Screenwriting 101

Film Crit Hulk

Table of contents
1

Part one - what is a story?

Part two - where to find inspiration.
Part three - 6 general stuffs you need to know
beforehand
1. Get your learn on!
2. No, seriously. Get your learn on.
3. Experience + what it means for you.
4. The script matters.
5. Why you still need to be able to tell an original story
6. But still remember, this is not about "getting things
made"
Part four - - how to tell a story - conceptually
7. Empathy is your new best friend.
8.

Beware the lure of indulgence

9. The consistency of character motive.

10.

Character trees!

11. Don't base your characters on one person, combine

them!
12.

How to filter "your real life" into a story

13.

The biopic / reality complication.

14.

Research!.

15.

The value pre-existing conflict.

16.

The jj abrams question - mystery? Vs. Urgency!.

17.

Don't write women just in the context of men

18.

Everything you write is saying something

19.

The ending is the conceit.

Part five - - how to tell the story - structurally.

20.

Economy is your new second best friend.

21.

The myth of 3 act structure.

22.

Do not use hero journeys either - it is a crutch..

23.

The sequential approach.

24. Trey parker + matt stones': "therefore / buts" not

"ands".
25.

Dan harmon's circles.

26.

The snow flake method.

27.
28.

Breaking into concurrent arcs

Merge into conflicting arcs.

29.

Learn your genre conventions.

30.

"page 17"

31.

If you use characters, they should likely be reused

32.

Beware deus ex machina

33. Beware the opening flash-forward.

34. Don't fuck with the audience just to fuck with the
audience
35. Writing is re-writing
36.

When & how to disregard these guidelines.

Part six - how to tell a story - screenplay-specific

instruction.
37. Know it's being read by every kind of person.
38.

The golden rule of description.

39. Oh by the way, you are not the director..

40.

The poetic art of action lines.

41.

Don't waste opportunities to say something.

42.

And if you want to be colloquial.

43.

Voice over... Perhaps, try not using it.

44. The practical art of dialogue.

45. Final + bestest advice ever: read your entire
screenplay out loud...
So you want to write a screenplay?

Know this: there are over a million scripts floating around

hollywood. Hulk has read, oh... A couple thousand of
them. And nearly every single person hulk meet in "the
industry" has a script of some sort. So yes, it is safe to
say that screenplays are an absolutely pervasive part of
the culture. Not only does the sheer volume of scripts
make it difficult to distinguish oneself in this climate, but
so does the fact that there are already a vast number of
talented writers in need of work. And lastly, consider the
fact that the art of storytelling is something that is
already ingrained into our culture. So given all these
pertinent realities, hulk has one very simple question:
Why do most movies have major script problems?
Quite frankly, the answer lies in a lot industry bullshit.
Meaning there is a good deal of putting the cart before
the horse so to speak and moving on with a movie before
you really have a story... But this column is not actually
about that. Nor is this column is about writing screenplays
that sell, pop, or that can be pitched to a studio. While
these elements are all important to being a success, it is
not a part of what we shall discuss here. In fact, hulk
would argue that if you only possess the ability to sell,
pop and pitch, then you can only have the kind of success
that does not last.
Meanwhile, knowing how to write, lasts.
So the following gargantuan, seven-part column is hulk's
humble attempt to try shed some light on how to become
a better writer and storyteller. The first three parts of the
column are rather conceptual. They take a great deal of
time to wax philosophical on the state of mind and
purpose one needs to approach storytelling. But the last
four parts of the column are (thankfully) rather practical
5

in terms of how to tackle the craft and screenplay-specific

conventions.
At this point, hulk would be remiss if hulk did not mention
the following information: the following column is, in all
seriousness, the length of a book. All this means is that
you can feel free approach this column any way you see
fit. Hulk did not want to break it up into several columns
over the course of days, because hulk felt like it was still
one singular idea. And while you may not be able to be
read in one sitting, hulk tried to make the structure as
digestible and easy to navigate as possible (most of the
subjects are listed by point number). Whatever short
comings this approach has in terms of pontification, the
piece will certainly not have others from a lack of effort.
We like to think of internet articles as these timely,
disposal things, but hulk stands defiantly against that
notion. A simple "blog post" can be more if we want them
to be. We both just have to change our definition. Hulk
really wants to believe this column can work like a book,
something that can easily be returned to over time. Hulk
wants this column to always be here if by
Chance you need it. And like most hulk columns, it's hulksized-ness is informed by the sheer mass of the subject
itself; for the art of storytelling, whether we distill it in
terms of the ideas, the know-how, or its effect on
audience, is an art that is as varied as our own lives, and
as expansive as our own universe.
At the same time, please know this column is not meant
to be some authoritarian rant on hulk's part. It is meant to
be helpful. Nothing more. Nothing less.
The motives for writing it are born from a genuine sense
of camaraderie, from knowing the same struggle that all
6

writers go through. And if you've been through that

struggle then you know that it is sham for any writer to
represent themselves as an authority. There is only the
lonesome struggle to execute one's ideas. It is constant,
pervasive, and everlasting. Hulk believes this struggle is
tough on writers. It makes for a solitary life. And trying
battles with ones own mind. It fosters a solipsistic sense
of independence, which can also breed contempt. So as
much as anything, hulk writes essays like this in an
attempt to connect. To share. To not feel like we are so
alone in the pursuit.
As such, this column is meant for writers for every single
level. Introductory, intermediate, and working pros who
perhaps know most of these things either in a conscious
or unconscious manner, but could always benefit from
seeing the ideas all laid out. Even certified geniuses can
sometimes overlook some missing element it may take to
fully elevate their script. And yes, this column is even
meant for those who have no interest in screenwriting
whatsoever, but are just curious about how the process
affects what they see on screen.
Because ultimately this isn't about the path to success, or
industry secrets, or some ethereal concept of import...
...This is about trying one's hardest to write screenplays
that work.
Part one - what is a story?
You obviously know what hulk means when hulk says
story, but let's try and define it in one sentence.
... Yeah, it's kind of hard.
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Life is full of these obvious, tangible concepts that we

recognize so easily, things like love, anger, happiness,
jealousy, and lust (can't forget lust!). We use these words
every single day, but rarely do we try to actually define
them in one singular, clear way. There have been many
attempts made by the worlds great thinkers. The make up
all those lofty quotes you've heard at some point and
they have either gone on to inspire people, or just fill up
those weird "best quotes ever!" web-pages that look like
they were designed in 1996. But these well-meaning
attempts at definition become even more problematic
when you consider the totality and range of most those
concepts. To embrace that range means not catering to a
simple one-off like "love means never having to say
you're sorry." but considering everything that it truly
means (and come on, "never having to say you're sorry?"
most of us should be apologizing for like 60% of the
things we say and do).
So hulk wants to ask you about the word story, as in
"what is a story?"
We could just call a story "one of those things people tell"
and be done with it, but that's not very helpful now, is it?
Imagine if aliens landed down on the
Planet and the fate of the human race depending on you
explaining in a clear way what a story was. It's so hard
because stories can have so many different purposes.
They can be accounts of facts. Full-on narratives. Rumors.
Legends. News articles. Background information. The
word itself is so unbelievably dexterous, so how do we
narrow it down?
For the purposes of this article, hulk will mostly be talking
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about kind of storytelling we call narrative. And narratives

are only something that humans have been creating since
the freakin' dawn of culture. Born from the need to
communicate the most rudimentary concepts of
language, narratives first sprang up as part of the oral
tradition, built around campfires and communal
experience. Then we made symbols. Wrote. Painted. And
the mediums, formats, and shapes of audiences have
changed many times over the course of time, but the
stunning importance of narrative has always been there.
The archaic tropes and devices involved in these
narratives have stayed in tact and remain wholly relevant
for good reason: narratives allow us to come to a sense of
understanding about life and our function within it.
Why is this history is important? Because it tells us why
we still freakin' do it.
Think about it. Parents try to teach their children what to
do. Teachers instruct pupils. Elders talk to youngins. They
can always say "do this!" or "do that!" but by telling the
story they can convey so much more than mere
instruction. They convey meaning. Consequence. Action.
Inaction. Purpose. It's all there. Narratives mean so much
to our culture, not just because they invoke a basic sense
of morality, but because they make our very humanity
something understandable. They make our humanity
something felt.
This should be your purpose. Ideally, whatever it is that
you would want to communicate to both the people
around you and for future generations should be
something that exists in your story. It should be the very
point of your story. It should be your purpose.
Okay, we get it hulk! Narratives are important! That's why
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we're here reading!

Okay, sorry, sorry! Hulk just had to make it clear in case it
wasn't. Some folks just need to be reminded why we
really do this stuff. Narratives actually matter. When we
get older we tend to lose sight of how amazing and new
these simple concepts feel to you, but ask any teacher
about that one. Because every high school kid in the
country is discovering the same ideas you did in high
school and they feel just as revolutionary to them. They
were the ideas that blew your minds and shaped your
lives. This happens less and less frequently with
adulthood, but our duty is instead to pass on that
meaning. The cycle of these ideas are not only constant,
but critical. Hulk considers the passing of these archaic
truths to be a meaningful duty.
But yes, you are probably right, you probably think stories
matter too.
So now real question is what makes a good narrative?
Is it something that involves you? That is well-realized?
That feels honest and real? That is crafted without
extraneous excess? That gets you to learn something you
never knew before? Or is it something that speaks to
some archaic truth that you now recognize in your self?
The correct answer is "yes."
Why good friend, a good story does all those things.
There is, of course, some amount of wiggle room when it
comes to how successful a story needs to be at each of
those elements. For instance, if your story is really
concerned with the thematic meaning of a scene it can
indulge in some aspects that are not wholly critical for the
10

story, but really there is a negotiation to all this. You can't

lose sight of all the things a good story needs, but when
you do it has to be for a really good reason. Sure that
good reason mostly depends on what is matters to you,
the proverbial author, or you, the proverbial audience
member, but hulk still thinks it's safe to say that if you
look down the list of great and / or favorite films, than you
will find that those stories really do capture all of these
elements.
So let's just go for it! Here hulk presents a working
definition of ideal storytelling: a good narrative is
compelling to the audience, economically told, feels real
either in terms of emotion, detail, or texture, and speaks
to some thematic truth that you recognize in yourself or
the world at large.
Ta-da! All hulk had to do was cheat with a run-on
sentence and list the stuff hulk said earlier.
You may have also noticed that we have now another
hulk-definition that has a really high standard for
execution. Remember this definition not meant to be
exclusive, but to simply set the kind of model for how to
create the best possible stories. The definition is meant to
be an inspiration and practical. All the best stories are
multifaceted, complex, interesting, and resonant. No
matter how technically "untrue" a story may be, a welltold, compelling one will still feel more real than anything
else in the world possibly could. The best stories speak to
your mind (thematically), body (viscerally), and soul
(resonance). So of course you want your stories to do the
same.
When you look back to the history of our species, it tells
you everything to do. It tells you the purpose of the
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storyteller, which is not merely here to entertain (though

that's certainly part of it), but to engage the younger
generation the tools they need to understand how to
carry on.
It means you should embrace the high standard. Sit down
and look at that definition and look at your own stories.
Ask yourself, are you trying to be cool instead of
compelling? Are you trying to be funny and edgy instead
of being real to your characters? Or instead of to the
world you've created? Heck, are you even thinking about
what your story says on an larger thematic level? Quite
simply, are you doing all the things you need to fit our
working definition of a good narrative?
The answers to these questions will tell you everything
you need to know.
Okay, gee thanks hulk for the big definition there, but i
don't know where to even begin. What kind of stories do i
even tell?
Hulk would like to suggest that you implicitly know
stories. You know them in your bones. You've seen / read /
heard thousands. You, no matter who you are,
instinctively know what makes stories good and how they
work.
The key is becoming aware of what you already know.
Part two - where to find inspiration
For some people, the hardest part of writing is finding
inspiration.

12

The problem with helping one find inspiration is that it

sort of has to be a natural, organic thing. You can't force
it. It takes practice, patience, and a lot of work. Hulk
mean, hulk could give you a thoroughly bad answer of
saying "stories are all around you! You just have to look
for them!" but that doesn't really help, even if the
statement is sadly true. Stories and inspiration actually
are everywhere. And if you train your eye then they
becomes constant, pervasive, and even suffocating. But
identifying what makes a story worth telling vs.
Something that isn't worth
telling is a matter that takes a little understanding and
largely depends on your disposition.
So first let you and hulk decipher why the moment of
inspiration really matters. It's not just the starting point,
but something that can work as a backbone for the entire
process. Hulk has tons of ideas and they exist in various
forms: brain storms, outlines, half-written screenplays,
fully-written screenplays, short stories, teleplays, novels.
Even a litany of small ideas written on napkins and scraps
of paper. What this personal information is meant to imply
is that the relative "done-ness" or form of the property
has absolutely nothing to do with the idea and concept
itself. A finished film is as close to the inspiration and idea
as that little scribbled note on a napkin. To the creator,
they are conceptually the same exact thing. Never forget
that.
Because the germ of your idea can be the thing that must
constantly light the fire underneath you. While in the slog
of working it out you must find that inspiration. The idea
itself be a through-line that saves your script throughout
the process. The moment of inspiration is both your
motive and motivation.

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But even then, where to get that idea written on a

napkin? The germ of the idea? The very first thing that
you write down? The answers to those questions are so
ethereal and vague that it is almost foolish to really try
and answer it. But, foolish as it may be, hulk wants to
help you. So hulk going to do hulk's best here and try to
give some productive ways of finding stories you want to
tell.
Hulk will start with a question: what compels you?
At first, try to answer it on a macro level: are you
concerned with youth issues? Animals? Crooked
politicians? The unsung plight of nurses? Corrupt business
men? You are really asking yourself, what do i have an
opinion about? People look for these kind of broad topics
in coming up with ideas documentaries all the time, but it
is also a great way to approach fiction. Often these issues
have some sort of personal relevance, which speaks to
the old adage "write what you know," but hulk think that
phrasing to some real problems (which hulk will explain
later in the essay when we get to the "real life" stuff).
Instead, hulk thinks what compels you is much more
functional approach.
One reason this approach works is because it naturally
imbues your film with the thematic backbone you need.
And the other reasons is because, come on, you should
freaking care about the story you are telling. Otherwise,
why do it? When a writer and filmmaker cares, then it just
radiates off the page or screen. The audience really can
tell. And if you don't care? That comes across plain as day
too. Even if it's not the actual thematic matter you find
engaging, it should be something else about the work.
Most often writers and filmmakers care for genre, effect,
or craft. You telling a scary story? You should delight in
14

scaring your audience. Treat the screen the same way

you would if you were telling it at the campfire. Engage
them.
But remember, this large scale approach is just one half
of the deal. Even if you have a strong, interesting opinion
on a subject, the idea still has to be explored through the
context of organic characters. The characters can't be
props to larger ideas because the story will then reek of
being hollow and manufactured. Which means you can't
just reverse engineer some characters that fit your ideal
situation and have them act out what you want to say. It
has to be balanced.
So let's go back to the same question: what compels you?
This time let's answer on a micro-level: "my friend soand-so is amazing, they work volunteer at a hospital
and ...", or "i read this great article about so and
So." heck, it doesn't even have to people-centric. You can
be like "i thought of this great scenario where...", or "this
really neat sci-fi world where so-and-so is possible." or
heck, you can just have thought of a single line or image
which you find compelling. These micro-level details are a
much more common form of inspiration. They are small
ideas that excite you to larger possibilities.
But they are not narratives.
You cannot simply say "i want to write about this
textured, interesting person." and it will magically
produce a textured, interesting story. So often, a lot of
recent movies have had trouble when they assume
texture and character detail somehow is the same thing
as motive. The whole hatred for "indie movies" has
15

nothing to do with them being quirky, or maudlin, or

saccharine. It's because they're often so empty. It's not
that their characteristics don't "feel real" it's that so often
these characteristics try to hide a lack of narrative or
thematic purpose. It is character-detail apropos of
nothing. You have to go further than that. With real life
stories sometimes the "facts" get in the way of good
stories. Hulk will get balls deep into why that is later, but
hulk just have to make sure we understand that the
construction of narrative is something more specific to
narrative itself.
Ultimately, a good narrative is born by combining these
macro and micro approaches into one singular, coherent
idea. Your characters and the story they inhabit should be
in complete alignment with the intention of your themes.
Which means your narrative is essentially "what you are
saying." so when you have a germ of an idea that
compels you, whether it's a detail, a person, a concept, or
a theme, you must then zero in and figure out how that
germ then becomes a story.
For example, when alan ball created six feet under, he
had a passing thought about a family who worked as
undertakers and how that must be a weird life confronting
mortality every day of their lives. That was the germ of
the idea. It wasn't just that it was"weird" or "different,"
but that they engaged this topic so plainly. The battles a
concept that is so damn pertinent to a culture that largely
avoids the topic altogether. But that was just the conceit.
He filled it out with rich, textured characters that also
compelled him. Prim matriarchs, 30 year old granola
transients, closeted adults, and disaffected teens. But
again. That doesn't make a story. He then came up with
two devices that propelled everything. First, the father
dying so this show about confronting mortality became all
16

the more focused on a personal level. The second, was

that that every single episode would open with a client's
death. Again, reinforcing the theme of confronting
mortality in every possible way.
Do you see the role the germ plays? You think about what
compels you and in this case it was the image of a family
and the idea of "confronting mortality." he used that as
the through line for the entire series, right up until "the
end."
Notice how hulk brought up a tv show as the example?
Hulk did that on purpose. Not every idea is a great fit for
the medium of screenwriting. Some make sense for tv.
Some make sense for a novel. Some makes sense for
video games. Some make sense for a sketch. Hulk reads
things every day that should really best be suited as
other things. But how to know what is best for what?
... Okay it's actually pretty difficult, but the idea is to
really zoom in on what makes the story work for its own
purposes. Hulk's advice is to not think of it as a movie.
Just think of it as a story. Little, big, whatever. Once you
understand what the story is on its own merits, you can
play with it to figure out how that story best works as a
movie, a tv show, comic, whatever you think best.
But no matter what, it first has to compel you.
Part three - 6 general stuffs you need to know
beforehand
Ugh. More definitions and treading water before the
actual advice! Come on hulk get to the good stuff!

17

Hulk sorry, but this important.

1. Get your learn on!
Yes, screenplays are just stories.
But as hulk mentioned before there is a way a story
makes for a good movie or a way it makes for a better...
Something else. To understand what makes a good movie
you really just have to understand how movies work...
And that's
Really a whole lifetime of columns. Understanding film is
a perceptive art takes years to get a good grasp, but the
good news that this information and know-how is
something already locked inside your body. You know
movies. You've been watching them your whole life. So
you just need to watch as many as possible from here on
in and then it is just up to your brain to best understand
the process your body goes through while you're
watching them. You just have to think critically while you
do so.
Why is the process so important?
Because if you intrinsically understand movies even if
you're totally unaware then that means the audience
intrinsically understand movies too. Which means you
can't just sling crap up there and "expect the morons to
love it." believe it or not, the general audience knows
good stuff when they see it. Movies can work viscerally
for everyone. The walked out of the first pirates, rise of
the planet apes, and bourne supremacy and "got it" so to
speak. There will always errant cases of someone acting
outside the barometer, but for the most part, well-told
18

traditional narratives will always work like gangbusters.

