didn’t commit does involve everyone in the story and therefore is seen as Overall Story Throughline material.
Main Character is not a character in Dramatica. Main Character is a perspective.
Similarly, Cap’s MC domain of activities being “Steve Rogers is trying to protect his oldest friend from capture” could apply to any story in which, for whatever reason, someone wants to capture or kill Bucky.
OK. So now you’re talking about setting up justification for another story, that’s great. We’re not talking about another story, we’re talking about this one. What is the personal justification for Steve’s behavior? How is it shown to us in this film? How is it uniquely problematic to Steve alone?
I thought I effectively addressed this with the example of the pen story: Tony tries to convince Cap to sign onto the Accords with promises that “we can fix the problems later – Just sign it for now, trust me.” He gives him the nostalgic pen story, trying to get Steve to ignore his conscience and instead play on the temptation to get out of trouble by signing.
I’m not even sure this could be considered problematic from an Influence Character Throughline perspective. Rather, it sounds more like an indicator of problems within their relationship. Isn’t the pen something to do with their friendship?
Russo explains:
The pens were an idea that he[Robert] brought to the scene as a way to represent what was going on between Cap and Tony in the scene.
And the idea that Steve knew his father personally, which plays into their relationship as friends.
For the actions of a character to be considered as coming from the perspective of an Influence Character Throughline it needs to present some alternative approach to solving problems. An alternative approach that impacts and challenges and creates problems for those in and around Tony.
I’m not sure how Tony’s manipulations specifically impact and challenge those around him, especially Steve. I see that working within their relationship for sure.
Steve’s attitude on the other hand drives everyone crazy and there’s no way he’s backing down. Tony, on the other hand, stops impacting through problematic manipulations the moment he’s not around Steve.
As another example, Tony’s manipulation of Vision and Wanda – with him getting Vision to act as her jailor while pretending he’s just spending time with her – creates a rift in their otherwise growing relationship.
How does this impact Steve to change his point-of-view?
If anything, it describes another instance of problematic manipulations within a relationship and could possibly be crosstalk from the original storyform played out with other characters.
Remember - the Throughlines are perspectives, not characters, and not relationships.
Just a few more notes:
Steve’s drive comes from his conscience. This is true in the first movie, the second, and the third. It’s the defining quality of Captain America and why he’s always considered the moral authority of the Avengers. He explicitly states throughout the movie that he can’t stop following his conscience no matter how tempted he is to give that up.
Its important, when finding the narrative of a piece, to focus on the piece itself and not extraneous information. If the understanding of a narrative requires knowledge of previous stories, then that narrative will come across incomplete and deficient for those new to the escapades of the characters.
While he’s seen some evidence that maybe Cap was right about Bucky’s innocence, it’s doesn’t alter the fact that he still logically thinks the Accords are the right way to go.
Logically thinking the Accords are the right way is not the same thing as having problems of Logic. This is the same problem before where the Appreciation is seen as an indicator of storytelling, rather than an indicator of an inequity requiring resolution.
Furthermore for this to be an Influence Character Problem, that would mean Tony’s problematic influence that challenges Steve to rethink his ways would be some sort of rationale for a dysfunctional or manipulative way of thinking. And this rationale would somehow challenge Steve’s abstaining for fear of future consequences…?
And then to bring it back around to creating a coherent and concise argument. If Tony was motivated by Logic and he was the Change character, that would mean all the problems by everyone in the story would come from Logic. And if they just stopped being logical there would be no conflict. And everyone would either be concerned with problematic Desires (Subconscious) or their friendship would be about their problematic Desires for each other.
I didn’t see that movie.
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Reading through your response a few times, I have the sense that you’ve addressed all my points effectively within the Dramatica model. The fact that I still don’t get it is a reflection of my own brain not being able to reconcile it rather than stemming from a disagreement where me harping on it will benefit anyone else.
Just for the sake of thoroughness and as a way to put an endpoint on my back-and-forth here, I want to query a couple of your points here where I think my question/confusion might be helpful to others as well.
I can’t disagree with this . . . because I don’t understand it. We’re now into language that’s so specific (even idiosyncratic) to Dramatica that I simply can’t parse the two sentences. I’ll point out the specific terms that confuse me because there may be others who’ll also benefit from clarification.
