I've been blogging about making your writing more meaningful, more literary. In this blog, I'll be writing about how to avoid building up so much excitement with your brilliant and intricately plotted first installment only to wind up with a mess in later works. It's an easy trap to fall into if you don't plan in advance for where to go next with your story.
We've all seen it. You watch the first season of a show like "Heroes" or "Lois & Clark" so many others, or you watch a first movie(s) like "Lilo and Stitch" or the nineties "Batman" (one and two) or the 2002 "Spider-man" (one and two), and so many others. You decide that is so well plotted with such great characters you can't wait to come back for more. Then, you do come back for more, only to find it disappointing or even painful. You think to yourself, "What gives?" In many cases, it's that the creators focused so heavily on the design of season/movie one or even two then ran out of originally planned story. They're left asking, "So, now what?" What comes next is floundering to catch the magic of part one or even parts one and two but never succeeds.
Part one is where creators/authors establish the world and characters then give a spectacular plot, or they'll lose audience/readership. But if you complete your protagonist's story arc, if the sexual tension concludes, the primary antagonist dies or disappears, or the main struggle presented in season one ends somehow, the author(s) then have to come up a whole new story, a whole new reason for drama. At the end of season one, the brilliantly plotted "Heroes" characters save the cheerleader and solve the problems central to first season. At the end of season one of "Lois & Clark," the central dramas of sexual tension and romantic rivalry provided by the ever-plotting Lex Luthor wrap up. Both series floundered and had a hard time finding footing because the arcs designed were over. You could almost hear the writers say, "Now what?" What came next in both cases was disappointing and lost audiences. This is a trap to be avoided. You may focus such time, attention, and intensity on book one only to say, "Now what?" to yourself.
It's possible to have a semi-successful part one only to get better and better as the writers focus on deepening characters and plot already established. For instance, "Smallville" started with a very formulaic season one that built an audience successfully enough to make a season two. Then, it built characters and plot, continuing to deepen and complexify a young Clark Kent's voyage from teenager to Super Man. Season one ends on a satisfying note that wraps up some storylines but then makes it clear there is more to the story. Those who kept watching all the way to season 10 got an overall conclusion to his voyage with Clark fulfilling his destiny. One can argue the success or failure of each character or story arc or season, but the fact that it continued with a loyal audience to the end shows that it teaches a lesson worth telling on storytelling.
But what would be better yet is to have an overall character arc and central plotting that go beyond part/season one. Conceptualize the story AS IF you're going to make it past a spectacular season/book one. Be ready with an overall story that has satisfying mini conclusions and character growth and depth on the way, with the vision of your story's overall trajectory.
Think of Harry Potter. J.K. Rowling had a character and plot trajectory for Harry and his friends planned for book one, with questions, character arcs yet to be completed, problems yet to be solved, and just overall more to be said waiting after book one. They translated well enough to movies that audiences who were never exposed to the books still waited with baited breath for the next piece of the overall story. Readers and movie audiences stood in long lines to see what would come next because it was clear there was a next to come to. From the beginning, Rowling had her ending planned, so each book in the meantime took us one step closer to an exciting climax. Remember, however, not to focus so hard on sequel hooks that each piece of the main story falls apart. Make sure part 2 doesn't feel like a boring pathway to get to part 3.
So, to recap, to avoid Now-What-itis, don't plan part one as if it's its own thing. Plan it as a piece of the greater story, one that comes to various mini-conclusions but doesn't wrap up whatever makes your drama and tension work until your series has come to an end. Also, don't skip the build up to mini-conclusions; in other words, keep each installment exciting. Each mini conclusion should bring you one satisfying step toward an overall climax.
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