Now you may point on the success of the transformers
series as evidence that shitty stuff succeeds too, but they
are a rare and special case of an audience knowing the
brainless fodder they are about to receive and going for
it. Plus hulk argue the tiny bit of emotional connective
tissue in the first film (don't torture bumblebee!) actually
earned the series a great deal of public goodwill going
forward. Double-plus, you cannot confuse marketing and
economics with something being "a good story." just
cause it gets butts in seats, doesn't make it good. Hulk
really believes that people know good traditional movies
by instinct and that is because every
person on the planet implicitly understands the effects
and needs of narrative.
So the question you have to ask when evaluating a film is
simple: did most people walk out of the film saying "it
worked."?
Let's go back to the [condensed] mission statement: this
column is not about screenplays that sell, or pop, or how
to pitch. These are all elements of success, but hulk argue
it is the kind of success that doesn't last. Knowing how to
write, lasts. So this column is about becoming a better
writer and storyteller. It is about writing screenplays that
work.
Because audiences instinctively know how they should
work, even if they cannot articulate it. They know if they
felt connected, or interested, or laughed, or screamed.
They know if they were compelled. So knowing how an
audience will respond to what is put on screen is
everything. You have to be effective. Hulk will delve into a
whole bunch of tools to be effective, but you just have to
understand that you need to watch a ton of movies. You
19

need to get your learn on.

2. No, seriously. Get your learn on...
As in start becoming an armchair expert in stuff. Why?
Because otherwise you won't have anything to talk about.
Hulk suspects that some people don't realize how smart
most writers and filmmakers really are. They are very,
very smart. Go ahead. Sit down for any conversation. Your
mind will be blown (as long as they're not a ratner or
something). The filmmaker will not only be able to talk at
length about the themes of their own films, or the
absolute intention of each scene, but they will show they
they are complete aware of their film's relative
shortcomings and can evaluate the reasons why that
occurred better than anyone on the planet. But it doesn't
stop there. They will be able to talk about the entire
landscape of film history. They will have seen most
everything. They will completely understand audience
psychology hulk mentioned in point #1.
But more than that, writers and filmmakers are at their
best when they are interested in the world outside of film.
Stanley kubrick was famously interested in so many fields
of study: mechanics. Engineering. History. Literature.
Great storytellers tend to be marked by an insatiable
curiosity about life itself. Yes, studying film as a medium
is important because you have to understand the tools,
cadence, and the writing process, but it's a worthless
pursuit until you can convey something about the actual
world. So look to your life. Look to other people. To
politics. Art. Culture. Psychology. Sociology. You should
have something interesting to say about the world around
you, because the world around you is what is actually
20

compelling to an audience (playing around with film

conventions is neat, but to a smaller group of people).
The world outside don't live in cinemas (like we do). So if
you want to be a writer or filmmaker, prepare for this to
be a part of the world. Prepare to be an expert in
something.
Embrace the high standard!
Note: hulk not saying you can't ever go meta with your
work. Just understand that the meta-ness needs to have a
concurrent face-value narrative level if you still want to
keep folks interested. That's all. Work the layers!
Wait, wait, wait, this is all getting a little didactic. What
makes you such an authority mr. Hulky-pants?
3. Experience + what it means for you.
Okay... So at this point you may be wondering why hulk
feels like hulk can even talk about this particular subject.
Hulk discussed hulk's humble feelings on the nature of
advice and the needs to share in the introduction, but
what is it about screenwriting specifically that makes hulk
want to contribute?
It is safe to say that hulk is more familiar with
screenwriting than probably any other element of
filmmaking. Hulk has not only written a deluge of them,
But more importantly hulk has reads a metric fuck ton of
them. Not casually either, but for, like, professional
purposes and stuff. Meaning hulk's ability to look at a
screenplay and identify why it works and why it doesn't is
a big part of what hulk do. And as such, it's not that hulk
21

want be an authority, but a chance to offer what hulk has

known & experienced. And that may be of some use. And
it may not. Hulk just wants to share the struggle just like
you. That's more the reason than anything.
But since this particular arena of filmmaking is "what hulk
do" you may note a slight difference in tone to this article.
Hulk will be a tad less cautious and a tad more direct. And
in full-disclosure , some of this directness of tone has to
do with something a little more jaded... At least more
than you would expect from hulk... As hulk said there are
thousands and thousands of people in los angeles who
have claimed to have "written a screenplay" and are now
trying to sell it. In complete honesty, what they have
write is more than likely total crap. They may have a good
idea. They may have a good sense of movies. They may
have the right intentions. But they have not even put in
close to 1/100th the work that so many working
professionals in this industry actually have. And sorry, but
hulk respects those working professionals too much to not
acknowledge the stunning gap between the quality. And
you have no idea how hard most of their paths were in
getting to where they go. They work at the craft of writing
the same way one works at any demanding job. And they
are really good at it.
So imagine if you suddenly hopped on a major league
field and just went up to bat. Ridiculous analogy, hulk
know, but this happens all the time in los angeles and
nobody thinks twice about it. There is this weird
assumption that anyone can write a screenplay if they
have a neat enough idea. Hulk knows this is a democratic
meritocracy, that's actually one of the great things about
the industry (anyone the right connection can have a shot
at being a screenwriter), but hulk's obvious problem is
with the lack of awareness. The blind assumption that
22

somebodies literal first attempt to write a screenplay

could somehow be worthy is downright strange (note:
doesn't fully apply to writers of other narrative forms, but
still does more than you'd think). So many people just
have no awareness of where they stand. Hence: delusion.
And it's a kind of delusion that suffocates the industry
and makes it harder for folks who can actually write. It
creates a culture where it's more difficult to have
confidence to "sell themselves." the don't want to be like
the rest of the delusional, pressuring jerks.
So hulk just want you to realize that knowing where you
stand, and how far you have to go is a critical element to
understanding where you stand in your writing
development. This isn't accusatory. Hulk totally includes
hulk-self in this one too. Really, hulk know that entire
paragraph above reek of a kind of elitism. Hulk totally,
totally aware of that. But that's not how it's meant. The
statement is meant to show you that you have to start
really working for it. You have to respect the craft and the
effort the same way the
Professionals do.
Hulk really, really wants you to be a better screenwriter.
You just have to take it really, really seriously.
Why is that so important? Because:
4. The script matters
Hollywood has the reputation of being rather unkind to
screenwriters. Why hulk can count on hundreds of hands
how many times hulk has heard someone call a script a
"blueprint" and that... Gah... Listen to hulk very, very
23

carefully on this one...

That is total balls.
98% of good movies have good screenplays. That is not
an accident. If you ever call a script a blueprint chances
are you are making, or are going to make, bad movies.
Sorry, but it's true. Almost every single bad movie can be
traced back to a bad script. Or fuck, maybe even no script
at all. Do you have any idea how many summer tentpoles are green-lit and get into heavy preproduction with
an incomplete to non-existing script? It is all built on the
blind dumb-ass assumption that scripts aren't that
important if you have the bare-bones in place.
Hulk would like to submit the idea that this is the single
greatest fault of modern filmmaking.
The assumption that a film's story can be simply "figured
out" in preproduction, production, or even the editing
room is a wholly laughable idea. Even in pre-production,
you need to understand what you need in order to have it
in place. Hulk mean, how can you really do that without a
freaking script!?!?! Do you know how many times
productions get locked into a terrible scene, because they
already started building sets?!?! Hulk has seen so much
money get wasted in pre-production as a bunch of
relative nincompoops re-arrange the story on the fly. They
even hire/fire writers without realizing the consequence
this has on their production.
And when you're actually filming a movie? Yes, you can
change a script to enhance, refine, and complement what
is actually being filmed. But this is deep-tissue stuff that's
decided far along in the process. This is when everything
is already set in place. You're not really re-constructing,
24

you're refining. While you are in production you need to

understand how what you're working on fits with the
context, intention, and logic of the rest of the story. This
should be obvious. It's how people made movies for
nearly 80 years.
But then the corporations moved in and everything
changed. They approached the story like... Hulk guess a
corporate business would/ and they
Sadly discovered that through marketing, tone-appeal,
star-power, and property recognition they could still get
butts in seats opening weekend. Which is super-great for
them because they didn't understand how scripts and
stories worked in the first place... To be fair there are a
good deal of executives who are stunningly brilliant. And
wouldn't you know it, but the things they produce on tend
to be rather good too!
But
the important thing is that scripts really use to matter to
the industry. The business of movies worked on a longplay sell for weeks and weeks. Word of mouth was what
got butts in seats over time, and it didn't have much to
do with opening weekend box office. So writing a good
story, well-told was your freaking business model. Now?
It's a neat little bonus.
Which is another idea that hulk would like to suggest is
short-sighted balls.
Consider the following argument: if the most valuable
thing a movie studio can get their hands on is "a
franchise" then how do you get people interested in
coming back time and time again? You make a good first
movie. And that means you need, like, a good story,
25

right? Not to get too smashy, but seriously people, how is

this not fucking obvious? There is the common knowledge
that the box office of sequels has little to do with the
actual movie, but is instead are a reaction to the last one.
How often do we hear "
_ was so good that i can't wait for _2!" isn't that how you
build the
Franchise model? Hulk understand that everyone trying to
make a good first movie and all that, but being sure
you've locked onto a great script is the first part of that. If
a franchise is everything to corporate folks, then why
insist the story doesn't matter? A good story well-told, is
secretly still the business model, we're just not seeing it.
Instead, one of the guys running disney says "only setpieces matter" and then can't figure out why nobody
fucking liked tron. This is the very pinnacle of "not getting
it."
This even true for all the popular "improv comedies" you
see in today's landscape. Guess what? All those heavily
improvised adam mckay movies? Have you ever read the
scripts? They're pretty freaking good. And they're a lot
closer to the final product than you may realize. The
character arcs, the relative points, the tone. It's all there,
and it's all often great. The improv's function is only to
find the best possible jokes, which they only manage to
accomplish by getting some of the best comedic
performing minds in a room together. It's a dialogue rewrite alone. Not an improvised narrative.
So to all you budding improv-based writers, you need to
have to write a script you're proud of first. Improv is a
great performance tool, but is not an approach to story.
26

You need the focus that narrative brings. So have the

script be the soul of your project and something you'd be
proud of, and then try to use improv to simply try and
improve the surface.
You know who agrees? Tina fey. She was wholly born from
the 2nd city improv model, yet she bases all her writing
on the work of golden age tv and the simpsons.
5. Why you still need to be able to tell an original
story
With all this "franchise" talk, you may have also noticed
that original scripts and stories aren't being made by
hollywood all that much anymore. Drew mcweeney wrote
a great piece about how we are in the age of fan-fic. He
delves into how we no longer have to look at our
influences and appropriate them into our own original
story, but actually get to work with those very properties
that inspired us. As such, it seems like every single thing
we produce is either a sequel, a remake, or based on
another thing.
The main reason this happens is more industry b.S. They
do it for valid marketing reasons (meaning it spikes the
awareness numbers because people are already familiar
with "the thing" itself). There's also another much more
insidious reason for this. The system creates a condition
where executives need to pick existing properties so that
if they fail, they can justify their decision by saying "i
picked something popular i swear! Economically it made
sense!" the human angle on that is understandable. No
one wants to be fired for crap reasons. But the complete
system-wide misunderstanding of deciding what kinds of
storytelling to embrace, is not. Storytelling needs room to
27

embrace narrative. It cannot be a checklist of marketing

points. It cannot be approached from that logic because
you will likely extinguish the very thing you need to
succeed. But alas, working with existing properties is the
new reality of corporate filmmaking culture.
And here's the thing about that... It's still okay.
Because if you want to be a working screenwriter, then
that cool original script you wrote is not necessarily about
trying to get it made (though that would obviously be
awesome). It's about proving that you are a good writer.
And in order to prove that you are a good writer you need
to prove that you can write an original, compelling story.
That's why it matters.
Because even these films are based on other properties
and characters, the question then becomes can you make
it interesting? Can you make it compelling to an
audience? Can you make the world come to life in a fully
realized way? You just don't appropriate story by way of
point-by-point adaptation. You have to understand exactly
how an original story works and how to integrate film
structure into your work. And you learn how to do that by
learning to write an original story.
So it goes back to the inspiration angle all the same: what
about the property compels you? What is so interesting
about it? And from there you tell the
Story you find compelling with the details and
iconography of the known property. You make it your own.
After all, nolan didn't make batman for adults because it
was "gritty." he made it for adults by making a batman
movie that was about interesting adult-minded concepts.
28

City politics. Symbols. Anarchism. He took the batman

iconography and engaged with ideas that interested him.
And by doing that he transcended the property through
the power and know-how of original storytelling.
6. But still remember, this is not about "getting
things made"
Hulk wish hulk could promise you all the fruits of success,
but there are so many things that go into getting
something made that have nothing to do with writing. It's
a separate topic really. So this column is about what you
can control. From the very start, hulk said that this
column was about writing itself and trying be a better
writer.
So all hulk can promise you this: if you understand stories
and screenplays, and if you want to pursue screenwriting
or some kind of career in film, television, novelization, or
media, then no matter what path you end up following
the information contain within this piece will still be of
value to you
... Or at least it can't hurt.
So those are 6 things hulk think you needed to know
beforehand.
Now how the hell do you write the damn thing?
Part four - - how to tell a story - conceptually
Please enjoy the following guidelines/rules/whatevers for
how to write a story/screenplay.
These guidelines will start with some necessary story
concepts that will help your approach, then follow with
29

structural advice, and then screenplay format advice, and

finally the key to putting it all together.
So first up:
7. Empathy is your new best friend.
When crafting a story and characters, there is something
very important to keep in the back of one's mind: there is
no single more-powerful force on this planet than that of
empathy... Hulk know you're counter already. Oh yeah,
hulk? Well what about galactus!?!
Pssssh. How does galactus get defeated? Alicia masters
appeals to the silver surfer's sense of empathy, which
causes him to join the fantastic four and defeat his former
master!
Empathy, bitches. Empathy.
But way more seriously, empathy is the most single
powerful tool at a writer's disposal. Even this silly
galactus example, which can be considered one of the
more simple lessons from one of the great comic book
sagas, works pretty damn well. And that is because the
far-reaching value of human empathy is what hulk
considers to be not just a great universal truth, but
The single universal truth of humanity's survival... Whoa.
Please excuse the naive-sounding loftiness of the
following, but in an effort to be attuned and grounded
human beings, we sometimes miss the same lofty truths
that stare us right in the face. Hulk would like to suggest
that it is an obvious, yet critical truth that empathy is
what binds human beings together. It's what allows us to
30

love our partners, families, and friends. Unless we're

dipping into some schadenfreude, it is even what gives us
our capacity for joy and laughter. Meaning empathy isn't
just "a nice thing we have in life," but a wholly necessary
function. To paraphrase david foster wallace, it's why we
don't spend every second of the day clubbing each other
the head and stealing each other's groceries. Even in a
world containing crime, depravity, and war, it is empathy
that allows us to sometimes refrain from those very
things. Which means it's why we survive as species.
Those are the damn stakes and it's stunning how often
this realization passes us by... And it's often why we miss
the fact it belongs in (almost) every kind of story.
When it comes to our movies, empathy is also the very
thing involves an audience and keeps their attention. It
hooks into their bones on a visceral level. It gives the
audience rooting interest and perspective. It is the reason
a movie is experienced instead of watched. Movies are
unique in that they get to have a person actually
participate in the old cliche of "walking a mile in another
man's shoes." we take it for granted, but isn't that kind of
amazing? A great filmmaker uses empathy as their fuel.
They use it compel the audience. And hulk truly loves
that the thing that enables humanity to function is the
same exact thing that enables movies to work! Nothing
could be more appropriate for hulk's favorite medium. But
now that we know empathy is important, the question
then becomes how the heck do we use it?
There is the old adage that you can make an audience
care just
by threatening to "kill the kitten."
This is just a saying of course. You don't actually need to
31

threaten to kill the kitten (unless you wrote the girl with
the dragon tattoo or something). What this analogy really
means is you take some obvious thing to empathize with
(cute kitten!) and you put it in some kind horrible danger
and instantly the audience is automatically involved in
your movie. But it also can be any of these rather human,
oft-experienced sort of things. Like spilling coffee on
yourself. Or having parents that "just don't understand!"
or the foil of that and having bratty kids. Basically you
want to have this very relate-able texture or context
which lets the audience say "i totally recognize and
sympathize with that inclination!" (notice hulk said
inclination and not "situation" because people make that
mistake. It's the emotions we identify with, not the
predicament.)
There is of course a way that these devices can be totally
manipulative. Some people hate to have narratives box
them in with how to feel and think. Rather than spend a
big chunk of this on how to balance the goals of empathy
without being manipulative, it is far easier to link to
devin's excellent review of warhorse, which covers the
subject quite well. The main point is to simply find the
right balance of presentation and be sure that there are
real character motivations behind the devices, meaning
the devices/situation should directly impact or comment
on the character and story and not just be there to
cheaply get "the audience on their side."
Sadly, there are a lot of people in the filmmaking industry
who confuse "empathy" with "likability." the mistake is
understandable, but please understand that the two are
not the same thing in the slightest. Empathy is
About relation and understanding. They think likability
amounts to "not having your characters do anything bad."
32

this assumption is counterproductive because without

having a character do "the wrong / fallible thing" you will
end up creating some real shit drama if you ask hulk. In
fact, this grave misunderstanding about empathy /
likability is responsible for the legions of doormat main
characters that movie audiences are treated to time and
time again.
Fallibility is empathetic! Hulk know hulk always bring up
indiana jones and we don't love him because he's perfect,
we love him because he's constantly fucking up (and
barely getting out the results). He's afraid of things, he
has false confidence, and shows fear. He's a perfect
human action hero. Hulk say it now and say it forever,
look to indy for inspiration!
There is of course a rather modern tendency to go the
other way with empathy and test the audience by seeing
how much of a dick a character can be on screen. These
sort of jerk-ass antiheroes litter the screen nowadays, and
for comedy / dark comedy purposes they can work pretty
well. But there's a whole art to it. The effect is actually
meant to distance the audience in order to illuminate
some kind of larger point or truth about human behavior.
This point can be black-as-night funny or darkly poetic
(coen brothers) or it can be grating as all hell (the
sometimes unsuccessful work of neil labute). But the key
is just to have an understanding of that approach. There
is a real contrarian tendency these days to go this jerkass direction just because it seems different. The
inclination is fine, but be sure there is a point to it. Don't
just make the jerk-ass main character a shortcut to being
funny / edgy without any sort of real thematic
exploration.
You will now notice, that whether you go the empathetic
33