I hope this doesn’t come across as obtuse, but I’m genuinely having difficulty parsing these terms:
"Problematic Consciences and Problematic Rationale"
Okay, problematic as in, creating what Dramatica deems as problems within the story structure? I’m assuming as opposed to problematic in a broader sense? Drunken driving is almost always a problem in the real world, but might not be in a particular Dramatica storyform.
Conscience is a Dramatica element, but Rationale is not. So I’m not sure how to interpret those terms in this context.
"do not tie in naturally with the Preconscious"
You’ve got naturally and Preconscious in the same clause here, but while I get Preconscious as being the old Dramatica term for Impulsive Responses (I think), I’m not sure what you mean by naturally.
Do you mean of the story mind? Because otherwise we’re talking about actual psychology here, which is a science, and declarative rules about how the actual human mind operates need to come from empirical evidence, not a model of story. In other words, if “the filter of the mind” you’re referring to is a concept within Dramatica, great, but if it’s a statement about how the actual human mind works then I’ve got to get off the bus, so to speak.
Okay, I’m interpreting this as saying that fear of consequences or logic or reason are notions that don’t exist within the context of Preconscious or Impulsive responses – they’re more like higher-order thought process that require reflection and thus don’t fit within the much narrower world of our impulsive reactions.
Is that correct?
I’m not sure what you mean by reality here – do you mean the logical interpretation of what’s in the movie (ex: “The aliens of Theta 7 don’t use teleportation so we can’t consider teleporting the bomb away as a solution”) or “reality” in terms of our world (ex: “It’s not realistic to believe that ISIS would all suddenly convert to Christianity”)?
This makes sense, I think. Would I be correct in paraphrasing this as, “the fact that Kimble cares about who killed his wife is his motivation, but it’s not what creates problems for him in the movie – it’s the physical activity of tracking down the murderer.”
Here’s my question: let’s say in the Director’s Cut of the movie, we have two scenes in which Kimble’s lawyer is separately trying to track down the real killer which puts his life in danger. Would that mean the Director’s Cut had a different storyform than the theatrical cut because Kimble is no longer “the only one experiencing conflict through this very specific activity of ‘finding that man’”?
So is this a quantity/proportion issue? Because I’m sure we could find a scene in the Fugitive where, let’s say, Kimble’s activity in trying to hunt down the murderer ends up adversely affecting someone else. I’m not quibbling with your assessment, just wondering if this idea of only the main character having problems caused by the MC domain must be absolutely true or just broadly true.
Why wouldn’t his loyalty to Bucky be enough to justify his actions? It’s clear in the movie that in their backstory, Bucky died saving Cap, and would have done so again and again. These guys aren’t just fellow soldiers with a crush on each other – all through Steve’s troubled youth Bucky stuck up for him, and Cap will always stick up for Bucky now.
I agree with the last line, but I’m not sure what your point is here? Why does Enforcing the Law being an Activity negate what I wrote?
Just to be clear, I brought up the MC domain as being applicable to other stories specifically because in your previous post you said that for the MC throughline to be correct (e.g. “Cap is trying to protect his oldest friend”) it would have to be possible to pull it out of the current movie and put it in a different one. That’s why I wrote that: The Fugitive’s MC domain of activities being “Dr. Kimble is tracking down the murderer(s) of his wife.” wouldn’t carry over into another story unless it was another story in which his wife is murdered.
I was responding directly to your earlier point, not trying to deviate into concocting other stories.
Steve’s drive coming from his conscience comes up in this_ movie. His moral authority among the other Avengers is why it’s so important for Tony to try to convert him to his side. Notice that Tony doesn’t bother trying to convince Hawkeye or Wanda or Falcon. He has to try to convert Steve because he’s the one everybody tends to follow.
That aside, I’m really interested in what you said about “If the understanding of a narrative requires knowledge of previous stories, then that narrative will come across incomplete and deficient for those new to the escapades of the characters.” This movie is Captain America 3. It’s not just a random sit-com style episode of the Cap show – it’s presumed (I think, anyway) that the audience has seen the first and second in the same way that people watching Spider-Man 2 were assumed to have seen the first one.
