This episode of TWA is brought to you by Campfire
Blaze. Welcome to the revolution comrades! I will
abide by the tyranny of the evil empireās domination of storytelling no longer! Unite
under the flag of freedom! Throw off the yoke of oppressive creativity and join the well
worn and veteran tropes of the resistance! The revolution begins now! Let Terrible Writing
Advice indoctrinateā¦ um I mean inspire writers to revolt and create their very own rebellion
to put a stop to the evil empireās tyranny! The first thing to remember when it comes
to writing fictional rebel groups is that they are defined primarily by not being very
clearly defined. Fictional rebellions are all about fighting for freedom against oppression
by an evil empire. Rebels donāt need things like an ideology, identity, or a cause beyond
the vague notion of fighting for freedom and stopping the evil empire. Is this critical
lack of worldbuilding a direct result of my creative bankruptcy and slothful storytelling
technique? Well yes, but in this case it also serves a practical purpose. Namely not accidentally
making a political statement and thus lose out on potential audience members who might
be alienated by the stark nature of more accurate representations of rebellions. Which I definitely
donāt want to stumble into because we all know that historic rebellions had nothing
to do with politics. I mean we have a group of people trying to overthrow an established
government through use of violence. Whatās political about that? By keeping the rebels free of any messy worldbuilding
this helps me sidestep things that might make the rebels look like bad guys. Things like
having an extremist ideology, a fundamentalist religion, being built entirely around a cult
of personality, being an actual cult, just straight up being terrorists, being led by
an authoritarian strongman, being led by a delusional charismatic authoritarian strongman,
or all of these at once for an extra spicy rebellion. And while we are on the subject,
a writer should probably also avoid the whole reign of terror thing that revolutions sometimes
have. We are here to lionize the rebels and romanticize the idea of revolution, not dive
down into the messy reality of rebellions no matter how much conflict the story looses
out on. Why use the negative aspects of rebel groups
as a way to drive conflict when I can instead drive conflict out of the story? How do the
rebels navigate the fine line between ideology and practically? Do they compromise their
ideals for the sake of a quick victory? Is it right to use terror to fight the evil empireās
rule of fear? Complex questions of morality in times of war and chaos? Nah. Rebels good!
Empire bad! All of those shades of gray will be burned away in the rebellionās totally
justified and most definitely not brutal purges. Itās a stark moral binary from here on out,
which come to think of it is something that a lot of real rebel groups have that make
them come across as unhinged when viewed from the outside. But in this case itās okay
because the author said so! Now who will join my entirely noble rebellion?
Why my fictional rebellion is made up of people from all walks of lifeā¦ so long as those
walks are all roughly middle class everymen. Poor, oppressed, and downtrodden people with
little to no education, prospects, or hopes that can be easily radicalized? No thanks.
The revolution is many things, but it can afford to be a bit picky. My revolution fights
for the rights of the oppressedā¦ you knowā¦ so long as the oppressed donāt try to touch
me with their dirty little fingers. Just because my revolution will champion the rights of
minorities doesnāt mean that it has to actually to bother to interact with them in anyway.
Besides, if I have a rebellion made up of diverse groups with differing backgrounds,
objectives, perspectives, and cultures I might end up with a dynamic organization full of
engaging internal conflict as the rebels have to balance the needs of various internal factions
while still effectively resisting the evil empire. Why would I want a dogmatic evil empire
that forces a uniformity of identity in its citizens to be thematically opposed by a rebellion
that embraces a wide array of perspectives and practices? Why would a writer bother to
flesh out the rebellionās rebels when they will be killed to a man during the first fight
with the evil empire anyway? Freedom isnāt earned by everyone working together to find
a better vision for the future. No. Freedom is given by a small elite group of special
people chosen by destiny and the rest of us can just die so the super special main characters
can look cool during the storyās climax! Next thing youāll be telling me is that
the revolution needs a plan. The revolution waits for no plan! Zeal will substitute for
any amount of planning and preparation. Campaigns are not won through strategy and logistics,
but with suicidal zealotry. Wait. Did I just turn my rebellion into a suicidal death cult?