or distancing route, a good deal of what you have to do

tomake it compelling is exploring is the human condition.
Ask yourself bold questions: what is it that makes this
character good? What is it that makes them troubled?
Wait, better yet, let's get specific! Ask yourself, why do
we like tony soprano? Why do we not like tony soprano?
What details about this character's life make him so
interesting?
Hulk has sat here and waxed philosophical about
empathy for quite some time, but that's because there is
no basic, truthful shortcut hulk can say which makes you
understand its nuances. You can threaten to kill the kitten
and be quite successful at it, or you bite your thumb at
the very concept of empathy all together. There is a wide
spectrum of approach and all hulk wants you to do is
have a real concrete reason for going in either direction.
It can't just be "because it is easy."
And whatever you do...
8. Beware the lure of indulgence.
One of the big mistakes in all of writing is to graciously
give into the more indulgent aspects of writing and
storytelling. Since empathy is what connects us,
sometimes the empathetic effect is so easy to achieve
that it is also responsible for letting us "escape."
Now, there is of course a value to escapism. It's a huge
aspect of entertainment. But one must always be careful
with the masturbatory element of that escapism. You can
get an audience member to think "i'm a hero saving the
34

world! I get the girl! Blah blah" but this sort of indulgence
can lead to some really unsavory stuff too. The kind of
stuff that has nothing to do with larger truths, or
understanding, or the human condition, or why we tell
stories. It's about massaging the id. And at that point,
your storytelling is basically the facilitation of mental
masturbation.
It may make people happy, and that's all well and good...
But it may not be doing them a favor. And by extension it
might not be doing humanity a favor.
This is not to overly-criticize the desire to entertain. Hulk
just think that when engaging the indulgent aspects of
storytelling, it is also important to understand what is
really happening with the audience, and to take
responsibility of your message. Hulk thinks you should try
to tie a few of the indulgent concepts into some grounded
and responsible aims too. Otherwise you end up writing
lifestyle-porn like entourage (which is not only a lazy
approach to indulgence, it is such a lazy show it can only
resolve plots with deus ex machina... If you like entourage
hulk sorry to be crapping on it. Really hulk is. Hulk admit
it can be really funny and has a few good performances
and stuff, but hulk not like its identity and purpose. It is
perhaps the most indulgent, yet well-made thing hulk has
ever seen).
So yes, even indulgence must be appropriated into
purpose. Hulk not implying that all movies have to have
some hallmark message tied into it, because that would
be super lame. In fact, some of hulk's favorite films an
just go balls out and make the most obviously indulgent,
wholly un-real narratives (think of something like crank).
The way these hyper-stories work is that the absurdity
and un-reality of the presentation actually creates a
35

sense of distance. And with that distance, the audience

can implicitly understand that the authors are criticizing
or laughing at. It enables satire and irony. You have to
think of the presentation like taking on the view of the
omniscient observer. Even if salinger technically wrote in
holden caufield's voice, we implicitly understand what
salinger thinks about everything that holden is saying in
doing. It's just a lens.
Ultimately, awareness of what empathy is and how it
works, will be the key to making all of your creative
decisions. It is the fundamental building block of
storytelling, and will inform everything about how you
want to tell your story.
9. The consistency of character motive
But what makes a story choice a good one or a bad one?
There are all sorts of inclinations, ideas, and directions
that one can go with in writing a story, but the best way
to decide if those story choices are worth it is to ask
yourself one simple question: "would the character
actually do that?"
This question matters so damn much because when a
character on screen does something they totally wouldn't
do, it becomes the very thing that most alienates the
audience. They make a subconscious decision to say "i'm
no longer going with you buddy, empathizing this way,
now i'm just watching you do the wrong thing." again,
hulk is not talking about literal right or wrong here or
what you would do. Hulk is talking about what the
character would and wouldn't do.
Think about it like this: we would "follow" tony soprano as
36

he killed one of his rival mobsters in a gruesome fashion.

It may not be something we would do ourselves, but we
understand this is something that fits within tony's
psychology and we accept it. But then we would definitely
not be happy with tony if he killed some random teenage
coed in some gruesome fashion. While both killings are
morally "wrong" to us, the audience member, only one of
them is inconsistent in terms of character. And that would
make us angry with the storytelling. Now. Of course david
chase was a master of playing with this moral line and
had all these amazing ways of bringing tony to the edge
of acceptance, but he always willing to deal with the
consequences. He always looked for meaning to erupt
from tony's choices. Hulk feel that chase was one of the
most thematically responsible storytellers to grace our
televisions. That responsibility never had anything to do
with simple moralizing, but the fact that everything about
his characters had weight and meaning. It was just
incredible.
But it's funny how this question of "inconsistency" applies
to real life as well. When tiger woods, who we thought of
as the paragon of hard-work, success, and nice-guy-ness,
was caught cheating we were collectively appalled. We
saw him as a sham and it made us furious. But when
charles barkley was caught doing the same thing (and
drunk driving to boot!) we just shook it off and said
"that's charles being charles!" we like people to be who
we think they are. Character consistency matters so
much to our culture,
and thus it has to matter to our storytelling too.
When a character does something in your story, it has to
make sense. So when they are suddenly pushing their
boundaries (and all main characters push their
boundaries) it has to feel earned. Sure we want these
37

characters to expand, change, and have arcs, but the

story needs to give them wholly valid reasons to do so.
The kind of plot-based reasons that perhaps awake
something that always in the character's soul. And maybe
they just needed to
Figure out how to let it out. And if you don't give the
characters good reasons to change, then you are
essentially making your characters be insincere. We think
of them like we think of tiger woods. We look at the
storyteller like they just wanted the character to fit some
point or the story they wanted to tell... And audience can
smell that insincerity from a mile away.
Hulk know that hulk makes this "sincere character" thing
sound like it's easy thing to do, but this is actually one of
the more difficult things for a writer to see in their own
work.
That is because, as the creator, it is often hard to
separate oneself from the power and control over what
you are writing. "of course the character would do that!
That's what i'm making them do!" but to the audience,
who only gets to learn about the character through the
very different lens of experience, it doesn't work like that.
They don't know what is inside your head. They only see
what comes out from the story. As such, they are actually
much better at reading "who the characters are" as well
as their capacities for good and bad.
As such, when writing it is important to ground yourself in
these same tangible capacities. Remind yourself of them
constantly. What would they really do? What are their
motivations? What do they want? What do they need? Are
they smart enough to do that? Are they kind enough to do
that? Are they mean enough to do that? You may like the
38

effect of a decision, but it has to be sincere.

Hulk know we all want to explore storytelling in as
adventurous a way as possible, but you have to do what
makes sense for your character. Go where they have to
go, not where the story wants them to go.
Now... How do you decide what actually makes sense for
a character?
10. Character trees!
Sweet! Actual methods of implementation! It only took
hulk 9000 words to get there! Hurray!
So character trees can be an invaluable tool for helping
you create fully-realized characters. Especially in
television and novels where the depths and histories of
character can be explored more richly in the longer
formats. But even for truncated screenplays, the value of
character detail can do so much.
That being said, also beware the dangers of character
trees because they can also lead to a lot of extraneous
bullshit. Meaning writers who complete character trees
often feel like they need to cram in all the details to make
the character "work." this not the case. It makes the
assumption that is this said detail that does the heavy
lifting. That is not true. Instead it is the
Nuance of how characters behave. So don't go overboard.
That being said, the great thing about character trees is
the stuff you come up with will always be there if you
need it.
Hulk was once introduced to a smart way of keeping track
39

of character trees by using body parts. You start at the

bottom and go up, thus "building a complete person."
To wit:
A) feet - what do they look like? What are the facts of
their family history? Where have they lived? The feet are
all are factual details to be drawn on.
B) groin - what do the want? How does their sexuality
manifest itself? What are the other base wants? Greed?
Approval? Esteem? The groin addresses all the things
about the person that are born out of impulse.
C) heart - what do they need? What things do they
secretly need in their life that will make them a better
person? Notice it is rather different from what a character
"wants" (which may be misguided). A character's heart is
likely the key to the ending catharsis.
D) throat - how does the person sound? Not just the
literal voice, but how does the person project
themselves? How do they come off to people? What is
their "surface vibe" as they say? A person's throat is
basically their posture and attempt at presentation.
E) left cheek - what is their intelligence? How does it
manifest itself? How do they problem solve? Basically, the
left cheek exposes the "left brained" abilities.
F) right cheek - what is their idealistic / artistic
capacity? What is their conscience and morality? Just like
before, the right cheek exposes "right brained" abilities.
G) crown - this is where you can look at at all the body
parts listed and piece together an actual psychology. You
40

now have all the tools at your disposal to create a real,

complex person with a conscious mind and a
subconscious id. You can start to piece together what
really matters when you write about the crown. What are
their defining memories? What is their pathology? The
crown essentially allows you to answer the question: who
is this character?
So that's a character tree.
You start factual, then get emotional, then ideological,
and then build into an actual character psychology. It is a
great way to build fully textured people with whole lives
onto themselves. Better yet, character trees work so well
in making all your characters truly different from one
another.
Character trees are not the be all end all, but a great
technique for
Development and continual resource in the writing
process.
11. Don't base your characters on one person,
combine them!
Let's face it., our friends and loved ones are huge
influence on our thoughts and experiences. There's no
real way not to incorporate them into our writing in some
form or other. But you have to be careful of when the
writer is so clearly basing the character on someone they
know. Hulk sees this all the time in scripts. The reason it
sucks it comes with this natural expectation that the
character's "reality" will do all the heavy lifting.
Know this: just because they are real, doesn't make them
41

feel real.
An audience cannot somehow sense what you implicitly
know about this real person. They can only sense the
information and characterization that is given. If you've
ever been in or taught undergrad creative writing
students, you will absolutely encounter the same problem
even every single semester:
Hulk: "listen jimmy, hulk not sure the character choice
there would-"
Jimmy: "but this is a real person!"
... It doesn't matter. What matters is whether or not it
makes sense for the character presented. So what to do
when you're so blindly sticking to real life? If you
recognize a truth in this real-life person that you want to
explore? How to approximate the influence of real people
into your script in a more organic fashion?
Hulk has a sure fire trick to making your characters more
interesting and freeing them up to the realities of writing
fiction: combine them.
You have that one friend who is really interesting? And
that other friend who is really interesting? If you try to
write them individually they always have a tendency to
come off all wooden and lacking nuance. But if you
combine the two of them? And you create a shared
wealth of history and psychology to draw on? You'd be
shocked how suddenly the character is brimming with
depth and possibilities.
A long time ago, hulk was once working on a script in
which two of the side-characters hulk kind of based off
42

"real life" were coming off flat and onedimensional. The

first was gregarious, funny kid who loved partying and
was wasting away his parent's college money. The other
was indian student with an interesting family story and
trying to approximate some kind fun experience in
college. (note: this movie was not van wilder). Then hulk
got that great piece of advice: combine them.
Wouldn't you know it, but suddenly the character was
leaping off the page. His "indian-ness" no longer defined
him, and vice-versa, the party-guy suddenly felt so much
more interesting and atypical. It removed the stereotype
of both characters. And the gregarious party-going
behavior became an
Interesting way him to manifest his assimilation into
american social culture. It was fascinating overcompensation. It also made the problems with his
traditional indian parents feel much more textured
instead of obligatory. Combining them completely
revolutionized this character's story.
So hulk started to do this with pretty much every single
"real life" inspiration.
You force them to be filtered through a prism of other
characteristics and suddenly it removes the singularity.
Now this device is not some one-size-fits-all thing you can
do with any two characters, but it becomes so much fun
trying to find the neat combinations of people that
actually fit together. Better yet, it creates new meaning to
all those details.
We like to think we see the people in our lives as
complex, but believe it or not we often just reduce them
to their own kind of stereotypes: "oh that's just so and
43

so!" so what hulk loves about this method is that it forces

you to remove the singular way in which you think about
the people around you. It breeds 3d characterization.
And it's not just true of character either....
12. How to filter "your real life" into a story
Inspiration just doesn't come from characters, it comes
from our own lives, experiences, and so many hilarious
stories. But again...
Just because it happened, doesn't make it feel real.
All the same lessons apply. Take the inspirations and
events and filter them into real storytelling models and
beats that make sense (we'll explore this later in the
structure section). Don't just be lazy and assume the
reader knows the event is equally "true."
In fact, it's usually the opposite. Real life can have this
strange way of feeling "unreal." non-fiction stories are
usually filled with the grandest elements and extremes of
human behavior. These have a way obscuring the
thematic points you may want to make and failing to
resonate with the audience. It's completely counterintuitive, but drawing on real life really doesn't make your
work ring true. So often it's suited for non-fiction where
we have to believe it.
And fiction is built for what feels true.
So hulk will now turn to another old adage. Really, hulk
urge you to remember what hulk about to say, even if you
glaze through every single thing in this article (which
tends to be pretty complex) just take away one simple
44

thing..
Don't write the story of your life with the lines you wish
you said...
Not only does it reek of amateur hour, it's just pure
masturbation. As p.T. Anderson once said "you're working
out your psychosis at everyone else's $8.50" (that should
clearly be updated to 15 bucks). But the problem is it's
cathartic storytelling only built only for yourself. Which is
not to say you can't make work, but just so often it
doesn't translate. Trust hulk on this one. It will not speak
to no higher truth. Even the most lauded masturbatory
works, call direct attention to the callousness. Like with
the entire work of woody allen, he weaves the problems
and hang ups of his own masturbatory writing directly
into the narrative. Heck, he outright explains how
insignificant it is and how it only helps the artist (this is
the entire theme of deconstructing harry).
Reality does not automatically make for fiction. And in
case you're wondering, yes, kaufman / jonze's
"adaptation" is 100% about this entire concept. It's all
about how one cannot simply rely on the facets of truth
and must search for beauty and truth and themes, and
must ultimately embrace storytelling conventions to
make those ideas resonate (even if one does so cheaply).
And that film explains it better than hulk ever could
Hulk mean, of course it can... It's a narrative.
13. The biopic / reality complication
If what hulk just said is true for your stories, then it goes
double for biopics.

45

So hulk has a lot of reservations with the biopic as a film

form... Mostly because there is a really high degree of
difficulty. Why so difficult? Because recounting a life story
tends to have nothing to do with how narratives work.
People do their best to try and make it a story,but it
doesn't often work. Most of the time, it's just feels like
stuff happening. The writers will recount all the "greatest
hits" in a person's life. And often the attempts to cram
clear narrative devices and themes into story feel
completely disingenuous, shoehorned, and inconsistent
with the tone of the film
So as a filmmaker, you have two real options.
The first is to heavily layer on the conventions of
narrative over the story, so that the traditional
storytelling elements do not feel half-assed feel. So they
do not fell inconsistent with the overall tone of the piece.
You also have to be super confident that those narrative
conventions actually fit the truth of the person too
(otherwise you might just be making propaganda). The
best example of heavy narrative layering done right is
spike lee's incredible malcolm x. The stories in the film all
have very specific narrative conventions. He expresses
malcolm's life through tried and true story tropes. He
approached his life events like little mini-movies, all
making up a much larger story. Like first there was his
hustling days. Then his jail days. Then his period of
learning (education montage!). Then his rising up into
Power days. And ultimately, his meditative final days.
There's way more sections than this too, but each of them
feels like its own specific movie. There's so much
propulsion and economy to each mini-story. Lee fully
embraced the principals of narrative at every turn so that
the supposedly-restricting "facts" became incredibly
46

compelling. He doesn't change the facts. He amplifies the

facts. And in doing so he creates a biopic that isn't just
true, it feels true.
The second option is to dismiss the concept of narrative
all together and commit solely to the concept of accuracy.
This means you tell the story through the evolution of
relevant details. This works less well with a person's life,
and much better with a specific event or time-frame. Hulk
calls this the journo-cinematic route. You be like all the
presidents men. You be like zodiac. Even with made-up
stories that are meant to capture "the nuance of reality"
you be like the french connection. You be like contagion.
In all these films you eschew the principals of narrative
and character arcs to tell the story of "an event" through
the fixation of detail. The actual human characters come
in and out, and sure they should be entertaining and fullytextured, but you really just need one of them to drive the
narrative propulsion, usually through their fixation on the
event itself.
The first time hulk realized that it made so much sense.
Their drive help's fuel the film's drive. In all these "real
event" films hulk list above, whether fiction or non-fiction,
they are filled with characters that push through
discovering the narrative itself. To unlock nixon's
watergate. To find the zodiac killer. To find charnier. To
understand and cure the disease. Their unbending
fixation is there to 100% serve the propulsion of the
narrative. So where is the arc? Where is the character
change we truly need in movies?
The event becomes the character.
This absolutely blew hulk's mind when hulk first heard
this idea. It seems to fly in the face of the character47

centric stuff hulk said earlier. This detail is actually really

important. Even though these films are some of hulk's
favorites (and maybe yours as well) there is a way lot of
people in the traditional audience can't relate to them.
There is no central character journey. It is harder for them
to empathize. Yes, they might be missing out, but the
filmmaker just has to reconcile the fact that kind of story
is not for everyone.
But, but hulk... That's can't be it, right? Just two
options!??! With nothing in the middle!?! There's gotta be
a way hulk, there's gotta be!
Fine... There's one option. One option to perfectly capture
the sanctity of realistic detail and combine it with the
ethos of character-driven story. The option is so rare, that
hulk has only really seen it happen once in tv and film
(novels are much better at it).
That option is the wire.
People often mistake the wire for only having this journocinematic route and that's not accurate. Yes, the show
was written by former journalists, who so drew on their
real lives and experiences, and in such a responsible way
that it may have just seemed like that was the case.
Everyone was like "the wire is totally, like, real man." ...
But that's only half the story. Because the show also
sticks beautifully to elements of narrative, particularly
greek drama structures. They were just so damn good at
grounding those obvious narratives in a kind of muted-uncinematic texture. It resisted all forms of stylization
(there's a great anecdote david simon talks about where
they don't pan down to show an important detail because
"the camera wouldn't know to do that." it was an evenkeeled universe). Even with all the show's fixation on
48

detail, they still used perfect story economy. They only

used the level of detail they needed and the rest is
traditional character arc and catharsis. And in terms of
theme it may be the single most socially conscious,
thematically-loaded television show that has ever existed.
Hyperbole much, hulk?
Whatever. It's the wire. And if you're going to try to
replicate it... Hulk mean... We may never seen anything
like again. But even then, perhaps there are some lessons
to take away from it.
Like this one:
14. Research!
Hulk is saving a lot of this for an upcoming column, but it
fair to say a lot of people have a preoccupation with "inmovie" logic.
Online culture in particular seems fixated on noticing plotholes and inconsistencies all the time. Often we deride
these movies for not "thinking it through' and being "bad"
because of it. First off, these sorts of complaints are made
by people who would have extreme difficulty writing a
story without plot-holes themselves, but that would be
sort of flippant of hulk and not important because they're
not the ones telling the story. Hulk's problem is that they
just might be missing the point.
Hulk thinks that character consistency (mentioned above)
and thematic consistency are far more important than
than in-movie logic. Most of us tend to forgive movies
with plot holes as long as the reasons for skipping them
are pretty damn good. All of the joker's plans in the dark
49

knight do not make a lick of sense. None. But it didn't

matter because the film was so propulsive and wellconstructed that we got swept up in the story (the film is
a great game of cat and mouse). But it really didn't
matter because nolan used all that storytelling in service
of interesting ideas about anarchism, morality, sociology,
and characterization.
So yes, hulk agree, it didn't make a lick of logical sense,
but it doesn't really
Matter. There's a reason everyone walked out and
thought "masterpiece!" and didn't notice the plot-holes
until they watched it a few more times.
But even though hulk think character and thematic
consistency matters way more than in-movie logic, it
clearly doesn't mean that we shouldn't bother putting
effort. That would just be lazy. And lot of writers in this
industry are guilty of being lazy. Hollywood movies are
filled with all sorts of nonsense, producing work that
makes it seem like the writers have never used a
computer and don't understand what the term "hacking"
actually means. Even when you go higher-brow than that,
the science of lost was often
lauded, but it was actually pretty much gibberish. If you
have any nonarmchair, seriously-hardcore science friends
then it was really, really hard for them to watch the show.
Mostly, because they would reference these cool
advanced concepts and then not actually understand
what they entailed. But these are sort of special cases.
As long as we are trying to write good scripts, we should
also try to be accurate. The narrative has to be sound first
and foremost, but true research can go on to inform so
many great ideas and really flesh out your story. You just
50

have to put the work in. And better yet, hulk think that
audiences subconsciously respond when characters really
know what to call things. The specific details give the air
of veracity. And sometimes great truths are arrived at
when you work backward from that veracity.
Going back to david simon, generation kill is compelling
because all they tried to do with the narrative was create
the most accurate depiction of life as a soldier in iraq.
And they did so in way that was only meant to make
those soldiers happy. But by doing pleasing those
soldiers, they created a kind of detail-oriented truth that
helped strike a chord with those of us looking in on the
situation.
Simply put: audience like to watch smart people be
professional. It is responsible for most of the good cop,
lawyer, doctor shows we see on tv, even though some of
them have taken to lying right through their freaking
teeth. And hulk thinks that this dishonest approach to
portraying real-world professionalism has really bad
societal consequences.
Look at csi. The "science" may be somewhat sound (if
that) and features real techniques, but the show is the
most dishonest look imaginable about how those sciences
are actually used in the field. It is utterly dishonest to how
those people really do their jobs. It is utterly dishonest
about the success rate of the techniques and the kinds of
resources police actually have. And as such it creates a
seriously damaging portrait of how society works. Don't
believe hulk? A lot of juries have stopped taken jurors if
they are csi fans... The show lies that badly (the jurors
constantly expect every single case to have the kind of
resources they need for on site forensic evidence.
Forensic evidence is only studied by 3 scientists in a little
51

lab room and there is a 6 month waiting list) .