So does this rule about internal completeness within the individual movie apply even if we’re watching, say, “The Return of the King”? Does it also apply to episodes of a TV show? I’m not asking rhetorically by the way – I’m really curious.
Could you tease this paragraph out a bit? I’m not quite able to parse it. Specifically, why is the idea that one has a problem of relying on the logic of the Accords not the same thing as having a problem of Logic?
And are you saying that the Appreciation needs to be an indicator of an inequity requiring resolution? If so, what does that mean?
A couple of things confuse me in this paragraph: 1) you reference Tony’s motivation but I thought character motivation was specifically something that shouldn’t be used as the basis for a domain problem. 2) You’re saying here that if the OS problem is logic, then the solution would have to be for everyone to stop being logical. But isn’t the dynamic pair of Logic, “Feelings”? And isn’t “Feelings” different from “not Logic”? In other words, what if the problem/solution is: “Everyone is following the logical course despite the way its creating problems for them, so what they need to do is start listening to their feelings instead.”
Lastly, I’m still dying to hear your thoughts on why Serenity, Dark Knight, and especially The Contender don’t violate the rule you gave for Civil War that the Main Character categorically cannot be someone who knows something the audience doesn’t.
I will. I needed to develop a foundation of understanding the Main Character Throughline as a perspective, not a character first. Hopefully, that is well established now. Dramatica is so complex and so precise that many take comments and story endings literally, instead of understanding them within the context of the Dramatica model.
Oh, and yes. EVERYTHING I do is within context of Dramatica and its model of narrative. That’s why, I suppose, everyone is here, and therefore what I endeavor to teach and communicate day in and day out. It’s also the reason why I’m so quick to boot those who want to create their own version of Dramatica. The internet is big enough that they can go do it somewhere else—making it easier to communicate what the theory is, rather than what it isn’t.
Reading through your response a few times, I have the sense that you’ve addressed all my points effectively within the Dramatica model.
Excellent! That’s all I’m here to do.
In other words, if “the filter of the mind” you’re referring to is a concept within Dramatica, great, but if it’s a statement about how the actual human mind works then I’ve got to get off the bus, so to speak.
Dramatica is a theory based on how the mind works. If you don’t buy this concept, then you don’t buy the theory. It’s one of the givens of the theory.
In regards to Conscience and Logic not tying in “naturally” with the Preconscious, I mean quite literally that those elements do not fit within the context of problematic Impulsive Responses.
Drunken driving is almost always a problem in the real world
It’s only a problem in narrative if it is specifically made a problem in that story. Stories are not the real world. You could write many stories where drunk driving is a benefit to a society. You might not find a lot of readers, but you can certainly do it.
That’s another great thing about looking at story through the eyes of Dramatica–you’re not beholden to any value systems. You’re free to tell the story you want to tell–as long as you stay consistent.
Conscience is a Dramatica element, but Rationale is not. So I’m not sure how to interpret those terms in this context.
A problem of Logic means there is an element of rational thinking creating conflict. I gist-ed Logic to fit within the context of the concept I was trying to teach.
This again goes back to the idea of using the story appreciations as storytelling, rather than sources of conflict. It’s not that someone is driven by logic to tell people what is right and wrong, it’s that their logical approach, their rationale, creates conflict.
So when it comes to problems of the Preconscious–which is what a Concern of Preconscious, or Impulsive Responses, is all about, Conscience and Logic quite literally do not fit in. “Gagging at the thought of eating oysters” while silly, probably illustrates the problems of the Preconscious best. Someone motivated to do that is not motivated by their Conscience, nor by Logic. That’s why I say those two don’t naturally coincide with a Concern of Impulsive Responses.
Okay, I’m interpreting this as saying that fear of consequences or logic or reason are notions that don’t exist within the context of Preconscious or Impulsive responses – they’re more like higher-order thought process that require reflection and thus don’t fit within the much narrower world of our impulsive reactions.
Exactly!
I’m not sure what you mean by reality here – do you mean the logical interpretation of what’s in the movie (ex: “The aliens of Theta 7 don’t use teleportation so we can’t consider teleporting the bomb away as a solution”) or “reality” in terms of our world (ex: “It’s not realistic to believe that ISIS would all suddenly convert to Christianity”)?