Whoops! Looks like I accidentally made my rebellion a little too realistic. Thatās
okay, Iāll just ignore that one. Come to think of it, zealotry isnāt probably the
best way to put it. How about plucky or ragtag? Yeah plucky, ragtag rebels sounds a lot better
than extremist suicide bomber insurgents since Iām trying to sell the whole ārebels are
always the good guysā thing. Any rebels that try to form a plan should be portrayed
as incompetent and are simply jealous of the main characterās saccharine speeches about
freedom and hope. Having the rebels execute a plan and then have to adapt to battlefield
conditions would only add unnecessarily tension and context to the action scenes. Battles
in fiction are just glorified fireworks displays anyway, not a life and death struggle of strength
and wits. Even worse, having the rebels execute a solid battle strategy might steal the spotlight
away from the precious main characters. Besides, I can always avoid that by stubbornly
refusing to address just how the rebels are organized. Do the rebels use a cell structure
to prevent having the whole of their organization from being compromised? Do they instead use
a strict chain of command more akin to an organized army? Where do they get their supplies
from? Do rival powers to the evil empire funnel the rebels weapons and equipment in secret?
Do they have a uniform or do they instead blend in with the civilian population? Is
there a rallying symbol that the rebels use to represent themselves? If the rebels constantly
die in droves to the imperial death troopers then how do they replenish their numbers?
These very basic questions do nothing but sap creative energy away from more important
things like what last words will the rebel leader give the main character right before
the imperial death troopers kill him? See if I did something like say make it where
the rebels get their weapons through a mysterious black market, then I might have to actually
flesh out the market, the criminals that run it, and the entire criminal underworld of
the setting. This is bad because this might lead to an entire story arc in the criminal
underbelly of the evil empire that showcases the corruption and greed that drives the rebellion
in the first place. The poor main characters might even be brought out of their comfort
zone and forced to bargain with organized crime syndicates just to keep the rebellion
supplied while having to risk said criminals turning on them. Maybe even resolve a personal
plotline of one of roguish supporting characterās checkered past while we are at it. What a
disaster that arc would be! Narrative tension and personal stakes? Layered worldbuilding?
Canāt have any of that! Back to a cookie cutter macguffin race and/or evil empire super
weapon plot! Besides, that story arc has one fatal flaw. Thereās no need for the rebels
to remain supplied in the first place, because itās the main characters that will do all
of the work anyway. Remember, overconfidence is never a weakness, but faith in your friends
totally is. Yeah. That sounds like something the a good guy would say. And it is all about being the good guys. Cast
the rebels as villains? Never. Americans are particularity fond of the rebels vs evil empire
story as it has become mythologize in our culture. That gives any writer a free pass
to write about rebellions and revolutions uncritically even to the point of trying to
frame every contentious subject in real life as a rebels vs evil empire narrative no matter
how glaringly stupid it is. Even writers who want a simple story about good guy underdog
rebels vs evil empire baddies are completely free to turn the rebels into murdering, edgy,
torture fetishists and should never use their critical thinking skills to examine why the
evil empire somehow has more fans. I mean why would people root for the evil empire
even though theyāve never been shown to do anything all that bad, have snazzy uniforms,
cool weapons, and are all portrayed by classically trained actors with tremendous screen presence?
Clearly people are going to root for the rebels with their focus group designed lack of personality
and absolutely no compelling hook, quirk, or design. Now what happens when the rebels finally win?
You see, thatās funny thing. They donāt! At least not if the story becomes a franchise.
See it turns out that building or rebuilding a government after a collapse is like really
hard, especially when it comes to democracies. So while worldbuilding the complex social,
economic, and political changes a successful rebellion turned revolution would entail is
extremely difficult, resetting the franchise back to status-quo is not. No matter how many
victories, no matter how many times the evil emperor is killed, no matter how many imperial
armies crushed, super weapons destroyed, or generals assassinated, the franchise will
always be reset back to its money making default. The rebels will always fight the empire. Forever!