The problem with csi is not that they are creating hyperfictionalized television, but that they are doing so under
the guise of realism. It brings up a really difficult
argument about the pursuit of narrative vs. The pursuit of
real-life logic. Again, there is some wiggle room here, but
hulk think if the manner of storytelling imbues a
commitment to tangible real-life details, there is also an
accompanying duty to portray those details in a similar
realistic vein.
And that means you should do your research.
Now let's switch gears out of character / reality and get
into some potential trouble spots with story approach.
15.

The value pre-existing conflict.

"everything was just fine! And then it wasn't!"

That is the first act of a whole shit load of bad movies you
see in theaters. We get a whole look at some world that is
built up with a sense of normalcy and then at a certain
point, it's like the movie actually decides to start. Now,
there is a way and reason to do this, but so many movies
don't really use that time for anything important or
critical to the story. It's just sort of there. More than that,
it feels like so many damn movies pass up on the
opportunity to ingrain their films from the very onset with
a sense of weight. All they have to do is start people in
the midst of a world already in conflict. Doing this gives
your story immediacy, importance, stakes, meaning.
And yet so many movies seem to pass on that option.
Hulk touched on this earlier, but they'll make a dumb
52

move where they will flash-forward to let us know "things

are gonna get crazy later!" and then just start the movie
all regular-like. When in comparison there are so many
great movies that start in the middle of a larger conflict.
There's big, bold examples like star wars, which famously
starts in the middle of a space battle. But it doesn't even
need to be some grand scale thing. We can start in the
middle of intimate human problems too. A parent's death.
A relationship at odds. A past-psychological trauma.
Starting off with these problems gives your script an
immediacy. One enters a world that already feels lived-in
and with history. It creates a world that we already know
has consequences and importance.
This isn't to say pre-existing conflict should be required
for every movie, just that so many stories seem to miss
out an opportunity to use it. And that's a shame.
So keep it in mind!
16. The jj abrams question - mystery? Vs.
Urgency!
Jj abrams has built a career off the power of mystery.
Hulk does not feel uncomfortable saying that. He knows
that it can engage an audience, propel further discussion,
create a beautiful atmosphere, and lock into your sense
of curiosity. All of his movies and tv work absolutely
commit to the power of mystery. He outlines the whole
theory in his now-famous (infamous?) ted speech about
how mystery can command a story all the way through
and especially the marketing presence. His frequent cowriter and collaborator damon lindelof, often talks about
his writing strategy where every character he writes has a
secret, which informs and guides their depth.
53

These tactics have great value... But both these guys

tend to use them to a fault. Sometimes mystery is just
not the required tone. Yes, mystery can hang over a
scene to wonderful effect, but it can also han over a
scene to an incredibly muting effect. Sometimes scenes
just need to be functional. Sometimes they just need to
be clear.
Sometimes they need to have urgency.
Urgency is simple. Urgency is born from clarity. We have
to stop that thing or the bomb goes off and we both die!
The thing hulk really like about this kind of storytelling is
that it is a visceral kind of engagement. Mystery makes
an audience member go "oooh, what the heck is going on
here?"and brings people into their minds to ponder. This
is admittedly a vital engagement that doesn't happen
often enough in cinema. But it is often just a cerebral
engagement. And urgency, with all its dull simplicity,
allows the audience to "skip" the use of their brain and
just experience the film in the most primal and exciting
way. That may sound like hulk is advocating being a
philistine, but not it all. Different scenes / films just call
for different things. And hulk thinks urgency is more
geared to how best to use filmmaking's natural power.
And don't think that urgency only applies to action and
stop the world! Circumstances. It works just as well for
two characters talking about the something that is
important to each of them. It is wholly functional. Think
back to how many conversations of lost had two people
waxing philosophical about something we never actually
understood. We wondered what the heck they were
talking about as they tip-toed around vague concepts, but
we were not necessarily engaged on character or story
54

level. And it became more and more tiresome with every

passing season. It wasn't that we wanted "answers" it
was that we wanted clear stakes and something that
mattered. Mystery truly has a short-term lifespan. If you
try to sustain it for too long, you're sunk.
So if lindlelof needs to have every character have a
secret, do we then lose the power of two characters
arguing over stakes we both understand? Hulk
understand that often lost was thematically interested in
subverting the very idea of what one "can actually know"
and thus need to put ones energy into faith. But so often
this wishy-washy mysteriousness overpowered the
Mechanics of basic narrative. What's funny is that the first
season really did understand the power of clear stakes
and tangible character motivation. But the deeper down
the well they went, the more they lost sight of that
balance, so much so that it ruined some of the power of
the central mystery... And please keep in mind this is
coming from a hulk that really, really loved the show.
Ultimately, there's clear reasons to use both mystery and
urgency, but hulk just want you to be aware of, you know,
how to use it and why. Ask yourself, what would make this
scene work better? Not understanding the urgency and
engaging the audience on cerebral level? Or totally
understanding it and engaging the audience viscerally?
Nothing highlights the differences of the two approaches
like mission impossible iii and mission impossible iv: ghost
protocol. The first steeps every character, and even the
film's macguffin in the total shroud of secrecy. The second
explains absolutely everything and takes you on one hell
of a compelling ride.

55

... Hulk knows which one hulk liked. Which did you?
17. Dont write women just in the context of men
Okay... Hulk not going to get big into this, because it
going be upcoming column, but writers, both male and
female, have to do a better job with how they portray
women. They just do. The culture of women in film is in
bad, bad way right now.
There's a lot of levels to it. There's active sexism "girls
just need to be in a movie so men have something to look
at!" and casual sexism "let's only define women through
the gaze and context of the male characters!" and even
subconscious sexism "the girl in this movie are way more
interesting, but guys are default main characters!" again.
Hulk going to address all this later in way more detail
(with a few certain badass guest stars!), but it is
important to create interesting, vivid women who, you
know, have their own stuff going on. Notice hulk didn't
say "strong role models" because that not the same
thing. Hulk talking the fact we can't
even write basic human traits. Hulk hear all the time
from students and even professional writers "but i don't
know how to write women!" ... That's b.S... If you can
write a guy you can write a girl. To suggest anything other
than that is ridiculous and nothing but opting to be lazy.
You may think this issue is "not that important" to the
story you are telling, but every film can be made better
by making the women in it more three-dimension.
Seriously. Every film. Think of all the rare films that
actually manage to write three-dimensional women, and
wouldn't you know it, but it just so happens every
audience member comes loves it. Even the most sexist
dudes on earth, who insist they don't "need" interesting
56

portrayals women,
Can't help but enjoy whatever they do on screen. We are
simply moved by interesting, human characters.
Side-note: hulk also has another column planned around
race in movies. But for writing purposes? Especially if you
have problems writing characters of different
backgrounds? Here's a tip: if you're white and you're
writing a bunch of white people. Try just suddenly
changing the race of one or more of the characters. Then
change nothing else... Problem solved.
Closing argument? People respond to people being
people.
And that's all you really need to know.
Now, let's hammer home the thematic angle of storytelling.
18. Everything you write is saying something
Whether or not we mean to put messages in our films and
media, they are still there.
This is an inescapable fact of authorship and the anchor
behind the entire field of semiotics. Everything characters
do or say, automatically implies something about the way
characters think about life. Even if they are just
automated responses, does that not imply author is
saying something about the way certain people may
behave?
This does not mean that characters are automatically a
stand in for the author's beliefs or some silly notion like
57

that. But there is a way that all authorship comments on

the characters. The manner of portrayal, the totality of
everything they say and do, has consequences, context,
and a tone of presentation. There are layers to it. And an
author's messages, whether intentional or unintentional,
are expressed through those layers of context.
A good storyteller knows how to harness those messages.
As in they use the story's context to create their own
meaning. Hulk talked about the idea of art and intention a
great deal in hulk's video game column on call of duty
and there are many ways to express an idea in
screenwriting, but the one core thing you need to have is
a simple awareness of what you are saying. It can be
some grand on-the-nose political statement, it can be
nuanced thought about a character's behavior, it can be
simple justification of heroism and kindness. But it says
something. And the simple awareness of whatever that
idea is, your theme, your purpose, often does half the job
of sorting that context for you. Hulk will say it again: the
mere act of having a viewpoint and theme in your head
while writing will do half the job for you.
Hulk know that hulk say it all the damn time, but
awareness matters. Everything you write in your
screenplay means something.
This is where we get into the concept of "soul" in the
mind, body, soul approach to movies. When hulk talked
about ideas and subjects that compel you back in the
inspiration section, the intent was to provide themes that
can be used to compel both your characters and then the
audience. It is your chance to connect to the person's
soul.

58

Thematic messages are not a burden or a responsibility,

but a damn opportunity.
Theme allows the author to say something important. It
doesn't need to be oppressive and dominate the story or
sense of fun in your film. Even in the most silly of
comedies like the other guys, mckay finds a way to
comment on the things he finds important and makes
them work with the context of a send up of action movies.
For instance, he totally finds it interesting that action
films often feature these crazy ethnic bad guys who
operate drug cartels and murder and stuff, but whose
exploits are almost nothing compared to the pervasive
shame of white-collar crime. Sure, the film makes fun of
over-the-top car chases and cliched super-police officers,
but it is also serious criticism about the simplistic way
action films paint good and bad.
And even if you just want your movie to be fun and not
overwhelm your audience with "messages" there is a way
to do that too. You can post-modernly thumb your nose at
the idea of "saying something," avoid what you think is
trite or didactic, and implore that very thematic message
into your film. Hulk mean, if that's what you actually
think, isn't the script just an opportunity to make that
clear?
Theme is always an opportunity, not a burden.
19. The ending is the conceit
So if all the ideas in our films mean something, then your
ending should say everything.
We often look at endings as those things that just wrap up
the story and make us feel better, but a better way to
59

think of an ending is for it to hammer in everything you

ever meant. All the story, all those themes, all those
ideas, all that work, it should resonate as the audience
leaves the theater. Not be extinguished in a merciful,
placating whimper.
Hulk talked about this at length in regards to james
gunn's excellent film super, where he didn't just do that,
but used the ending of the film to reveal the thematic
idea of what the film was really about the whole time. It
wasn't some cheap plot trick, but a transformative,
thematic-hammer. The film's ending is powerful,
resonant, and re-shapes the entire film you saw just
before it.
Endings always matter. Here's a run-on sentence for ya,
but why else would shakespeare always end his plays
with some haunting or beautiful
Monologue, delivered by an actor, seemingly right to the
audience, in which they would ruminate on the events
that have transpired, what they meant, and how they
should resonate going forward... Hulk mean... He is the
greatest writer ever and he basically just tells you the
conceit right at the end.
So do not look at the ending of your piece as a burden,
but an opportunity. An opportunity to say everything you
want to say in your movie. It is an opportunity to be
poetic, resonant, and interesting.
And if you skirt on that opportunity? And just wrap a few
things up without living up to the rest of your film? Then
that might be a bit of a problem because that's what the
audience leaves with.

60

Hammer home your points. End strong. Say something.

Now let's quit this conceptual shit and get into part five
and how to use structure!
Part five - - how to tell the story - structurally
Note: the corresponding picture to part five, shown
above, can die in a fire.
So parsing out the structure of a screenplay is commonly
referred to as "breaking a story." it feels like a better
phrase than "constructing" because that word feels like
rough assemblage. Whereas breaking a story is about
taking the idea itself, your inclination + the story already
locked in your mind, and breaking it down so you
understand it on structural level. It's more like you are
manipulating what you instinctually have and know. Like
working with play-doh or something. Hulk likes that
thinking much, much better.
Anycrap, let's look at how to properly break a story.
20. Economy is your new second best friend
A friend of hulk's said something fascinating recently. He
made the comment that there's not a single summer
tent-pole released in the last ten years that couldn't stand
to lose at least 15-20 minutes.
This is a truth.
It is stunning how many movies today tell their stories
with ton of fat. And no, hulk not talking about mere
"pacing" which is built in the edit and direction (and which
is actually executed faster than ever these days). Hulk
talking about script-level fat. Hulk talking about whole
61

scenes that have no purpose other than to be "funny" or

"cool." hulk will get into the inclinations that create this
story fat in the next few points ( mostly how writers today
don't know how to combine characterization with
plotting), but the point is that
You really, really need to embrace the concept of
economy. It should be the huge thought in the back of
your head. Repeat it again and again: tell only as much
story as you need... And if you're telling more than you
need, well then there better be a damn good reason for it.
By valuing economy from the onset, it helps you create a
tight, focused, exciting script. If you do that then
integrating characterization, nuance and theme is
actually far easier to incorporate than going in the other
direction. Trust when hulk says it is far more difficult to
take a lumbering story, full of thorough characterization
and thematic exploration, and then somehow parse it
down into a tight story. It's so much harder. So go the
other direction.
In every kind of story, even the most casual charter
pieces, even films with a leisurely editing pace, you still
want the character's evolution to be propulsive. Even with
the most intimate, human stories, you always want to
enter each scene with a new sense of purpose and
interest.
And in order to do that you have to unlearn points #2122.
21. The myth of 3 act structure.
So hulk think 3 act structure causes a whole lot of
bullshit. Once you've read about the concept and get the
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basic idea (it's just a slightly-more fancy way of saying

"beginning, middle, and end), then you can pretty much
leave it right where it is. The idea that 3 act structure is
the best way to approach storytelling is a freakin' myth.
The fact that it is the most popular only tells you way so
many people have bad structure in their writing.
Hulk linked to this old column last week so that you
wouldn't have to go linking back to some other long
article in the
middle of this one, but if you didn't have a chance to
read it, hulk will now give the short version.
First off, just know that hulk isn't saying "you can't boil a
story down to three acts in some way that make story
sense" because of course you can. Hulk's point that using
3 act structure as your writing model will likely produce
some of the laziest screenwriting on the planet.
Every time hulk reads a script where someone so
blazingly sticks to 3 act structure, the same problems
seep out again and again. 3 act structure stalls out your
action. The 2nd act or "middle" always feels like a
wasteful wash where nothing happens with character and
plot. It's merely spinning wheels before the climax. It just
doesn't foster narrative propulsion. That's because it
reverse engineers structure in most reductive way
possible.
And remember, when you boil down an idea into its most
basic elements, you are therefore boiling down an idea
into its most basic elements. You will only have the
inspiration to create something just as basic as your
analysis. Which means you could also be discounting a
large number of elements that were

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Used to create that rich and fully textured story you so

unceremoniously boiled down into 3 acts. Hulk find this all
really troublesome.
So what is practical, helpful definition for an act? An act is
any time a character makes a decision from which they
can no longer go back.
Hulk thinks that's pretty damn practical. As such, a film
can have any number of acts. Really. Do whatever makes
the most sense for your particular story, with your
particular amount of characters, and your particular
characters' journeys. Is the character going to evolve
through a lot of stages in life? Are they going to learn one
simple lesson? What sort of complexities are they facing?
Are the problems short term? Long term? Do the
problems evolve too?
These sorts of questions dictate your structure. As kind of
go-to-model hulk does largely enjoy shakespeare's 5 act
model which breaks down things in a kind of helpful way
and really seems to fit the standard length of a
screenplay (you'd be shocked how often people try to use
3 act structure and find themselves stalling out at 50-70
pages).
With shakespeare, there is act 1 - the introduction, which
establishes preexisting conflicts and the needs and wants
of the main characters. Act 2 - the instigation, which
introduces how the main conflict of the story comes to be,
which is often something that complicates the preexisting conflict to boot. Then there is act 3 - the turn, in
which there is some grave turning point that flips the
conflict on its head and has grave consequences for all
(these are often shakespeare's best acts. They are full of
large, bold action that are normally reserved for
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"climaxes" of most 3 act films. By moving these grand

gesture to earlier in the story, they thus have the power
to both shock the audience and shape the story further.
It's brilliant storytelling). Then there is act 4 - the spiral, in
which the results of the turn gain steam and propel
toward the ending (what is interesting is how most act 4s
look like the entire act 2s of 3 act structure. Which means
there a lot of back and forth and set up for finale, but it
works much better in shakespeare because the acts are
so short, and hectic and feels like time is running out.
Meanwhile, it doesn't work in 3 act structure because
they try to do this for 40 pages in the middle of the movie
and it just completely lacks importance). Finally there is
act 5 -the climax, which brings the narrative to a
resolution and hammers home the final thematic
messages of the entire piece (the ending is the conceit!).
But again, this is just a much more interesting model for
propulsive storytelling, but any number of acts will do.
Malcolm x is 9 acts in hulk's estimation. Some films are
upwards of 20. There's even a way that every single
scene should feel like it's own mini-act that accomplishes
some story point and propels you further, it's just we tend
to reserve the term "act break" for these major sort of
gestures. But really every scene in a film should be
accomplishing something, just on a different scale.
We're going to explore all the possible ways to approach
the shape of your story in the next few points, but just
remember that using 3 act structure as your "guide" is
one the most reductive, unhelpful thing you can do. It's a
model that just makes one's movie look like every other
bad movie.
But more importantly it will not help you become a better
writer.
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22. Do not use hero journeys either - it is a crutch

This was also linked to in the preamble article and raises
similar problems. Now, of course the hero journey can be
used just fine in a lot cases, but hulk's main problem with
the structure is how it similarly reduces the concept of
propulsion in favor of theme alone. But really it's much
worse than that. So many writers use it as crutch
nowadays thatthe beats are so overused and sooooooo
familiar at this point that it's almost counterproductive to
the goal involving the audience. And since it's a crutch,
the writers often don't even care about the themes
involved and hit these beats because that's what they
think stories do.
Screw if it makes sense for character and this plot, i'm
doing what campbell says i should do!
Yeahhhhh, the problem with that is that's not what
campbell said you should do. What does hulk mean? Hulk
means that joeseph cambpell never meant for the hero
journey to be a structural writing guide!
The hero journey was a way of appraising ancient myth to
understand the cultural relevancy and anthropological
ties that bind. Meaning it was an academic and thematic
appraisal. It was not ever meant to be thought of as
structural guide. Hulk know that george lucas used it as
his inspiration, and thus everyone is now using it as their
inspiration, but the things that make star wars a good
narrative, whether it be the characterization, the
propulsion, the scene-to-scene goal-orientated structure,
have absolutely nothing to do with the fact that he was
tapping into these common archaic myths that campbell
described. That for theme and theme alone.