Whether we write stories or analyze stories, where we assume the conflict is or where the consistent arrangement of perspectives lie, often fails to hold up under closer scrutiny. The storyforming process forces us to be objective about what was once a very subjective experience–making up stories in our own heads and interpreting the events of those stories in our own heads.
Dramatica won’t let you make an inconsistent or incoherent argument all around. You can make arguments for one perspective and one concern, but once you try and make them all at once from a consistent and objective point-of-view, those things you thought were there, only looked that way because in your mind you can shift context all the time. That’s how we survive in our day-to-day lives and why we do the things we do (again, this is from Dramatica’s concept of the Storymind–the idea that we use justification and problem-solving throughout our own experience).
In Dramatica, you can’t constantly shift context. You set the context and that’s it.
This is why writers new to Dramatica run into this problem where they can’t fit their story into the program. The storyform tells them there is something wrong with their story (really, something inconsistent), the writers don’t like the idea that what they thought was awesome in their head doesn’t play out in the final result, so they toss Dramatica aside and decide it’s not for them.
Storyforming with Dramatica is a process of moving away from the subjective inconsistencies in our own minds towards an objective consistent context so that we can tell a coherent and complete argument.
(And I’m pretty sure I’m going to have to explain that a couple more times, because I’m not sure how I did!)
Would I be correct in paraphrasing this as, “the fact that Kimble cares about who killed his wife is his motivation, but it’s not what creates problems for him in the movie – it’s the physical activity of tracking down the murderer.”
Totally.
Here’s my question: let’s say in the Director’s Cut of the movie, we have two scenes in which Kimble’s lawyer is separately trying to track down the real killer which puts his life in danger. Would that mean the Director’s Cut had a different storyform than the theatrical cut because Kimble is no longer “the only one experiencing conflict through this very specific activity of ‘finding that man’”?
I guess. But that wasn’t the movie that was presented. If that scene was shot, they likely cut it out because it doesn’t make sense whatsoever given the final storyform of the movie.
Theoretically, people can’t help but write a complete story (a consistent storyform). They write and re-write, shoot and re-shoot, edit and re-edit, until they have something that holds up together (in other words, tells a complete argument from all four perspectives). Sometimes, mistakes slip by–stories aren’t perfect–but for the most part, when a story works, it is held together by the storyform.
One thing I have learned from all this is the language surrounding “Author’s Intent”. Usually, we describe the storyform as indicating Author’s Intent, as if this is exactly what the Author was trying to say.
After this discussion, I think it’s more accurate to say that this is the message that was presented–whether the Author meant it or not.
Take my reference above to “shipping Steve and Bucky.” For those who don’t know (and I didn’t until a year or two ago), “shipping” is apparently the process of creating a realtion-SHIP between two characters that the original text failed to address.
I’m pretty sure it wasn’t the Russo’s intention to motivate a segment of the Internet population to write and draw various romantic encounters between Steve and Bucky, yet for some reason these fans were motivated to do so.
I would say this is because of the Influence Character Problem of Feeling. The storyform of the film–the storyform that ended up on-screen and presented to the Audience–places Steve in a place where his attitude his motivated specifically by Feelings. Whether or not they meant to or not, this is the message communicated and one many took too. You can Google “shipping Steve and Bucky” and see all kinds of interesting things. If you Google “Iron Man’s logic” or “Tony’s rationale” you won’t find anything close in number.
I’ve worked on productions where the Audience “ships” characters that were never intended to be that way, and if I recall correctly you, Sebastien, might have had the same experience. This was never their or your intent, but the storyform of the film, the message of the film is there once a mind (a Storymind) begins to put the pieces together.
So, I think no longer thinking of the storyform as representing Author’s Intent and instead thinking of it as the actual storyform communicated makes more sense.
So is this a quantity/proportion issue? Because I’m sure we could find a scene in the Fugitive where, let’s say, Kimble’s activity in trying to hunt down the murderer ends up adversely affecting someone else. I’m not quibbling with your assessment, just wondering if this idea of only the main character having problems caused by the MC domain must be absolutely true or just broadly true.