Hey itās not a revolution until it revolves back around to where it started. KNIGHT COMMANDER:
Niece Nifty
Nigel Niger
Nigeria Niā¦ Huh. Iāve never seen this word beforeā¦
Iām not sure how to pronounce it? SIR ADBLOCK: Why donāt you try spelling
it out? KNIGHT COMMANDER: Okay. N I CONSPIRACY GUY: Oh by the Spear of Destiny
this it taking too long! Weāll never find the forbidden naughty word by going through
the dictionary one at a freaking time! KNIGHT COMMANDER: Well how else are we gonna
stop the Sponsorhip Wars? If we can say the forbidden naughty word, then no one will advertise
on this channel. CONSPIRACY GUY: Look. You say that word one
of two things will happen. Either YouTube will annihilate the entire TWA Expanded Universe
to save its own skin from controversy or an angry internet mob will try to cancel us. KNIGHT COMMANDER: Exactly. We want to cancel
the Sponsorhip Wars! CONSPIRACY GUY: Back in my day cancel meant
that something was actually canceled. Now it just means that everyone argues semantics
on the internet while inadvertently driving traffic to the thing they ostensibly are trying
to make vanish. The whole thing is a giant waste of time! Canceling only works if the
person being canceled has a sense of shame and good luck getting JP āI've already monetized
my apology videoā Beaubien to feel anything close the concept of shame. Even if we say
the taboo word and even if some sponsors flee the channel there will always be someone without
scruples who will purchase ads here! This plan either dooms us all or backfires at best. SIR ADBLOCK: That is good point, Sir Newguy.
What do you suggest? CONSPIRACY GUY: You have a freaking sword!
Go find who the source of the sponsors is andā¦ KNIGHT COMMANDER: And give them a stern warning!
Thatās brilliant, Sir New Guy! None can withstand the withering assault of a good
stern warning! SIR ADBLOCK: Commander, I think the new guy
is saying that violence may be necessary for the protection of the TWA Expanded universe.
We must be ready to fight! KNIGHT COMMANDER: We must gather our forces
then! But where will we march? CONSPIRACY GUY: I just happened to have stumble
upon some key intelligence thanks to this videoās sponsor, Campfire Blaze! Campfire
Blaze is a browser based writing organization tool to help aspiring authors, dungeon masters,
and people who are most definitely not spies from the ancient conspiracy to keep their
plots straight. Thanks to Campfire Blaze I now have the tools I need to organize my plot
with timelines to help visualize the plotās flow and avoid working at cross purposes which
happens all the time to me because of the complexity of my plots. It has a host of other
tools like a word processor, character sheets, character arcs, relationship details, and
even tools to flesh out magic systems, languages, and artifacts that allow for an entire series
bible to be constructed. Multiple conspiratorsā¦ um I mean users can even collaborate on projects
in real time for cooperative tabletop projects, fan works, or multi author books. Try the
free version or build your own subscription by choosing only the modules you need by going
to bit.ly/TWA3-21. TWA fans can also use the coupon code TWA21 at checkout to receive 20%
of all lifetime purchases of Blaze modules! Link is in the description below. SIR ADBLOCK: Wow. Your intelligence report
sounds and awful lot like a sponsor segment. CONSPIRACY GUY: Umā¦ well you see, I need
to go through all of that so the check clears. KNIGHT COMMANDER: What? CONSPIRACY GUY: I mean... look. All of the
TWA Expanded Universe factions are gathering to storm Megacorpās vaults to seize the
source of the sponsors. We just have to get there first! KNIGHT COMMANDER: I see. Then me must gather
our most elite forces! We must mobilizeā¦ the Ad Block Force!
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this....sucks
he's talking about rebellions as if ISIS is the norm that writers are writing about. meanwhile acting like the violence of overthrowing an oppressive regime is somehow wrong, as if living under the far worse violence of the regime is better because at least our hands are squeaky clean! cus feeling superior is way more important than helping people....
sry I really did not like this video at all. yea disney falls to many of the tropes but that's not exactly the point
JJ Abrams apparently thinks Terrible Writing Advice is a how-to manual