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Look. The hero's journey seems like it's a structure

because of the circle and the points along the way and all
that other stuff, but it doesn't appropriate storytelling and
how to execute conflict resolution. It just doesn't. Hulk
thinks it's truly awesome for identifying themes and
motifs, but it was never meant to be a "how-to-write!"
structural tool.
To bring this point and the previous one all together:
green lantern was a film that was absolutely ruined by its
naive will to adhere to both 3 act structure and hero's
journey (it's a 2 for 1!). You can absolutely feel both
models' dirty mitts all over the thing, with no
understanding of the other values the story needs to fill
those concepts in. The entire second act just loafs around
waiting for things to happen. Really. It's all supposed to
be part
Of some "trial" but it's not even that. It's just an extension
of "the refusal" that goes on for-fucking-ever. It's an
endless delay of pep-talks and this faux-manufactured
"conflict" because the writers are so afraid to move the
story and characters along to the points they're reserving
for act 3. Wasting an audience's "narrative time" is worst
kind of offense to hulk (again, not talking about slowpaced editing. Hulk actually likes that. Narrative time is
different). And when the obligatory climax comes it feels
apropos of nothing but mere expectation. It's wholly
unearned and distances itself from anything that come
before. Even the act 1 transition is garbage. It isn't even
really an "act" because hal jordon doesn't even make a
choiceto go to planet oa. The ring just takes him there.
And he then spends the entirety of this supposed "act 2"
going back on that transition. The entire film has one
actual decision right before the last battle.

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This is a complete failure to understand what storytelling

really means.
Hulk feels the film is one of the laziest, most-story-deaf
scripts ever written. Really. None of it is what you want in
how to tell a story. And hulk really worries that part of the
reason is because they so desperately clung to 3 act
structure and the hero journey, thinking it would handle
everything they needed.
Dammit all, hulk smash! You, the person hulk writing to
now, stay away from them! You want to be propulsive!
And.. And... Sorry hulk calm down now. [clears voice] ...
Hulk just want to suggest to you that there are other
models out there which help you write much better work.
You may argue "but hulk you talk about other structure
model to use. Aren't those just as reductive?" no, not
really. It's a fair point of course, because all these models
are indeed reductive, but there is a specific way that the
reductive angles of each all help solve certain problems
one encounters in writing. And hulk finds that aside from
a few thematic points in the hero journey, these two
popular models won't solve much of anything.
But hulk really believe there are some other models that
will help.
So let's look at them, shall we?
23. The sequential approach
The sequential approach is more detailed than this, but
basically it amounts to "sit down and start writing the
story logically from point a to point b."

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... Yeah... This is a horrible way to write screenplays if

you've never written one before.
Chances are it is will create a run-on, purposeless story. It
will show a lack of forethought. Ideas will be lost and the
story will simply meander to places it never felt like it
would belong. Hulk sees scripts that were clearly
Written this way time and time again, where the story just
plain runs out steam with no real sense of how to resolve
it.
But the value of the sequential approach becomes
startlingly apparent later on
in your development. Once you've already had a good
deal experience with structure and heavily outlining, it
can re-introduce the most basic logical form of writing.
You see, so many intermediate writers get caught up in
the game of beats and structure and character points that
they'll end up writing these little disconnect scenes. The
story is this scene and then it's that scene, etc. They'll
work each work like their own little plays. It works in
terms of making your outline look good and well-realized,
but over-relying on those methods also hurts the overall
flow. Because no matter what most structural outlines
create flow problems. They just do. And in comparison,
the logical process of writing sequentially can so helpful
when you finish a scene and say " well now i go here of
course!"
Meaning that sequential approach is best used as a kind
of intermittent tool. Start with heavily planned arcs, but
don't be afraid to momentarily lose yourself in the flow of
the writing (particularly if it the first draft). But always
take pit stops to refocus. Be sure that where you're going
fits back into the outline. Go back and forth, but never be
69

afraid to give into what scene dictates might happen

next.
Once you're done, you still keep going back working it
into your beats. The whole thing is a difficult balancing
act (once hulk explains the next few beats, achieving this
balance will make much more sense), but really the
important thing is to realize that flow is always critical to
organic story propulsion..
But how do you be sure what "flows" actually makes
sense?
24. Trey parker + matt stones: therefore / buts
not "ands
Watch this video of the south park guys unexpectedly
show up in an nyu screenwriting class and drop some
knowledge bombs. (prop's to hulk's friend dave for finding
it). Really. Watch it. It's 2 minutes. Hulk swear:
This is one of the most succinct and helpful things that
hulk has ever come across in explaining the process of
writing. Since finding it, hulk has not only spread the
word, but used it time and time again. Hulk really not
even need to expand on it because it so freaking clear. It
even addresses the single most relevant problem in
today's writing and that is a lack of narrative purpose to
the action one seeing on screen.
Simply put: "therefore's" and "buts" create the sense of
propulsion.
The "and thens" stop the narrative cold.
It's no accident that the south park guys have become
70

better writers with

Every passing season of the show. They have always
been funny and smart, but after 10 years they have
finally learned to shape their storytelling. Meaning the
show has gone from being flippant and funny, to now
they are being downright resonant. A punk ass show that
can tell stories mind, body, and soul. And that's really
something.
So look at your stories. Look at every scene. If the only
way to line up the beats is with "and then" then you're in
trouble. Find your "therefores" and "buts."
Start reshaping your purpose!
25. Dan harmon's circles
There are, of course, far more complex models to create
this same sense of propulsion.
There was a recent wired article where the incredible dan
harmon, creator of community, delved into his structural
approach the show. Check it out here. Now this model has
a very specific purpose to tv sitcoms, but the form is
rather interesting and can be applied to many other forms
of storytelling. The short version of his character-conflictstructure look like this:
1.

A character is in a zone of comfort

2.

But they want something.

3.

The enter an unfamiliar situation

4.

Adapt to it

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5.

Get what they want

6.

Pay a heavy price for it

7.

Then return to their familiar situation

8.

Having changed.

It is a wonderful way to look at storytelling because it is a

direct model for showing how a character changes. It is a
perfect model for achieving catharsis.
This model not only fosters good characterization, not
only incorporates some thematic idea of what human
beings want, but also requires a sense of narrative
propulsion and purpose to each scene. 8 little story beats
that can be manifested over a whole movie, an episode of
television, 8 scenes, 8 little moments, or even, if you're
really good, a single brief interaction.
The complexity of how harmon approaches these circles
is fascinating, but it is important to recognize that this
particular model is something he personally understands
in every facet. It is his method. Whereas this whole
Analysis is about how you incorporate it in into your
method. Even if it may help you solve a whole bunch of
problems in your script, it just might not make perfect
sense for your non-sitcom approach.
So the real lesson to take from dan harmon's circles is
how much work and thought he puts into his character
arcs, and how hard he works at getting his stories to
break to them.

72

Whichever structural methods you end up incorporating,

you should be working just as hard.
Moving on!
26. The snow flake method
A lot of times, particularly when approaching longer
stories like season-long tv arcs or novels, people will have
trouble finding ways to enrich the story with detail while
still remaining relevant to the conceit. Sure we have point
#10's character trees, but that's doesn't solve a lot of
long-form structure problems. That's when hulk finds the
snowflake method helpful.
Take a look, it gets to the good stuff at "the ten steps of
design."
There's a lot that goes into it, and again the link is so
clear that hulk just doesn't want to regurgitate it, but the
idea is to really flesh out the ideas in through-lines
through every facet of the approach. It can be a
fascinating exercise to take your core idea and
extrapolate it into singular details. You basically ask
yourself:
"what are the scenarios in which my core idea would best
manifest itself?"
Let's go back to our awesome six feet under example,
which seemed to use the snowflake method. Alan ball
asked himself, what scenarios would confronting mortality
best manifest itself? And he found answers: working in a
funeral home, father dying, constantly taking in dead
bodies, constantly dealing with grieving loved ones. Hulk
have no idea if ball is a snowflake-method guy, but when
73

hulk looks at his work it sure looks like it. All central
theme extrapolated into plotting, character, and singular
details.
At this juncture, you may have realized that whole point
of these structures is to have as many different ways of
attacking different kinds of story problems. This is perfect
because writing is largely about problem solving. You
write. Everything seems great. You hit a snag. You try and
figure it out.
That's writing.
So depending on what you're looking to solve, there are
so many models to incorporate into your favorite method.
So that being said, lets look at hulk's favorite method and
use the entire story-breaking / inspiration process we've
learned so far. It's really a two part process. The first is:
27. Breaking into concurrent arcs
One of the best places to start really organizing your
structure is to look at all the arcs in your story and lay
them out as individual stories.
Hulk could come up with a fun analysis of a movie that
we all know and could work with, but because hulk keeps
talking about the problems of reverse engineering, let's
go in a different direction instead. Hulk will now come up
with a made-up story right here on the spot... Hulk swear
this what hulk doing and it probably going to be pretty
bad. Again, hulk swear hulk won't refine the idea so it will
be bad, but at least you can see the organic process:
Um... So, like, a doctor has journeyed to a small aids
hospital in africa, to rebuild his life after a painful
74

divorce... You know this kinda story. It makes up the world

of melodrama and such. So in this story the doctor has to
face his
Own past and pain and yada yada yada you get it, but
also.....There's a boss who
Runs the hospital in a very counter-intuitive way that is
different from the doctor's own experience. And this is not
just in terms of medical logistics, but regard for human
life and what is "best for everyone." the boss won't take
certain risks and will only do what they can do to keep
the system in balance. And there is also another main
character and she is a co-worker at the hospital and love
interest to help him rebuild his life. That sounds like three
good places to start.
Now... Hulk not just interested in something as simple as
those character archetypes. Hulk really wants to explore
the real-life concepts of compassion vs. Practicality in a
bureaucracy. Plus, hulk really interested in the state of
health and politics in africa. So now we have some
themes hulk finds compelling. So the main character and
the boss will have a disagreement over the proper
treatment of aids, where the main character is propracticality with safe sex and the boss is religious with
the old stance of abstinence. But hulk doesn't want it to
be this simple good / bad dynamic. Let's reverse it then.
The boss will also have a very practical approach to not
helping folks who can't be helped and will only get others
sick, where as the main character sees that as lacking
compassion. They both have their ideals, and they both
have their sense of practicality. Cool.
So hulk begins to work with these ideas, blah blah blah
but at certain point in brainstorming process hulk would
75

sit down to map out the three arcs.

-relationship with boss
-relationship with co-worker
-relationship with his self / past
And for each of these arcs hulk would plan out a story for
that makes sense on its own. They would not simply be
"elements" of a larger story, but their own complete
stories, independent of anything else. Also, hulk would
not waste anything. Hulk would list out each scene, which
would comprise each
Beat of the story.
This would allow hulk to be sure that each beat really
accomplished something.
Hulk won't do it for all of them, but here's a quick + dirty
treatment (that again is unedited) of what the story beats
would look like for one of the arcs.
-relationship with boss: doctor meets boss and notices
their different life approaches. The doctor feels alienated.
The doctor then sees the boss's pragmatic
uncompassionate style in action and it gives him ethical
concern, so they come into a conflict over it. The doctor
sticks to his guns on a different case and saves a patient
who a danger to others. It is a success and everyone else
fine, much to the dismay of the boss, the main doctor
feels emboldened by this success, so the next time the
doctor does this same thing, it is less successful. His
emboldened attitude was misplaced so he then he sees
negative consequences of this decision. A decision causes
others to get sick, the doctor sees how his emboldened
76

attitude has undermined the bosses ability to run the

hospital, the negative consequences for spiral, the
problems are righted by the two appreciating the other
and coming to work together.
Now this is example isn't that good or focused, and in fact
it is the kind of hospital plot line we've seen a million
times before, but that just makes it perfect for our
purposes. Since they are all familiar story beats you
implicitly "get" the bare bones of the story, we can now
talk about where it can properly go.
The first step would be that these beats need to be
fleshed out in an organic and accurate manner. The story,
like any story, could easily feel forced. But the beats
could easily feel natural as anything too. Either way, we
have what we need. We don't need any more scenes than
what is conveyed in that description of the arc. So we
have economy. Notice hulk does not double up on
conflicts which say the same thing. There is an incident
that shows a good reaction. And incident that shows a
bad reaction. We don't need any more than that. Those
two cases alone will propel the story where it needs to go.
Next. Hulk would do this for the other arc with the
coworker relationship and the arc with his past / self.
Again, we do this to be sure each element is a singular,
complete story.
... But these are not three separate stories, are they?
Not at all. This is a movie, or a tv show, or a novel, or
whatever. And as such it is one thing. Which means the
arcs need to be ingrained into a singular story.
This is where you do the 2nd part of the breaking process
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and:
28. Merge into conflicting arcs
Hulk uses the following movie all the time when talking
about screenwriting, not because it's a stunning example
of innovative writing, but because it only tries to do the
most basic things and it gets them so, so right.
The movie is kung fu panda.
Really? Yes.
The thing hulk loves about the film is how it balances the
relationships and plot mechanics to keep them all very
unified. There is po, the dim-witted panda chosen to be
the dragon warrior by master oogway and meant to
unlock the power of the dragon scroll. There is tigress, the
one who was in line to be the dragon warrior and is now
deeply disappointed at not being chosen. There is tai lung
the villainous former pupil who wants to unlock the power
of the dragon scroll for himself. And all three are linked to
master shifu who failed in training tai lung because he
loved him too much and gave into all tail lung's indulgent
behaviors. To correct his mistakes, shifu was far too hard
on his next pupil tigress, who he imbues with far too
much desire to please him. And then shifu is faced with
training the idiotic, but well-meaning po, a task he does
not want or understand, especially because it was meant
for tigress. And then guiding over all of them, particularly
shifu's frustrations, is master oogway, the one who chose
po as dragon warrior and guides all five of these
characters with a quiet sense of zen and destiny.
5 main characters. 5 different sets of relationships. They
all have motives to relate to each other. They all have
78

reasons to dislike each other and provide conflict. But

best of all they are all "interested parties" in the main plot
of obtaining the dragon scroll. They all have a real stake
in the story and action. They are not characters made be
foils for each other. They are all real people with real
stakes. The film does not waste of this great dynamic
either. When the dragon scroll is unlocked, in moment of
converging plot, it really allows them to come to a real
catharsis about the understanding of themselves and
their relationship to one another, po's embracing of his
own zen-like abilities, tigress's will to accept po as dragon
warrior, shifu's realization of his blinding pre-judgement
of po, and even in the case of revealing tai lung's own
pride and weakness. The movie comes together for every
character arc and every relationship, all in a singular
narrative moment.
Hulk just has to say it, but the basic mechanics of plotting
and character in this film are fucking perfect.
It's also somewhat funny and has some really good kung
fu.
So again we return to hulk's silly african doctor movie
that we just made up and is nowhere near as good. We
don't want it feel like 3 separate movies, we want to go
all kung fu panda on this shit. We want it to converge. So
we
Essentially "start over" with the multiple arcs. That's right
we don't just augment what is already there to make it
work. That would be half-assed and ultimately make
things still feel disconnected. We need to converge the
relationships. We need interested parties. We need stakes
and different wants all centering around the central
setting and narrative. We need to find our unifying
79

concept of a "dragon scroll" even though it probably

won't be a tangible object and instead some concept that
is far more ethereal.
We need to make it one story.
Which means all those arcs we just made in point #27?
They don't matter. They were a rough draft to help us be
sure we didn't skirt anyone's relationships. Now is the
time to completely assimilate them together by starting
over.
The tai lung example above made hulk think about about
adding another character to the mix who would
complicate the whole thing and add another layer of
conflict. They could be another co-worker in the hospital.
They could create a love triangle and have a radically
different, inhumane idea of how the hospital should be
run, one that would surely sink the hospitals direction.
The inclusion of this character would be productive. It
would make for a clear 'wrong" in the scenario. It would
provide the audience with empathy for the other main
characters and hate for this jerk-face. It would basically
set up default rooting scenarios we want in the film. It
would be totally effective and worthwhile.
... It also not the kind of human story hulk interested in
telling.
For one, it's just too damn manipulative. Hulk knows this
melodramatic story likely can't be turned into high-art or
anything, but hulk's particular inclination would be to
make this script more quiet, nuanced, and well-observed.
And that means no abject villains. But since we still want
the inner-conflict the villain provides, it would then make
sense to take some of those same 3rd party clashing
80

motives, and give it to a non-evil character. How about

the love interest co-worker? This would be good because
before this hulk hadn't really a strong idea of the
character's faults. Sadly, she was just one of those foils
who could "make the doctor realize he needs love" or
something stupid. But giving her a contention and
differing view point on what direction the hospital should
go in. Doing this provide stakes and conflict. It would
maker her relevant to the story and not just relevant to
the main doctors catharsis. It would help make her
textured and real. We would get the same conflict the
villain would have provided, but in this version her
humanity would make her view seem more human.
But what could this third direction for the hospital actually
be? Well, hulk very interested in the politics of africa as
well, so maybe the 3rd character should want to reach
out to the local army or despot who, despite their
atrocities, have resources that could help. Both the boss
and the main character should want to stick to the
hospital's crucial independence. It
Would make for a story in which all 3 main characters had
significant interest in the direction of the hospital (ie the
plot), but also the main theme of idealism vs. Practicality.
It would give all three characters different relationships
with one another. Plus by adding this army/despot
character we would then have an outside force which
helps us automatically empathize with everyone within
the hospital's team. But again, none of this would be so
cut and dried by the end. They would all come to
understand about each others' view of idealism vs.
Practicality.
It is the merging of conflicting arcs. And it is how one
writes one singular story.
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Now, hulk should mention that figuring out a scene order