Theoretically the entire story happens all at once (because it all happens in the mind). So the idea is yes, you have a holistic understanding of the entire Throughline all at once. I believe it’s both a quantity and proportion issues as much as it is a qualitative issue. No story is perfect–but there will be enough of something that the Audience will naturally begin to put pieces together into a storyform (assuming you buy the Storymind concept).
Why wouldn’t his loyalty to Bucky be enough to justify his actions? It’s clear in the movie that in their backstory, Bucky died saving Cap, and would have done so again and again. These guys aren’t just fellow soldiers with a crush on each other – all through Steve’s troubled youth Bucky stuck up for him, and Cap will always stick up for Bucky now.
I get all of that, but see that as playing out through his Influence Character Throughline of Fixed Attitude (sticking up for Bucky), Innermost Desires (loyalty), Hope (his whole 50’s mentality), and Feeling (the crush).
By personal justification, I mean some kind of personal problem there, some personal conflict. I don’t see how that stands out from what everyone else is doing.
Seb. Says: The people opposing cap aren’t concerned with protecting Bucky either. They’re concerned with enforcing the law.
Jim Says: Enforcing the law is an Activity.
Seb. Says: I agree with the last line, but I’m not sure what your point is here? Why does Enforcing the Law being an Activity negate what I wrote?
Just trying to show how everyone is involved with problematic activities, not just Steve. Steve protects Bucky, others enforce the law - those are forces on both sides of the same kind of problematic Activity, within the context of this story.
Just to be clear, I brought up the MC domain as being applicable to other stories specifically because in your previous post you said that for the MC throughline to be correct (e.g. “Cap is trying to protect his oldest friend”) it would have to be possible to pull it out of the current movie and put it in a different one. That’s why I wrote that: The Fugitive’s MC domain of activities being “Dr. Kimble is tracking down the murderer(s) of his wife.” wouldn’t carry over into another story unless it was another story in which his wife is murdered.
Right, because “tracking down the murderer of his wife” requires his wife to be dead. That is his personal baggage as defined within the context of his Main Character Throughline.
I was responding directly to your earlier point, not trying to deviate into concocting other stories.
I was just trying to point out that it’s important to focus on the story told, or presented, when trying to figure out the storyform. Also, when it comes to writing, figuring out the storyform you’re presenting, rather than the one you hope you’re presenting.
Can save you a lot of grief when it comes to shipping!
This movie is Captain America 3. It’s not just a random sit-com style episode of the Cap show – it’s presumed (I think, anyway) that the audience has seen the first and second in the same way that people watching Spider-Man 2 were assumed to have seen the first one.
A Dramatica storyform is an objectified meaning of the story as presented from beginning to end. Where you start and end that story matters. The storyform for an entire series is different than the storyform for a season in that series and is different for storyform for an episode within that season.
You set the scope of a narrative by determining the start point and end point (Drivers) and a limit for the events within (Story Limit).
Return of the King has several different storyforms going on–different MC/IC, etc. Overall I’m sure there is one storyform to rule them all (the entire trilogy) but that will be a project for another day…
Could you tease this paragraph out a bit? I’m not quite able to parse it. Specifically, why is the idea that one has a problem of relying on the logic of the Accords not the same thing as having a problem of Logic?
And are you saying that the Appreciation needs to be an indicator of an inequity requiring resolution?
100% yes!
Every single appreciation is an indicator of inequity requiring resolution. Domain, Concern, Issue, and Problem are all really just inequities with fancy names to indicate their “size” within a narrative.
Contrast these two in terms of Logic:
- the logic behind building a wall between the U.S. and Mexico doesn’t make sense. It will just cause more problems
- Some think that if you build a wall tall enough and long enough then you’ll protect innocent civilians from the terrorists
The latter introduces an inequity into the conversation requiring some kind of resolution. The former is just a statement, or opinion. One motivates a story, the other just sits there.