is too big a subject to get into here... That may sound
crazy, but it's its own 8,000 word column. Hulk will cover
that when the time comes, but your approach should be
pretty logical. Just sort of put it together and try to
include as many of the characters in each scene as
possible, except when they have to be alone or in pairs.
Use logic.
There is also one thing about hulk's african doctor movie
example that hulk have to talk about: early on hulk
realized something very important. It has to deal with
point #17 and the treatment of women in film. You'll
notice hulk immediately went to the "default male
protagonist" and also the default "female support figure."
neither of these options are good first inclinations. You
may even realize that this story, with all its capacity for
melodrama
and by total admission a somewhat greys anatomy-like
plot, really makes more sense if the main character was
female.... Hulk totally agrees... That's a good sell for this
movie... But here's the thing. Because the tone of the
story could feel so much like fodder for a kind of
exploitative female story (something almost lifetimeesque), hulk would like to try to push it in a different
direction and embrace an a-traditional tonal approach. It
would be a male doctor in touch with emotions and a
simple relate-able story. Hulk wouldn't want it to be
"aimed at an audience" but something more organic,
nuanced, and aimed at everyone. It a case where hulk
would go the opposite of intuition for main character's
gender, but all for a very specific effect.
This is what hulk talks about when talking about the
responsibility of the author. Think about these kind of
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matters and effects constantly. They will totally inform

your themes. And with enough discussion hulk would
easily be open to switching back the sexes of the two
coworkers, so that the female was the protagonist. Hulk
wouldn't worry about doing that in the slightest. Do you
know why?
Because they're people. Not genders. And writing them as
people makes for better characterization. You can switch
genders in scripts all the time and unless you're making
penis and vagina jokes or something (which something
hulk would totally do) the effects aren't that big a deal.
The gender doesn't matter the way you think it does. So
don't worry so much about it. In the end,
They will either be played by an actor or an actress so the
audience will be able to know. You don't have to write it to
tell them.
But even as hulk eschews the gender lines and espouses
on the principals of melodrama here, the principals of
melodrama do not apply to all forms of stories. That's why
you should:
29. Learn your genre conventions
Do you realize how many "mysteries" and procedurals
hulk reads where it is completely clear that the author
has never actually studied mysteries? And are totally just
copying what happens on tv? It about half the time. All
hulk wants is for them do pick up any damn book on the
subject and learn conventions of noir or mystery or
detective work or whatever the heck they're writing. It's
not about simply aping the storytelling models, but the
fact that don't understand the tone either. They just sort
of pick up on some basic textures from sorta kinda
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watching it once and awhile (csi shows do this! Etc). And

that is crap thinking.
Mostly because it creates crappy scripts.
The truth is that to even begin trying to discussing all the
rules of genre conventions would entail another 30,000
word column. Don't worry though, we'll break up genre
into individual columns for some point down the road.
Hulk just want to insist if you writing a western. It should
look like you've seen a western before - cough cowboys &
aliens cough... Sorry, that may seem like a cheap shot,
but it really didn't seem like it knew the first thing about
the genre beyond the importance of wearing cowboy
hats. And if you're writing horror, you should know the
mechanics of a scare and when to lay the mechanics on
thick or light. There's an entire rhythm to a horror film
and you'd be shocked how often people misuse and
abuse it (or not even understand it. Hulk lookin' at you
wicker man remake!).
But the real reason you need to know your genre
conventions, isn't just for these tonal reasons, but
because they each have a psychology to how they work.
Most of the time it is about the psychology of release. For
example, all genres and films use similar cause + effect
models to achieve some form of anticipation and release.
Each genre then lines up with a different emotion: horror
films use this two ways. When you are excited for the kill,
it utilizes anticipation and then uses a moment of shock
to send you into elation. But when you fear the kill it tries
to establish tension followed by a moment of releasing
the audience from tension, which makes it "ok" to watch
again. The two psychologies completely inform how one
one should write and stage the action of the horror in any
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given moment. You have to ask the question, does the

audience want this particular character to die? Or not
want this particular character to die? And go from there.
If you look at action films the cause and effect needs to
manifest itself by creating tension followed by a moment
of elation and impact (are they going to do it?!?! They did
it!!!) even though you know that in most actions films the
heroes will succeed, that doesn't actually matter. The
film's success is in tricking the audience's brain, through
wholly visceral film-making techniques, to feel for a split
second like they maybe they won't. (going back to
urgency vs. Mystery, there is a reason action films work
well with clear stakes and completely obvious urgency.
It's visceral).
These cause + effect models are everywhere and part of
every kind of genre. To understand them is paramount to
your ability to write. It even goes to thematic motifs like
understanding how good westerns are often about "the
end of things." or that romantic comedies depend on the
audiences falling in love with the characters before the
characters do with each other (there's a reason the recent
romantic comedies have completely failed when they go
for they slept with each other! Now they have to figure it
out! It doesn't play into the basic sense of how the cause
+ effect works... Knocked up not withstanding because
that movie actually goes for other avenues of narrative
resonance and succeeds brilliantly.)
Understanding the psychology of how a genre works will
give you precisely what you need to make your own film
work.... And yes, every film is technically a genre film.
Now that we've covered "breaking" stories, we should
look at a few micro problems and devices that show up in
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writing...
30. "page 17"
The term "page 17" is a strange phenomenon revealed to
hulk by an old mentor.
He said that if you look through most good screenplays,
for some reason the movie's main plot or action kicks into
place on exactly page 17... He spent a career looking into
it... Hulk checked into it too... He's actually right.
It's almost bizarre, but if your read a ton of scripts, "page
17" of these 90-120+ page screenplays seem to be this
naturally occurring point in the main plot where the story
really gets going. Even something as non traditional as
the first chapter of inglorious basterds is 17 pages (sorry,
hulk just checked, it's 17.5). It's like the "screenwriting pi"
or something, this naturally occurring page number were
it "feels right" to really start embarking down the main
narrative path.
Perhaps this is apropos of nothing, but hulk sees it is yet
another tool at your disposal. Have you started your main
plot too fast? Have you delayed it for too long? If it's page
33 and the main plot of your story hasn't gotten going
yet, all because you're still "setting things up," then
chances are that is
A bad thing.
It's not as if you absolutely have to get your main story
cooking by page 17, but hulk would like to suggest if
you're going much earlier or much later than that page
number, then perhaps you should probably have a really
good reason to do so, that's all. Don't let it be due to
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laziness.
31. If you use characters, they should likely be
reused
Again, these are guidelines. But so often we are
introduced to certain characters in a story, who achieve
some temporary goal in a scene. Comic relief. Exposition.
Spurring forth a new plot. Whatever. And often they will
then disappear... It doesn't work that well for your story
economy.
Hulk knows hulk keeps picking on the movie (perhaps
fairly so), but in green lantern we are introduced to hal
jordan's family in an opening scene. They clearly do it to
make him seem all human and caring and stuff. It's so
freaking manipulative it's just stupid. But then... We
promptly never hear from them again... Whatsoever.
Sorry, but it was one of the most laughable things hulk's
ever seen. Not just for in-movie logic terms, but character
consistency too. You figure he'd care about his family
when all of a sudden shit started going down with the city
getting eaten by parallax, but hey whatever. Hulk guess
there's far more boring things to do when your family in
trouble. But hey, it's just offense from a terrible script
(who knows though, maybe something ended up in the
cutting room floor and hulk just being mean).
But the real reason it sucks is because it feels like wasted
narrative time. The audience can inherently sense messy
and scattered storytelling. They sense when things don't
feel important or necessary. Like in hulk's example with
how the characters in kung fu panda converge and have
stakes in each other because it makes for a relevant
story. Simply put, there should be reasons characters are
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part of the story. They should serve purposes beyond "i

like what they do for the hero in this one particular
scene."
The stories we weave and have connections. Even
something as silly as animal house, doesn't just bring in
otis day and the knights for a good times sequence, but
later returns to them to make a very different impression
(complete with criticism of white-assumption, but also
some old-school racist overtones!... Okay, really it's the
"primitive cultures" joke that is truly dated, but it's
fucking awful. Meanwhile, the rest of the movie is still
pretty amazing. Sorry for the tangent). Anycrap, the point
is you should always try to look for opportunities to make
all the characters have as much relevancy to the story as
possible.
And that means finding fun and interesting ways to bring
them back. As a great example, think about the way curb
your enthusiasm plots are
Constructed where everything always seems to come
back and be relevant. Whether comedy, drama,
short or long narrative, find ways to do things like that. It
doesn't have to be so perfect and have little neat bows on
it, but there is surely an organic way not to waste
characters.
Because the more the characters feel like tangents, then
the more they'll feel like tangents.
32. Beware deus ex machina
Deus ex machina works when it is the point.
To clarify: there are so many stories where at the last
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second the hand of "god" or fate or whatever comes in

saves the characters from certain doom. These moments
are so out of nowhere and often undeserved that even
the most unaware audience member will be tempted to
call "bullshit!" at the screen. There are the ritual worst
offenders of this device (like lazy old entourage), but on
the spectrum of use there certainly less-horrible
examples of stories that do it quite well.
As hulk said above, deus ex machina works best it is the
point of the story. Usually this requires some sort of
engagement of the idea of faith, that a character
espouses some believe that the universe is trying to
guide them, or that he trusts he will be saved. Hulk talked
a little crap about the storytelling problems in lost before,
but that was perhaps undeserved. For that show had
amazing characterization and deep-tissue thematic
resonance. They were also quite good in how they
handled this particular device. The best example of which
was in season one episode appropriately titled "deus ex
machina." spoilers and such, but in the episode john
locke, a man who has recently found his faith through
extraordinary means, once again begins to question it. A
vision had brought him to a mysterious hatch on the
island, one he desperately has tried to open in order to
unlock the mysteries within. Over a great deal of time he
finds no success in trying to open it. His anger grows. And
one night he stares down into the hatch and slams his
fists against the window. He screams and yells to
whatever is within. He then yells out to the universe, why
had they cursed him with the vision? What did the world
want from him? Why was he supposed to open this hatch?
Why would the universe be so cruel as to taunt with this
impossible task? He screams and cries into the hatch as
the music swells. He is at his wits end with his very sense
faith... And then... Ever so quietly... A light comes on
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within the hatch... It shines on john's face and up into the

night sky.... End episode.
It's one of the more beautiful moments hulk has ever
seen on television.
And that is because it finds such meaning in this tiniest of
gestures, one that speaks so deeply to the narrative and
themes at play. The simple device of a light turing on, as
well as the focus of the entire episode leading up to the
device, is about the very purpose of deux ex machina
itself. And for that
Reason they turn the device not just into something that
"works" within the narrative context of the show, but
something that swoons with meaning and resonance. It is
perfect writing.
So when you consider using deus ex machina in your own
work, think of this one stunning example. Ask yourself,
why am i using this "easy" solution? Is this the only way i
can solve the problem? And if so, think about the nature
of the device and what it actually means on a thematic
level. Does that fit your own themes? Is it appropriate for
your character?
Deus ex machina works when it is the point.
33. Beware the opening flash-forward
No this isn't more lost stuff. The kind of opening flashforward hulk talking here about happens all the time and
hulk mentioned it before in the preexisting conflict point.
What hulk talking about is when a movie will start off with
some moment from the climax or later scene, when
things are all heightened and dramatic and stuff. Why do
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this? Because it lets the audience know stuff is going to

go down in this movie! That it will get all serious! That the
protagonist will end up in some crazy situation! That's,
you know, full of drama and stuff!
Hulk politely asks: so the fuck what?
What is the real point of that? Of course the audience
knows that kind of stuff is coming. That's probably why
they bought a ticket. Hulk get the desire to let an
audience know what kind of craziness is coming so it
doesn't take them off guard, but so often the flashforward is apropos of nothing else. And after it's over, the
narrative will just jump back to the real beginning of the
story. Hulk sees the device used so damn much these
days and not only is it ubiquitous it's also poorly done. A
quick-seeming and cheap solution to... Hulk not even sure
what... Making things seem serious? Aren't there so many
better ways of doing that? Like with the whole "preexisting conflict" thing hulk mentioned?
Honestly, a lot of time hulk feels like writers use it
"because that's what movies do." ugh. It's just so devoid
of tact.
Now this isn't to make it seem like the device is
completely unusable, as there are some ways it works.
For instance, it was a common device on the first few
seasons of breaking bad. Sometimes they worked
spectacularly. They'd start with a few scattered images
we barely understand. They will build a complete sense of
mystery as to what we're even seeing. There is literally
no comprehension so it works like a mystery to be pieced
together. "oh, that's that object from..." etc. It's used as
clues. It's not just jumping ahead, showing off the answer
and then asking "how are these characters going to end
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up in this crazy situation!?!?!" which is what so many

fucking scripts do. And the
Times breaking bad did give away actual context and
information, it was often a piece of total misdirection.
But if you're just doing it so your story starts off all
climax-y and serious then you're not only wasting the
audiences time, but you're robbing your climax of
important resonance. You're subconsciously making the
audience feel like they're just waiting until we get there
again. And even if breaking bad used it well for two whole
years, there's a real reason they stopped using it. There's
only so much even they could do with it.
The opening flash-forward is horribly overused device, so
be wary.
34. Don't fuck with the audience just to fuck with
the audience
The following is hulk's general piece of advice about life:
if you start any sentence with "wouldn't it be cool if... "
don't do it. Just don't do it.
When it comes to storytelling specifically, the reason is
simple. Asking that question implies you are thinking
about the result first. You are probably thinking about
some abstract idea of how audience will react. You are
thinking about the ways stories are normally told and how
you want to be different. You are thinking not about how
people will be compelled or engaged, but how they will sit
back and be amazed because you did something different
and "cool."
Hulk has mentioned time and time again in these
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columns about how trying to pursue cool is a poor aim,

because it always reeks of false intention. It always
seems desperate and unearned.It has nothing to do with
being a valid option for the story. It will be like a
marketing executive trying to identify what the hip kids
are into. It's true even if you're a cool, forward-thinking,
progressive person. It will feel calculated and cold. The
pursuit of cool or what's "different" will always seem
disingenuous.
So try to tell your story. When it comes to narrative, don't
actively try to be different for different's sake. Because it
will just end up seeming like you're fucking with the
audience.
Look no further than the current debacle with ending
ofthe devil inside. The studio / filmmakers went along
with doing something "different" and in moment of
complete stupidity they did something they thought
might be cool. Spoilers if you want to see a horrible
movie: the film ends abruptly and tells them they can
continue the experience with the story on a website, thus
shifting it into some form of transmedia lameness... Well
guess fucking what? Did the filmmakers not realize that,
narratively-speaking, they were doing the most ridiculous
thing in the history of the world?
Devin had a great article about it how the decision, even
if unintentional, made it seem like they were effectively
cheating the audience and thus they got fucking pissed.
Hulk agrees, but really wants to hammer the point home
That it was how the url called to attention the fact they
were exposing an incomplete narrative, by implying there
was more narrative to be held elsewhere. They did
something worse than just having an unresolved ending...
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They made it seem like the narrative was purposefully

incomplete.
Here's the filmmaker's explanation:
"the stories always have a very hollywood ending. And
we're doing the antithesis of that. I know some people
love it and some people f*cking hate it but it gets people
talking. We're just trying to make it realistic. Not every
situation ends perfectly or the way you want it to end."
(via bloody disgusting) ... Sorry.
Now that hulk has that out of system let's analyze why
that comment might be the worst thing ever said by a
filmmaker.
The first problem is that he makes it clear he's okay just
fucking with the audience to get a reaction. Second, what
the hell does that have to do with realism? Nothing, that's
what. Third, he's obviously not trying to tell a story but
just do "the opposite" as if that somehow is attractive or
cool or badass. It's just contrarianismapropos of nothing.
Fourth, he plays the "get people talking" card which only
matters if you're pushing a product like a salesman, not a
so-called artist. Fifth, he plays the "purposefullywitholding message" card, thus implying we're just mad
at the ending because the film didn't end how we wanted
it to, thus implying we're just a bunch of hapless dumbfarts who need to be placated.
For all five of those reasons hulk would like to politely
suggest
this guy can go sit in the corner of director jail and think
about what he's done.
Because the most grave problem with all these
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statements is that there is clearly no understanding of

what narrative even means. None. His "hollywood ending"
comment shows that he perceives nothing about how
endings work. He seems to think that anything with
resolution is akin to having the characters ride off into the
sunset hand in hand. It's asinine. Remember what hulk
said earlier about how the ending is a chance to ram
home themes? Well most found footage films tend to end
abruptly, but at least most of them have an ending
gesture like that manages to do something. They will at
least reveal who the bad guy actually is, or show that
everyone else is still alive is totally fucked or something
but. This one just ends on another action beat
indistinguishable from other action beats before. The film
and his ensuing comments are enough evidence to
showcase that this person could not possibly understand
less of what a story is, how
It works, or why it matters.
If "the ending is the conceit" then this films conceit was
total ineptitude.
So to all of you, hulk want you to know storytelling is not
some "game" where you mess with the audience. It's an
art. If you want to go in bold narrative directions, you
start with the familiar tropes and you carefully bring the
audience on a journey, often to places that are
uncomfortable, but you do so with a guiding hand. You
can bring always an audience to an antagonistic place,
but you can't do it in antagonistic way. And if you do? You
better be damn sure that audience's angered reaction is
the exact result you want (which is why in its most basic
sense, human centipede 2 "works" for its filmmaker).
So while everyone is going around saying the devil inside
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is "fucking stupid," there's a real reason why everyone is

so damn angry. They showed the deepest lack of
understanding of why people watch movies. You can't
take turns or surprises and mess with expectation without
having a damn good reason for them.
You have to negotiate your dropping of one element of
good narrative making, and fully embrace one of the
other elements from our working definition. Dropping
theme? It better make perfect sense for the texture,
character, or reality. Dropping narrative economy and
propulsion? Better make perfect sense for theme. For
instance, the change of narrative direction in no country
for old men is easily felt, but has a stunning thematic
resonance. By removing shackles of narrative restriction,
the film is free to explore something completely abstract,
even downright poetic. As a result, what could have just
been tight, well-realized action films, becomes on one of
the best films of all time.
But also remember that for all the people who either
weren't perceptive to thematic stuff or just not that into
it, the ending of no country really rubbed them the wrong
way. And it's because it eschewed the most basic
expectations of narrative. But the coens understand and
expect those limitations. They understand their
responsibility to deftly weave in and out narrative in order
to create new thematic meanings. Sure, the coen
brothers defy expectations of storytelling constantly, but
they do so only to engage deep questions behind life.
They don't sit around and go "wouldn't it be cool if?"
35. Writing is re-writing
Finish the first draft. Then do at least, like, 7 rewrites... At
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least.
The simplest truth is that a first draft is nothing. It is not
proof you have written a story, but proof you have written
a certain number of pages. Hulk has never really read a
good first draft of anything. So the way hulk always
Likes to write is to just get a first draft over and done with
so that hulk can then be on hulk's way with all the fun
editing process.
Editing is fun.
There is the old adage that "writing is re-writing." hulk
feels it is true because that is when you get to shape the
actual story. When it's a bad script, which they all are at
first, you can reshape it through sheer commitment to
make it a good script. And the best part about refining
your script is, you know, you can still make great changes
with zero negative consequences (unlike when you start
filming). Hulk loves editing scripts. It's when the story
actually feels alive.
Paul thomas anderson talked about writing once and said,
to paraphrase, that writing is like ironing. You have this
rumpled mess that's still a shirt and everything, but you
keep going over it again and again til it's smooth. Each
pass straightens the shirt, accomplishing its job until you
have exactly what you need.
So how do you know when you're done?
It'll be "done" when you feel like you're just tinkering with
it. You'll making small incremental changes which, sure
might be well and good, but they are providing no deeper
overhaul or understanding to the piece itself. So hulk
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think you should only get one round of tinkering and then
it should be out of your hands and with other, trusted
eyeballs. To either be approved of, or to tell you what it
really needs.
No script ever feels perfect. There is only the time to let it
go.
36. When & how to disregard these guidelines
And so at last this massive part five comes to a close (two
more parts to go! Whooo!)
Hulk said these were all guidelines, not rules. And hulk
meant it.
Your idea. Your story. The thing that compels you. That is
what matters. Everything should cater to it. You may have
noticed that throughout all these guidelines, hulk kept
bringing up exceptions to rules. Sometimes they were
exceptions that worked and sometimes they didn't work.
The ones that didn't work were either haphazard,
unconscious reactions or flippant, counter-intuitive
gestures. While the ones that worked were justified
because they only abandoned one element of our good
narrative definition to deeply explore another element of
our definition. The good exceptions negotiate and
approximate, whether it plot, context, character, texture,
thematic, etc.
So do what makes sense for the kind of story you want to
tell.
Be willing to say "fuck battles in the last act." if that's
what it calls for. Tarantinos kill bill vol. Ii knew that after
the battle against the 88, he couldn't top it action-wise.
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So he had a brilliant 5 minute monologue, summing up

the entire viewpoint of character, followed by an equally
climactic discussion over dinner, and finally 5 seconds of
intense fighting... It was a hundred times more interesting
than any possible battle. He did what made sense for that
story.
So do what makes sense for your story.
Mike leigh's happy go lucky eschews every rule of
traditional romantic comedies to say something far more
insightful about the nature of life and happiness.
Do what makes sense for your story.
Animal house essentially stop the movie and has a full-on
dance number to "shout." it halts the narrative and
succeeds only because it is a pure joy from start to finish.
Do what makes sense for your story.
The ending of no country for old men tosses aside all
narrative propulsion to wax philosophical on the nature of
life and resolution itself. It pokes inward at each of the
characters, cutting to the bone of their essence, but
leaving these other big cathartic gestures off-screen. And
yet it all resonates with a simple speech, al
Do what makes sense for your story.
Shane carruth's primer gleefully breaks every single rule
about narrative, concept, and coherence. As such, a lot of
people cant even watch it. But for some folks, he
manages to create one of the more brazen, interesting
films ever made. It so concentrates on the concepts of
scientific veracity that it captures its resonant thematic
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truths through the subject itself (much like the zodiac and
contagion examples), only his subject is one of the most
complex theoretical concepts on the planet. This
completely unapologetic treatment of scientific accuracy
via plotting results in a stunning, distinct, original film.
The filmmaker pursued an uncommon view that
compelled him and thus revealed a new view that
compelled us.
Do what makes sense for your story.
But just know this... Every single rule or guideline that is
being broken in the examples listed has damn good
reasons for why. It's not "just cause it would be neat."
they weren't making some totally pedestrian movie and
then broke a rule because "it's more real!" they weren't
even just "going with their gut," a thing that hulk bets
many of you would want to do. Hint: that could just be
your visceral, contrarian id talking. And that's not
something you want to trust with story.
No. Those examples of exceptions succeed because it
makes complete sense for those stories. It's almost as if
that had to go there to see their conceits through.
The biggest problem with how everyone is breaking the
rules nowaways is not because it's robbing us of
traditional narrative power, though that sucks, it's
because no one seems to even understand why the rules
are even there. If they don't know what the rule says and
how it works, they therefore can't understand what
breaking the rule says either. They're just trying to be
"different" ... And hulk says fuck that.
Worse, there's some folks who really don't even know the
rules are anymore.
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There's gotta be a reason for all of this, right? Why don't

we know the rules anymore? What happened? And why
do we just slam forward with this faux-understanding of
filmmaking?
It all speaks to an evolution of filmmaking. If you forgive
hulk for indulging this bit of a history-lesson, but back in
the golden age of hollywood everyone pretty much knew
the narrative rules. Movies had a very set craft. They
knew all the beats. Writers were all stabled in the studio
system and they would even have different roles. There
would be a structure guy. A dialogue guy. The director had
a role. Movies and storytelling were on an assembly line.
Yes this produced a lot of similar work, but it was
downright professional stuff. And besides, all the best
writers / filmmakers knew how to sneak subversion right
into it anyway so the artistic inclination was able to
flourish too. The point is that the authors created good
stories, well-told.
The 60/70's changed the paradigm. The system had been
"working" so well for so long, but a good deal of
storytellers got lazy within those constructs. Which means
movies in general got lazy too. When this was coupled
with serious changes in counter-culture, it resulted in the
audience genuinely tiring of the hollywood system. New
audiences wanted an alternative, so they turned to new
filmmakers. They didn't have resources so the
construction was messy. Natural. Outdoors. Thus, movies
broke the mold. The textures, stories, ideas all resonated
in a perfect way for the time and place. Of course, the
huge success of some blockbusters in the 70's paved the
way for another round of studio dominance, all done
through the homogenized, big business 80's. But again,
things changed. We had another reaction to "the man"
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with the 90's independent film boom. Again the films

went messy. Natural. Outdoors. But alas, the independent
movement was homogenized again as corporations are
now running "indie studios" too.
The purpose of all this history is to highlight the fact there
have been ebbs and flows to the nature of the business
for... Pretty much always. There is always a dichotomy: to
work within the system, or to work outside the System.
Depending on the direction of the trend it makes it easier
to do one or the other, but storytellers, at least the ones
we lionize, always seem to have implicit desire to snub
the dominant culture or popular models and embrace the
most artistic constructs and forms. It is an idolization of
perpetual rebellion. The 90's independent filmmakers
rebelled against the homogenized 80's model, but they
were also in love with the 60/70's poets of their day, and
sought to emulate them.
It's all very romantic sounding... But the problem with
this, and why no one seems to give a shit about the rules
anymore, is because we have fallen in love the cadence
of this rebellious work.
Think about the 90's boom. Tarantino has had hundreds of
emulators, but the reason no one comes close to being as
good as him is they only take the tangible stuff. The cool
suits. The swears. The out-of-order storytelling. The ironic
sense of music and bloody gunfights. They get the idea
that people talk, but nothow they talk. They miss the very
simple elements of narrative propulsion, objectives, and
clear stakes. His story telling isn't out of order for no
reason, but instead to reveal the story in a fascinating
thematic evolution. People obsesses over his cadence,
which is totally neat and stuff, but it's not why his films
work.
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This has always been true. People rip-off altman,

scorsese, spielberg, lucas, etc. But the reason those ripoffs feel so false is not because they are derivative, but
because they fail to recognize the most basic dynamics of
good narrative storytelling. Let's go super-recent:
Super 8 usurps all the language and cadence of
spielberg's films, but it fails because it doesn't know how
to make the monster elements connect thematically to
the story (unlike jaws + et). Really, it doesn't get two
central components of our good narrative definition.
Attack the block succeeds because it takes the inspiration
of carpenter and dante and filters those motifs and
approach into its own personal story and texture. Plus it
has deep thematic ideas. It gets all four components of
hulk's good narrative definition.
Story rules. Cadence is overrated.
And because hulk has to acknowledge the exception for
just about everything, yes the cadence/style of your script
and film is great tool for speaking to certain audiences.
But stylization is not nearly as critical as the intention and
honesty of your well-meaning story. It doesn't matter
where you come from and who you're working for, you
can be operating subversively within the system, or you
can be chucking rocks from the outside with an
independent bent. You can be telling a traditional story or
you can be using wildly inventive meta form. It really
makes no difference to hulk. The meaning of the story,
and its ability to resonate for the audience, is what makes
the narrative thing work.
Hulk doesn't care what kind of conceptual story you are
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telling, or what structure you are using... Just think about

what you are saying. Approach your stories in terms of
mind, body, and soul. Ask yourself questions. What does
this action mean? What am i implying with this
character's behavior?
Know when you're following the rules and know when
you're breaking them.
Know who you are reaching and why.
Be conscious.
Int. Coffee shop - moaning
normal dennys, spiroa-likc coffee shop in los angeles,
It's about 9i00 in the morning. While the place isn't
jammed, there's a healthy number of people drinking
coffee, munching on bacon and eating eggs.
Two of these people are a young man and a young
woman. The young man has a alight working-class
english accent and, like his fellow countryman, smokes
cigarettes like they're going out o f style.
It is impossible to tell where the young woman is from or
how old she is; everything she docs contradicts
something she did. The boy and girl sit in a booth. Their
dialogue is to be said in a rapid pace "his girl friday"
fashion,
Young man
No, forget it, it's too risky. I'm through doin' that shit.

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Young woman
You always say that, the same thing every tlmei never
again, i'm through, too dangerous.
Part six - how to tell a story - screenplay-specific
instruction
Of course, there is the format of the screen play itself.
The reason hulk waited all the way until part six to talk
about it is because the fundamentals of good storytelling
are way, waaaaaaaay more important than what basically
amounts to a matter of proper formatting. The things you
are about to learn are simple and easily applied. But this
does not mean that hulk does not think formatting and
screenplay etiquette aren't important. They are just not
super important.
So aside from the very basics like grammar and spelling,
there are other basic things you need to know like what
scene headings are, how to number scenes, etc. But
these are matters are easily learned from reading any
screenwriting book or script on the planet. Or just google
"how to format a screenplay." it so easy hulk not going to
even link to it. The point is it is so not necessary for this
column and would waste your time.
What is far more necessary, however, is to discuss more
of the unspoken rules that can greatly improve your
script.
37. Know it's being read by every kind of person
If charlie kaufman, an incredible writer who knows what
really makes a great
Script, sat down to read your script you would want him
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to think it's great. This goes without saying. The same can
be said for if your favorite actor sat down to read your
script. And then if a studio exec said down to read your
script you would want them to think it's great too . And if
a script reader, who reads a million of them and whose
time is short, sat down to read your script you would want
them to think it's great and keep reading, forgetting
there's a next one on the pile. And if an 21 year old
intern, who really doesn't have the breadth of experience
or patience, sat down to read your script you would still
want them to think it's great too.
Now guess which order of people the script will be read
in?
Yup. You have to make your scripts accessible to the 21
year old intern. Sorry folks but when you're starting the
game it's true. Now, this does not mean that you "can't
use big words" or tell a complex story. That would be
nonsense. The 21 year old intern is actually pretty smart.
What it means is they are busy and can get distracted.
Actually, the same goes for all those people really. Their
time is invaluable.
Which means you have to get to the point and not dillydally in the damn description.
That means no "walls of black text." really. Hulk one of
the most patient readers on the planet. Hulk can read
fast. Hulk picks up infinite jest every year and revisits it.
Hulk fucking loves to read dense intricate text. Hulk
mean, look at these fucking essays. How could hulk not?
But when hulk sees that big wall of black text in a script,
hulk's heart just sinks a little. It just has no real function
in a screenplay. By the end of part 6 you'll fully
understand why that is, but for now just accept that it is.
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And this reality just means it is never productive to read.

It's certainly never any fun to read. It's never compelling.
You may think it's important, or relevant, or interesting, or
carefully constructed. But to the reader it's just not. It's
just clear you're worrying too much about someone not
doing exactly what you want with the detail. That's not
good screenwriting.
So when describing the action, be as brief and concise as
possible. It's the same thing as hulk's "have narrative
economy!" lesson only it applies to the actual text and
not the story. The second things start to get dense in the
description, every reader will tune out. It is an absolutely
fixture of the business. These are busy-as-shit people.
Most of them will simply glance at the action to get a
sense of what's happening and then just go back to the
dialogue.
So be brief and move on.
But at the same time you can't have nothing either.
Because what you write in the non-dialogue sections is
still vitally important to the story, it still has to be
conveyed with purpose. Because the director will
absolutely use it to go into production, the critical details
have to be there. Which means that
You, the writer, have to learn how to balance
the needs of economy with the needs of relevant
information.
And wouldn't you know? Here's a way to do that:
38. The golden rule of description
"write only what we can see."
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This is an important one. If you're writing "he grew up in a

small town back..." in your action lines you are doing it
wrong. It may be helpful for the filmmakers in trying to
decide who to cast etc, but the only information that
should be conveyed is what the audience could see in the
theater.
For one, any good director will sit down and look at a
paragraph that has nothing but character history and say
"how the fuck can i show that?" and the promptly toss
your script in the garbage. If they like the story, then
they'll just ignore it and do what they want. So instead, a
good script conveys the information that can be seen.
The details like: age, clothing, posture, voice, and actions.
These details don't have to be reductive and limiting, but
an opportunity. Really try to say something with this age,
clothing, posture, voice, and actions. Use them to really
say something about the character.
You do this in the script because, fuckin hell, it's exactly
what the movie needs to do too. It can't just start reading
your action lines. So they need to convey visual
information!
Sorry if hulk seems angry and smashy about this one, but
you'd be amazed how many people don't realize this very
simple facet of how the script should be informing the
movie how to work. If you need to establish that someone
worked on a farm? Don't write "she used to work on a
farm." there's nothing you can do with that. Instead write
about how she has pictures up of her with her family on
farm or something tangible like that. It may be lame, but
it's at least something that can be shown.
Hulk's old action-scene column-partner tom townend
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(cinematographer of attack the block!) brought up the

great example of handling exposition with example
fromsilkwood. Meryl streep's character is on a plane and
she's about to be handed food. She goes to grab her
wallet to pay, but attendant informs her they're free. The
meaning is clear: she's never been on a plane before...
This was long before the airlines went broke and you had
to start paying for shit. But the attention to detail speaks
volumes about character.
Since you can't just go into the description and write the
history of the character, embrace these opportunities to
fit it in elsewhere. Going back to character trees (point
#10) try to fit your "feet" details into the story with other
ways: groin, throat, and crown.
If you write something we can't see, is not just mere faux
pas, not just a completely wasted opportunity, but a
writing habit that will actively make the movie worse.
You're putting an idea into the filmmakers head that will
make total sense for your story, help them get it, but it
won't help the audience get it.
Guess who matters the most?
The golden rule fixes all: write only what we can see.
39. Oh by the way, you are not the director
This rule seems to go more and more by the wayside, but
here's the thing: if you are submitting this script, chances
are you are not the director. They will want to hire
another person. Which means if you mention camera
moves or anything that should be in the shooting script
only, then you are totally overstepping your bounds. The
director might even be pissed off enough about to
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completely disregard your advice and actively do the

opposite(even if it's good)... Hulk's seen it happen.
So as a writer, how do you, like, convey what should be
seen? The answer is simple: you don't. But there are still
a few tricks one can use to convey not only what should
be shown, but how too. Here's hulk's best example of how
to imply movement with words. Say you want to show
something up close then have the camera pull out or cut
further back to show the whole thing. To do that you say
something like this:
"a delicate hand glides over a 1952 chevy bel air. The
hand belongs to anita jones (20's), fresh-faced
midwestern smile, with a bad home-spun blonde dye job
and a discount pink dress. She proceeds to wave to the
crowd."
Now. Hulk just made this up. But what does it tell you? It
conveys a camera motion without an actual note of
camera motion. The "belongs to" bit is great trick for
implying we should be up close and then back out. Just
like you want to do with action lines, you show don't tell.
But going back to point #38 just before this, the
information also conveys a good deal about character. It
shows she's working a car show. The "midwestern" term
implies not only a look, but a personality type that goes
along with it (without just saying "she's the personality
type"). You show her d.I.Y approach to her appearance
and this implies she doesn't have much money.
Writing these sorts of lines, which inherently convey
character, meaning, setting, information, and cinematics,
is exceptionally difficult and takes a lot of time. Hulk
probably spent 20 minutes on that one line and it just
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going up as an example in a column. This is how you

need to approach description.
This is all part of what hulk likes to call:
40. The poetic art of action lines
Paul attanasio probably writes the best screenplays in
hollywood.
That is not to say he writes the best stories that will
become the best movies, though he's obviously done
some amazing work. This is to say that he writes the best
for the medium of screenplays. His action lines are poetic,
resonant. They allow the directors to make the best
possible movies. Even when his character descriptions
get a little too much in the way of things "you can't see"
they are still these tangible, beautiful concepts that can
come across in the performance of the character. But
really it's his ability to convey information in beautiful,
small bits. And often the writing is so good and so
concise, you just don't really mind his rule-breaking.
Check these fucking out:
"herbie stempel, herbert the great, early 40s and
overweight. Marine haircut and shabby suit. A job for his
generation - - exiled to the boroughs, flayed by greyflannel insults, scourged by lowly status, grudge-laden
before god.
"charles van doren, 30s, handsome, well-born, debonair,
self-deprecating, perfect. The lithe build of a man who has
never been made to run uphill. An endearing blankness -the boy availability of a man still in search of himself.

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These are both from quiz show... Which is one of the best
scripts ever written (though the movie almost lets a bad
accent destroy a perfect film), but the real reason it's
wonderful, particularly for this column, is that it shows
you how to write scripts. Concise. To the point. Gorgeous
prose. Hilarious dialogue. Poignant dialogue. Hilariously
poignant dialogue. It's all there.
If you want to know how to write beautifully in the format,
it should be your bible.
Seriously, download the pdf and keep it forever:
But let us really hammer this point home:
41. Dont waste opportunities to say something
In robert towne's incredible script for chinatown (though
he isn't afraid to go on for big walls of text... It was a
different era) there is this really neat little detail that
exemplifies something that doesn't happen enough in
screenwriting.
Jake gittes is a private detective who has just informed
one of his clients that, yes, his wife is cheating on him. To
console the poor chap jake does the following:
"gittes reaches into his desk and pulls out a shot glass,
quickly selects a cheaper bottle of bourbon from several
fifths of more expensive whiskeys."
The implication of this may seem obvious, that gittes is
"cheap" or something, but the fact that he has them all
lined up and ready to go in his office says something
else... It implies that jake knows the client won't know the
difference.
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What may seem like a small detail in the script is actually

a detail that can be sussed out to several other
implications. It's a brilliant little gesture of which towne is
a master. Really, hulk read a shit ton of scripts and these
opportunities are rarely explored. So hulk want you to
embrace the kind of high-degree storytelling evident in
these tiny details. Embrace the high standard. Always try
to always say something. Even try to say multiple things
at once.
Every detail in your script can matter if you really want it
to. Don't waste opportunities to say something!
42. And if you want to be colloquial...
So while attanasio and towne represent the formal end of
the spectrum of screenwriting, on the other side there are
more colloquial writers.
For instance, there is shane black.
Shane black was the first million dollar screenwriter. He
wrote the lethal weapon movies and the last boy scout.
He then sort of went to writer jail for the last action hero
and the long kiss goodnight, but he returned in a big, big
way with kiss kiss, bang bang (it's a hilarious, great film if
you've never seen it). But when he started out, one of the
things he became famous for was being very colloquial in
the scripts. He directly engaged the reader and would say
things like: "this is the scene that's so fucking good, the
audience will just whip it out and start jerking off right
there in the theater!"
... It made an impression.