A couple of things confuse me in this paragraph: 1) you reference Tony’s motivation but I thought character motivation was specifically something that shouldn’t be used as the basis for a domain problem. 2) You’re saying here that if the OS problem is logic, then the solution would have to be for everyone to stop being logical. But isn’t the dynamic pair of Logic, “Feelings”? And isn’t “Feelings” different from “not Logic”? In other words, what if the problem/solution is: “Everyone is following the logical course despite the way its creating problems for them, so what they need to do is start listening to their feelings instead.”
Hopefully, you now see how “following the logical course” is not the same thing as Logic as an indicator of inequity.
And yes, I would agree that if Logic were the Problem then Feeling would be the Solution, but for the sake of the conversation I was focusing on getting rid of the inequity - as in “if they stopped being logical” because being logical would have to be an inequity in a story driven by Logic.
In regards to 1), what I meant was that the Changed character shares the same Problem and Solution as the Overall Story Throughline – that’s what ties them meaningfully into the argument of the narrative. The Problem of a Throughline is the basis for a Domain “Problem” as it describes the finest most precise bit of detail to which one can describe the inequity.
As for Dark Knight and Contender and Serenity, I haven’t seen the last so I’m not sure but as far as the others go–
The biggest problem here is taking statements literally instead of understanding the comments within the context of the Dramatica narrative model. This is why I wanted to make sure there was an understanding of the Main Character as a perspective, and a perspective towards an inequity. Anything that supports that inequity functions as a means of better telling that point-of-view.
When I say, from a Main Character Throughline perspective, I know what I know–this is within the context of the Throughline. I’ve already written about it in my Throughline analysis of the Civil War which I will publish next week, but in short:
Steve Rogers, Captain America, withholds key information that pertains directly to Tony’s personal issues. I know everything I need to know to generate my personal perspective of I. Tony’s personal issues of guilt shift with knowledge of the secret, making his unawareness of this information key to understanding the meaning of his point-of-view.
In other words, the fact that he doesn’t know something that could alleviate his guilt is why he represents the I point-of-view.
In The Dark Knight, Batman struggles between being the hero or being the villain. Illegally tapping cellphones supports this perspective of doing something wrong. In other words, there are plenty of things that I have done in my life that I don’t want anyone to know about, and I will do anything to keep them secret–including keeping them from myself–because they’re “bad”.
The film supports this perspective. Instead of watching Batman setup the cellphones and the listening devices which might encourage an acceptance of such actions, he does them off screen and there’s a bit of shame felt when Fox calls him out for it. This plays into the whole issue over doing things a hero or villain would do.
It plays into the perspective of inequity as seen from the Main Character point-of-view.
The Contender works the same way. She’s withholding that information on principle because that’s what Be-ers do. The Be-er aspect is part of her perspective. The idea that anyone would even conceive of her doing these things is so offensive that she won’t even do the one thing that could end it all. Her Issues of Deficiency and that drive of Re-evaluation motivates the holding of that secret and her refusal to address the allegations. The reveal supports that first-person perspective of dealing with conflict like this. As far as she is concerned–from her perspective–she shouldn’t have to face these questions in the first place.
So it’s not a literal interpretation of I, but rather an understanding of I as a point-of-view on inequity and conflict resolution. I know what I know–in order to communicate my inequitable perspective.
Thanks for the response, Jim. Some really fascinating observations and dilemmas come out of this:
I found this statement to be really profound, and, in a way, really troubling (for me, not necessarily for anyone else.) It’s fascinating because when I think of the Dramatica model, I think of a lens – a way of looking at story. I can examine a story through the lens of Dramatica and the Grand Argument Story with its four throughlines, four domains . . . etc. I can use that lens to identify gaps in my own work, and possible explanations why something isn’t resonating for me – and the places to look for what’s missing.
However there’s a huge gap between that notion of a lens on story and the idea that the Dramatica Theory of Mind accurately describes the inner workings of the human mind – that it subsumes empirically-derived psychological theories and frameworks. It’s like saying we’ve arrived at a replacement for scientific models of the workings of the human mind without the need for empirical research and peer review. The prospect of buying into that is almost inconceivable to me.
And yet . . .
I can see how – given the complexity of the Dramatica Theory of Mind and the need for real dedication to its study – it’s hard to ever fully understand its application to story without entirely embracing the theory. So, for someone like me, that means there’s a constant critical voice that’s probably getting in the way – questioning every abstract possibility and use of language rather than accepting it and thus moving onto the next stage.
My own approach – which might be a bit heretical – is to think of a model of story as a lens. Dramatica is a very sophisticated and complete lens whereas something like Save The Cat is a reductive one that only works for some stories. The former will help me see why Whiplash is so satisfying as a film whereas the latter won’t. But it’s notable that Dramatica analysis concludes that Harry Potter and the Philosopher’s Stone is a tale – an incomplete story. Save The Cat has no trouble exposing why audiences loved the movie, felt satisfied by the movie, and, in many cases, kept thinking about it long after it was over, because Philosopher’s Stone does exactly what STC expects of a narrative: it privileges plot progression and main character journey over all else, and does it really well. Similarly, there are many ways to examine The Maltese Falcon that explain why it resonates powerfully with audiences, but through the Dramatica lens the storyform appears broken.
I’m not sure what conclusion to draw from this, but I think that original statement, that “Dramatica is a theory based on how the mind works. If you don’t buy this concept, then you don’t buy the theory. It’s one of the givens of the theory” provides a good insight into why, despite my admiration for the model, may never quite cross the threshold into being able to apply it fully.
Fortunately, I still find the questions and problems it poses provide interesting angles to consider, and this is always helpful for me as a writer. I’ve often said that a competent writer gets to 80% pretty quickly. Every percent after that requires you to claw and scratch and bang your head against the wall, so if I get 1% closer through my incomplete understanding of Dramatica, that’s still a big deal to me.
Totally get this – and it’s a valuable axiom to live by as a writer.
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.
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. Or can you have a complete storyform that never “overlaps” (for want of a better word)?
I certainly have, and it’s fascinating because at various points in the quartet of novels I’ve considered making those relationship issues more explicit, however my editor quite rightly noted that I’d be immediately making that “the issue” of the books – a point of contention for readers to fight out on the Internet. What’s interesting is that in some ways, leaving room for shipping can be a better way to make the implicit bonds between the characters feel stronger than if you “deal with it” on the page itself.
This makes perfect sense to me.
Okay, back to the issue of Main Character in Civil War!
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?
Sorry if that sounds muddled. Maybe what I’m really asking is: 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?
Two last things, one which may make you want to throw something at the screen, so I apologize in advance.
I re-watched Captain America: Civil War last night (I’m on a publicity tour so I really should have been sleeping instead of thinking about this at four in the morning.) I came away thinking that the OS might be in Manipulation. Here’s why:
- This whole thing starts off with the use of the code words to literally change Bucky’s mind – reducing him from a person with thoughts and feelings to a kind of automaton who does whatever he’s told.
- It ends with Zemo captured and Everett (played by Martin Freeman) saying, “your plans failed” to which Zemo smiles and asks, “Did they?”
- He tells us that if you destroy an empire (Activity), it can be rebuilt, but if you make it destroy itself (Manipulation), then it is destroyed forever.
- If you removed the problematic activities (fighting, bombing . . . etc), Zemo’s problem isn’t solved: his wife, son, and father are still dead thanks to the Avengers. The public’s problems are solved: they still view the superheroes as vigilantes (this comes at the start of the movie and it’s made crystal clear that it’s not just becomes of the events in Lagos).
- There’s nothing within the story that indicates we should believe that if you removed the heroes activities (or even put them under the umbrella of the Accords), that this would solve the problems. Again and again we’re made to understand that not only would people still get killed, but that probably even more would die, and the Accords might even mean that the Avengers are prevented from going in and saving people because it’s politically problematic.
I don’t mean to make you go through and have to go point by point to deal with my argument here – I suppose I’m more exposing my own inability to think in Dramatica terms than anything else, so it’s totally okay to just say, “you’re wrong, go figure out why yourself this time!”
Okay, last point specifically about this whole MC debate:
I wonder if we can agree that there’s something unusually challenging with this particular movie.