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Which is to say a lot of people liked it and found it funny,

and a lot of the old school thought he was pissing on the
craft. Both are fair reactions. But whatever you have to
say about it, hulk thinks the scripts behind that colloquial
prose were usually pretty good (even if the scenes usually
weren't good enough that the audience would start
jerking off). But even if that basic goodness was really
what mattered, all the love and all the hate also spawned
a lot of imitators. What can hulk say? It all just keeps
coming back to people fixating on the tangible details
instead of tone. So they fixated on his being colloquial.
Maybe they thought
that was the secret or something, hulk dunno. But some
do fine with it. Some do not.
All hulk have to say on the matter is this: if you're going
to go colloquial, then let's get something straight... You
have to be really fucking funny.
That's all there is to it. Because if you're not actively
making the reader laugh than there's, quite literally, no
point to doing it. Seriously. None. You're already pissing
on the concept of economy. And by breaking the 4th wall
just say "i know you're a person/ hulk who is reading this.
Let's just try and cheer you up!" it better be good. But
there isn't anything else the reader can can do with it
other than laugh. It certainly won't make the movie any
better. It certainly won't convey to the director how to
make the movie any funnier. The audience sure can't see
the funny line.
It adds nothing of value to the film. The only thing it can
do is make the reader laugh, which admittedly is
something to be appreciated in the long slog of reading
scripts.

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But if it doesn't make hulk laugh, then it's just garbage for
wasting hulk's time... Which means some reader might
throw it in the garbage to boot.
Those are the stakes. Be warned.
43. Voice over... Perhaps, try not using it
Voice over is one of the most overused devices in the
history of cinema. It is used to explain things that don't
need explaining and would best be left to being shown
through actual cinema. Or they are often issues that
would be best left to being explored by dramatic means.
Even the most unaware audiences find voice over to be
pretty un-engaging.
Why is that? Because voice-over always tells, and never
shows.
What perhaps speaks to the device's assured laziness is
how fucking inconsistent it is too. If you're going to use
narration at the beginning of your film, then you have to
use it at the end (cough the descendants cough).
Otherwise you're just cheating. Then there's that hilarious
time the voice over showed up in a couple scenes in the
middle of we don't live here anymore and then promptly
disappeared for the rest of the film. These sorts of uses
only confirm the laziness. Those films used it just when
they needed it to solve some weird, stupid problem of
exposition. Then they promptly dumped it.
The real problem here, and what every single person who
uses it tends not to realize, is that when voice over goes
in and out haphazardly, you are altering the rules of your
"movie universe." you are saying the story comes from
this person's perspective and they are a kind of "god of
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perspective" in this movie. That's what voice over really

means to your tone. And it has a huge impact to how your
audience subconsciously thinks about the film's reality. So
when the movie suddenly fucking ditches the voice over
and becomes a regular movie apropos of nothing, then
the audience can feel it. You are essentially saying you
have made two different kinds of universes in your film.
And that's cheating. Worse, it's destructive to the intent
of your Storytelling.
There are of course, a ton of examples of great voice
over.
All the malick films employ the device to stunning affect.
But heck, the dude is basically writing poetry which goes
along with the stunning beauty of his imagery. And really,
he's one of a kind. Another example is in the informant!
Where the seriousness of the plot is intentionally
undercut by going into the head of matt damon's
ridiculous main character, where he'll suddenly start
ruminating on panties in japanese vending machines.
There is no information or exposition, but pure
characterization and hilarity. This doesn't make it
narrative nonsense though as it serves two obvious
functions: it helps balance the comedic tone with the
seriousness of the story, and it helps explain just what
kind of batshit guy would go down this silly, extreme
path. Hulk thinks it's great. And then there's the voice
over in the coen's raising arizona, which does the exact
opposite. H.I. Mcdunnough, who on the surface a
complete hick criminal, has this lofty, beautiful, poetic
narration that actually counters the hilarity of the world of
the film, by giving it this deep poetic resonance and
makes the whole thing a kind lofty, weird, wonderful fairy
tale.

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There's always a way to use a device well.

Just don't be lazy about it. Voice over can lend a nice
feeling of atmosphere, characterization, and tone, but be
careful with how it affects your universe. If you really
need it and don't want to fuck with your universe, then
try a few simple tricks to use it more organically. Like
have one character literally telling a story that can
overlap into the next scene and effectively be used like
voice-over. This way you get the tonal and information
effect you want without getting the tonal effect you don't
want. But again you have to be consistent about it.
But really, always try not using it first... You'd be surprised
how well plain old narrative works.
44. The practical art of dialogue
Hulk talked in the introduction about knowing the struggle
of writing. Well... Hulk knows this struggle. It hulk's
biggest obstacle. Hulk knows this. Hulk just does not have
the ear for it, especially while writing the first few drafts.
So for hulk to really work with dialogue, it takes time,
patience, and a lot of lesson-learning.
So here the following are hard-earned lessons that hulk
has come to know:
A). Eliminate the following in dialogue: "ums", "likes", and
"you knows."
If you want it to be something organic and sounds like
how real people talk, then that's for the actor to decide.
Seriously. If you're trying to get an actor
To time their ums, likes, and you knows to your exact
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specifications and cadence, then you are going to get the

most hollow sounding fake nonsense ever. It is impossible
to make these kind of natural pauses seem unforced. So
take em out. Plus they're not necessary anyway and will
completely stall the reader just trying to get the meaning
of your words. Really make them go bye bye.
B) you want your character's dialogue to be more clear
and on point than you'd assume.
Don't layer the dialogue in a lot of qualifying and
anticipation. Nancy meyers movies tend to do that
horribly. Stuff like "well, i was going to say...." and "i think
i really just need to come out, and let you know that."
ughhhhhhhh. Have you ever seen the holiday? It's like 2
hours of characters sputtering out stuff before the
characters talk and have opinions. It doesn't come off like
"organic speech," it comes off like hulk's ass. Adding
these kind of qualifiers just slows down the entire rhythm
and import. It prevents the audience from following along
and engaging and responding because they're miles
ahead of the character's themselves. So just say what
you freakin' mean. Be terse and to the point. You may
worry that doing so will make your characters sound terse
and to the point, but it won't. Movies forgive a lot of
brevity. It will be organic because it won't sound like real
life. It will make them sound like they're in a damn movie.
Which they are. There's a reason characters talk like that
in films and it's because that's how the audience needs
them to be.
C)

your characters can't all talk the same way.

You should be able to hear one person in a scene and

know who they are just by the dialogue. Achieving this
can be really difficult, but it's true. You can't just rely on
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the actors to do it for you. When hulk reads comedies 1/4

of them have all their characters in the generic funny
pithy voice, and 1/4 of the others have their characters all
talk like the author. It sucks (fyi, the other 1/4 of comedy
scripts are really funny , and the last 1/4 are not funny
whatsoever). So concentrate on having your characters
have different voices. If this is a big problem for you, hulk
have a few practical solutions. If it helps, think of a bunch
of different actors in your head, all with unique cadences.
Throw in steve buscemi, with... Um... Dennis leary and,
like, carol king or something. Or whoever! Hulk knows this
sound stupid, but it will honestly help you differentiate
them in your head. When whatever actor comes in to play
them they will bring the character a more organic center,
than the extremes you used in your head. It's just a way
of making their voices separate. A mere means to an end.
But honestly, there's a sure fire way of fixing most of
these dialogue problems...
45. Final + bestest advice ever: read your entire
screenplay out loud... Many times.
This will solve a lot of the problems mentioned not just in
the last point about dialogue, but all the 45 points
mentioned so far.
You'll hear your script out loud and be like "oh that sounds
like crap" or "oh that's a weird thing to say" or "oh that
totally wasn't necessary." you'll get a sense of how your
scenes are paced and if any of the scenes don't make
sense near each other. Have a couple friends read it with
you and talk about it.
Hulk really can't tell you enough how much you need to
do this.
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Just by getting the damn thing outside your head, it

solves so many problems inherently. You'll know exactly
what to do with it once it's "real." like with the action lines
that go on and on? Guess what? If you get bored reading
them, the the person reading your script will get bored
reading them. So you'll know exactly what to cut. Reading
a screenplay out loud should inform you. It should speak
to the exact kind of movie you want to write.
To the anecdote!
And now, hulk will speak to the power of what reading a
screenplay out loud can do for you. We can all agree that
the social network was pretty much great, right? It has
such a wonderful use of dialogue, smart commentary,
insightful details, resonant themes, and a propulsive
sense of storytelling... Hey... Wait a minute! Isn't that just
all the things hulk mentioned back in part 1 of this
essay!?!? When hulk talked about
what makes a good narrative??? Hulk is bringing it full
circle on y'all!
So on to the actual anecdote. Hulk just did a podcast with
will from the silvertongue online u.K. (hulk will link soon!)
and he told a story that hulk had never heard before.
During preproduction on the film, david fincher
apparently had aaron sorkin sit down for him, and in one
sitting he had sorkin read the script out loud. He wanted
to know the pace, inflection, and sense of rhythm that
belonged in the script. So aaron sat there, read the entire
movie out loud, just as he had pictured it. It took him 2
hours and 1 minute to read the whole thing.
The final running time of the film? 2 hours 1 minute.

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The lesson is clear folks: read your script out loud and
hulk will guarantee you will win an oscar.
... Okay, it won't do that but will make your script way,
way better in every sense.
Part seven - now here comes the hard part
And thus we come to the final part of our journey, and
hulk has to start it with some bad news.
Hulk hate to break it to you, but none of the things hulk
just told you actually matter.
... That sound you hear is everyone's hearts falling down
into their butts.
The reason it doesn't matter is because everything hulk
just told you is not something that can be easily parsed
out over planning sessions. You may now understand it.
You may now really be eager to start trying to apply it.
But it cannot be fully applied with simple awareness. For
one, there are so many details about how and why to
create a story, that when we sit down to actually do it, it
reveals itself as dysfunctional. We'll just be trying to think
of that one thing, that one goal, and the contents of this
entire essay will fall out or our brains like it teflon.
Which means that writers have to take these devices and
concepts and ingrain them into their process. These
elements must be seared into their brains so they are
completely automatic. Only then will the writing process,
and the writing itself, truly feel organic. Only then can
you write "sequentially and with flow" and still include all
the critical elements of storytelling and structure that
hulk has been fawning over for the entire column.
Because the simplest truth is that you really need that
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speed. There is a certain kind of on-the-fly writing chops

that are desperately needed if one plans to be a working
writer in film and television.
Sure you might be able to hammer out something good in
the course of a year,
But what about when you're handed a re-write job and
the thing starts shooting in a week? What about the fact
that it's the end of the season and you have to write an
entire episode in two straight all night sessions? That's
just as much part of being a writer as anything else in this
business.
But even then. Even if you're a writer who somehow has
all the time in the world. Chances are if you can't write
organically, then your work won't be organic either.
So it has to be ingrained.
... But how the hell do you do that?
Hulk has regularly cited malcolm gladwell's theory from
"outliers" that it takes 10,000 hours to become truly good
at anything. It takes practice. Focus. Repetition. The same
way a baseball player practices hitting a ball over and
over again until each reaction becomes simple muscle
memory. A writer must do the same. Identifying script
problems, seeing narrative shifts, recognizing falsesounding dialogue. These are all things that must be
ingrained and easily recognized though the same kind of
muscle memory put on display by a great baseball player.
And to get to that point takes 10,000 hours of writing.
10,000 hours of solving your own script problems. 10,000
hours of thinking about things like character motive, story
structure, and the art of cinema.
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And if you write every day, then 10,000 hours usually

takes about... 10 years.
Hulk cannot help if this reality scares you. So often hulk
talks to people who have dreams of writing scripts and so
often they are not even close to that figure. Some of you
are still young and in school and in the perfect place to
start. Some of you are... A bit behind. But if you really
want it, then you cannot let that reality stop you. You
have to be ready to put in your 10 years. And hulk can
really speak to the truth of that 10,000 hour figure. It
wasn't until 10 years in that hulk's writing became even
remotely passable. And suddenly, it felt like hulk woke up
one day and it all clicked. Yes, the process was actually
rather gradual, but all these things hulk "knew" had
become something hulk actually "understood."going back
to point #24 hulk mentioned that it took the south park
guys about 10 years to really understand storytelling and
how to approach their show... That wasn't an accident.
Things take time. Things take work.
So for all these pages and pages of practical advice,
advice that hulk really, truly believes in, in case that's not
obvious, there is still no quick fix. You have to learn to
incorporate those ideas into your deepest essence as a
writer. You have to practice with them like a baseball
player would. And like a baseball player, you'll find your
own strengths over time. You'll find you already have a lot
of the skills and training you need to be good at structure.
Or perhaps you've been training as a good listener so you
have an ear for dialogue. Maybe you have the skills to be
economical. But no matter what your skills become and
how they manifest themselves it will take
Unbelievable amounts of work.
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This is scary. And you have two possible reactions:

1) damn... I... Don't think i can do that. I don't think i
have time, and i mean... That's so much. I want to, i really
want to be a writer, but i just don't think i can do it.
2)

okay, fine. Whatever. That's not going to stop me.

If you answered like #1 then you like the idea of writing.

You like the things it makes you feel, or perhaps the
lifestyle or acclaim you think it will afford you. And if you
answered like #2, then you are a writer.
So it is time to start writing. Go do your first screenplay.
Just write the damn thing. Do it. And once you finish it,
yes it's going to be terrible. But that's totally okay. Sit
down. Write another one. Do it better. Then do it again.
And again. Don't look at them as your be all end all, but
another step in the process. Learn how to craft stories.
Then write another. And another. Get better. Don't worry
you're "wasting good ideas" because the value of the idea
and the inspiration never goes away even if the script is
crap.You can always come back and re-do the idea once
you're better at writing. Hulk's done that all the time. Just
keep writing them. Hulk wrote over 70 screenplays before
even one working professional, said "hey this is pretty
good!" and from there, getting something actually made
is even harder. Yes, it takes luck to get the right
opportunity, but you gotta be sure you can deliver when
the opportunity comes.
Just remember, it is scary as all hell. But you are not
alone. You have thousands of other writers with you... And
you have hulk.

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Hulk knows that sounds cheesy as all hell, but hulk mean
it: you have a hulk on your side. Hulk wants you to win.
Hulk even hates that this oh-so-necessary 10,000 hour
message is dominating the last section of this article. Yes,
hulk needs to warn you, but hulk would rather inspire you.
So in that spirit, hulk just wants to finish this sucker with
a little explanation of one of hulk's heroes.
The man in the lead image of this part seven is a guy
named paddy chayefsky. He is one of the greatest
screenwriters of all time.
Chayefsky's success was due in large part to the fact that
he was, first and foremost, a writer in general. He wrote
plays, novels, television, and even criticism (hulk likes
criticism too in case you haven't noticed). Paddy
chayefsky approached his craft with remarkable sense
understanding. His style always seemed to vary. You
could always recognize his focus and intelligence, but
never an overpowering "style" that dominated his work.
His voice could mutate at a moment's notice. He could
transcend genre, tone, comedy, drama, medium, form,
and even language. He could explore the simplest stories
about decent human beings and ethos (marty), the
growing
State of the nyc social scene long before capote even
thought of breakfast at tiffany's (the bachelor party), the
incredible thematic realities of bureaucracy and personal
will (the hospital), the hardcore sci-fi and horror concepts
of trippy genetics (altered states), the ahead-of-its-time
views of sexuality and become a forerunner to late 60's
cinema (the americanization of emily), and in his
magnum opus, he managed to penetrate the deepest
layers of satire to the point where he basically foretold
the future of television and american culture at large
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(network). If you need a comparison then chayefsky was

sort of a porto-charlie kaufman and certainly every bit as
much of a genius.
But chayefsky didn't just work on these lauded projects,
which earned him the most lone screenwriting oscars of
anyone in history; he spent most of his career as a
"working writer" during the golden age of television. Back
in college hulk hunted down most of his lesser-seen stuff
and the one thing that always becomes so amazingly
clear about his work is that even with his this utilitarian tv
work, he so completely understood what he needs to do
and explore with the story. While he famously hated the
way hollywood encroached on storytelling and the
author's duty calling it "democracy at its ugliest," he still
never, ever let that impact the quality, nor the effort that
went into his work. He knew how to write big and small,
broad and nuanced, when to follow rules and when to
absolutely shatter them.
The range, totality, understanding, and humanity of
paddy chayefsky inspires hulk every single day.
He is everything we should ever want to be in a
screenwriter.
He inspires hulk to write something like this column.
The writing of this column was a bit of a strange journey
for hulk. For one, it's not really a column and more like a
book. Hulk's been working on it for about 4 months. A
week ago, hulk was close enough that hulk thought it
would easily be done by last sunday. Well... Hulk decided
to include a few more points and suddenly it spiraled.
Hating the fact it was coming after promised, hulk's spent
the last 4 nights getting about an hour of sleep. The delay
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was the right decision however. Hulk sincerely hopes you

agree.
But why would you write something like this hulk? What is
the purpose?
On one level, hulk was excited about the idea of trying to
convey the sum total of almost all of hulk's knowledge
about storytelling and screenwriting. Of trying to make it
a singular complete thought. A story of writing with a
through-line that would maybe speak to you. Band on
some small level, this column feels complete, and yet...
Hulk still feel like barely scratching the surface. As crazy
as it sounds, hulk looks over what is written and stills
sees so much more that can be said.
Which means, the next step falls to you.
This column is only but the first step in a longer
conversation. Having finally written this behemoth, hulk
finally feels free to go on and talk about few scripts
specifically or delve into more nuanced ideas. Going
forward, this column becomes the resource to look back
on for hulk, a stepping-stone onto other discussions and
even better insights.
And hulk wants to talk about all of those ideas with you.
Hulk wants us to flesh them out and make them feel real
and understood. Hulk hopes that maybe you can help
hulk even refine those ideas too. To teach the hulk the
many things that hulk has yet to understand about a
subject that can only be tamed, but never mastered. Hulk
wrote this so we could both become better writers. And if
we really want to make it happen, then we can all be
something of a sounding board for one another. Hulk says
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this without a hint of cynicism or disinterest. The internet

is full of yelling and contention and ugliness and hulk
wants to create a place where we can do way better than
that.
Because secretly we are way better than that.
Hulk genuinely wants to change how we regard the
internet. Hulk know that sounds freakin' insane, but it's
true. Hulk basically just wrote a book and here it is.
It's for you. It's free.
So write in the comments below as hulk promise to return
to this column again and again over time. Disagree with
one of hulk's definitions? Needs help breaking a story?
Can't figure out a character's path? Write. Ask. Help. And
feel free to drop hulk a line any time at
filmcrithulk@gmail.Com. It can get a little backed up at
times, but hulk reads every single thing hulk is sent and
will always try to get to every single person. Right now
hulk about 60 hulk-mails behind (some going back to
october) , so please be patient because hulk fully respond
to each one.
But really, why do all this, hulk?
The same reason hulk explained at the beginning.
Because hulk knows the struggle. It is endless war with
one's one brain. It is lonesome. Difficult. And often
infuriating.
... So who would want to go through that alone?
<3 hulk

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