While storyforms aren’t about audience reception and thus what one “feels” watching it doesn’t at all dictate the storyform, it always seems to me both in my own experience with Dramatica and in watching the User Group videos that the one thing that almost always lines up – the one thing that’s easiest to agree on – is who the main character is. Outside of a few films, we can almost always answer who the main character is without difficulty. There are exceptions, of course, with a notable one being Jerry McGuire, which I believe has two storyforms and thus two MC’s. As you pointed out in your post, Return of the King has multiple storyforms.
Of course, that might not be the case with Captain America: Civil War. To me, after re-watching it for what must be the third time, it seems like it must have two storyforms because both the hunt for Winter Soldier and the Avengers’ Civil War over the Accords look like separate storylines (I’m using storylines here specifically to avoid the Dramatica term of throughlines), and both Steve and Tony appear to me main characters dealing with two different sets of problems. How dare I say this? I think because there’s absolutely no doubt in my mind that there’s an RS between Steve and Tony, but after watching the movie again, there also appears to be a distinct, ongoing, and vital RS between Steve and Bucky:
Originally, I thought this was just about loyalty and friendship, but then I noticed the material about the death of Peggy Carter. Cap explicitly tells us: “When I woke up from the ice, I thought I was all alone in the world. Then I found out Peggy was still alive.” After her death, Cap is entirely alone in the world. Then what happens? A photo appears showing the bomber as Bucky: now truly the only person from Cap’s past who’s still alive. His only connection to the person he was. When he’s testing if Bucky’s in his right mind, Bucky tells him the name of Steve’s mom, and that he used to go around with newspaper in his shoes. Bucky really is the only tie Steve has to the person he was before this new Captain America stuck in a time period he doesn’t understand, and in which he never seems to fit. How could you “unstick” Captain America? Send him back to his own time. All his problems go away (something that’s not at all inconceivable in a world with aliens, magic, ultra-and advanced technology).
Now, maybe it’s possible that all this fits within the IC domain, and that we can ignore how vital all those scenes between Cap and Bucky are (or attribute them to the OS), but it still creates more cognitive dissonance than most other movie analyses.
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?
E.T. , The Iron Giant, Jerry Maquire, King Kong, Laura, Lolita, and Rosemary’s Baby are just a handful of stories all named after the Influence Character. Given that they are not sequels to movies that are named after the main character, but still.
Very valid point. I probably shouldn’t hit the movie title too hard as the basis for identifying the MC. I do think there are differences, of course, between E.T. or King Kong which we can see instantly on watching are clearly not told from the POV of those characters (whereas we spend more of the movie following Cap than Tony, seeing events and dilemmas through Cap’s eyes). Jerry Maguire, by the way is the MC of one of the two storyforms in that movie.
But again, you’re right that using the title to form the argument probably isn’t helpful.
Having re-watched the film last night, I feel a bit better putting in my $0.02.
What’s clear to me is that:
- Steve and Zemo share a Protagonist/Antagonist relationship. One of them is Pursuing and the other is trying to Avoid the story goal.
- Steve and Tony’s dynamic is the basis of the Relationship Throughline.
- Tony is the Changed character.
- The story is an Optionlock, and driven by Actions.
While I appreciate @decastell 's point about the Fixed Attitudes and I think his points about Steve being in the Activity Domain are good, I just can’t get behind Steve and Tony’s relationship being in the Situation domain. By extension I fail to see how Fixed Attitudes affect most everyone in the OS. Having seen it for like the 8th time last night, the story to me seems to center around the idea of minimizing casualties.
The Accords are brought in to try and combat this, with the option of retiring should the person not agree to the terms. From what I observed the only person with a strong fixed opinion on the Accords themselves is Steve. Tony, Natasha and Vision are promoting accountability. The former two in conjunction with winning back the public trust. All three of them are of the opinion that this is the best of the available options to prevent further injuries. T’Challa agrees with the sentiment of the Accords but doesn’t care for the politics of it all. Clint chose to retire and is mostly indifferent to the accords. Scott is brought in later and doesn’t care about the Accords, neither does Peter who doesn’t even know about the Accords.
The Accords themselves sit there until the signing in Vienna when it’s interrupted by the bombing.
If they suppressed their heroic urges there would be no film series, most of the conflict seems to stem from the result and cost of their actions intervening to fight villains and save lives.
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 seems a lot cleaner to me that the RS is defined by Manipulations.
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.
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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