How Long Should the Acts Be in My Pilot? (Data Analysis)

There was a discussion in one of my writers’ groups this week about how long a teaser should be in an hourlong pilot. We all thought it should be fairly short, but we had different ideas of what “short” actually meant. I remembered that awhile back I’d made a spreadsheet analyzing act lengths from 51 hourlong pilots so I decided to go to the data.

(If you’re interested in half-hour dramedy pilot structure, I broke that down here.)

 

What I found: across all pilots that had a teaser, the average length of that teaser was 8 pages (with the shortest teaser being 3 pages and the longest at a whopping 16 pages). This surprised me! I would have guessed that teasers were more like 3-5 pages on average.

I shared this info with my writers’ group and someone asked if I could also share average act lengths for the other acts. This is tricky because I assumed the average length of an act would depend on how many acts the pilot has in total – this group of pilots ranged from 4 acts to 7 acts.

The most common three structures among these pilots were:

  • teaser + 4 acts (17 pilots)
  • 5 acts (13 pilots)
  • teaser + 5 acts (11 pilots)

So I decided to break down average act length by structural type:

TEASER + 4 ACTS 
Teaser: 8 pages (range: 3-16)
Act 1: 17 pages (range: 11-22)
Act 2: 14 pages (range: 5-22)
Act 3: 11 pages (range: 6-16)
Act 4: 11 pages (range: 4-18)

5 ACTS
Act 1: 17 pages (range: 11-30)
Act 2: 13 pages (range: 8-18)
Act 3: 11 pages (range: 7-15)
Act 4: 10 pages (range: 5-15)
Act 5: 9 pages (range: 4-14)

TEASER + 5 ACTS
Teaser: 9 pages (range: 5-13)
Act 1: 10 pages (range: 6-15)
Act 2: 11 pages (range: 7-17)
Act 3: 11 pages (range: 7-15)
Act 4: 9 pages (range: 6-13)
Act 5: 9 pages (range: 1-15)

As you can see from the ranges provided, the range of lengths for each act is quite broad which means there is not some hard and fast rule about act length that every professional writer follows. Some individual networks and shows may have rules about act length, but that’s not something you can really concern yourself with when writing an original pilot.

Because there are so many different ways you can tell a story, even on television, you should obviously choose a structure that you feel fits your particular story (or possibly the network you’re hoping to be on, which is a different analysis entirely).

That said, one hunch I had that this data backs up is that acts do tend to get shorter as you progress through a pilot (with the exception of the teaser, if there is one, which is usually shorter than Act 1). This makes sense because it creates a sense of quickening pace as we barrel through the story to the inevitable BANG at the end (which then hopefully propels us to episode 2).

That isn’t a rule you must follow, but it might be a helpful thing to look at it if you’re writing a pilot and the pacing feels slow. Maybe your earlier acts are too short or your later acts are too long.

Another interesting observation is that the total number of acts in a pilot didn’t seem to have as much effect on individual act length as I expected. The only exception is that in pilots with five total acts ([teaser + 4 acts] or [5 acts]), Act 1 is quite a bit longer than the other acts, whereas in the six act structure ([teaser + 5 acts]), the acts are all a more uniform length. You can see this is true even in the broader ranges and not just in the average.

One last fact: the average total page count across all 51 hourlong pilots was 61.5 pages. The shortest was 56 pages (nine pilots were 56-58 pages) and the longest was 69 pages (six pilots were 67-69 pages).

Some caveats on the stats here:

  • This dataset is not huge. It only includes 51 hourlong pilots: 17 are [teaser + 4 acts], 13 are [5 acts], 11 are [teaser + 5 acts], and the rest are a sprinkling of other structures composed of teasers, acts, and tags in various combinations.
  • These pilots come from a mixture of cable and broadcast networks but none are from streaming networks like Netflix. (Look out for a future imaginary post titled Stop Using “My Pilot is Written for Streaming” as an Excuse to Be a Lazy Storyteller.)
  • This list includes pilots that premiered as long ago as 2002 and as recently as 2017. It’s possible (even probable) that trends have changed. That said, 22 of the 37 pilots premiered in the past three years (14 of them in 2017), so most of these are recent.
  • Speaking of recency, I’d need to do a different kind of analysis to confirm this, but it seems like among the more recent pilots, the [5 acts], [teaser + 5 acts], and even [6 acts] structures have increased in popularity over the classic [teaser + 4 acts].
  • Genre isn’t taken into account here at all (except that they’re all hourlongs, so no sitcoms). This may not be true, but my hypothesis is that teasers for crime shows might be shorter than other types of dramas because it’s a more traditional find-a-dead-body “cold open.”

  • Keep in mind that “average” can be a misleading statistic – all datasets have a calculable average, but just because you can calculate a statistic doesn’t mean it’s meaningful.

    For example, let’s imagine that my dataset had included 20 pilots and that in ten of them the first act was 10 pages and in the other ten the first act was 50 pages. In that case, the average length of act 1 would be 30 pages. The problem is that if you took that information and wrote a pilot with a 30-page first act, you would be writing a pilot that doesn’t look like any of the pilots in that dataset. If you were trying to mimic existing pilots from that list, you’d actually be better off writing either a 10-page first act or a 50-page first act, not splitting the difference down the middle.

    Fortunately, our data here is not that dramatically split. Most of the data tends to be grouped around the averages with a few outliers that are much longer or shorter than the average. I included the full range of lengths for each act so you can see how long and short some of those outliers were.

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Writing Difficult Characters: 6 Lessons from Hulu’s “Difficult People”

Writers love writing difficult characters. And with over a decade of antiheroes on so-called “prestige television,” who can blame us? Bonus: it’s fun to write the cutting one-liners you’d never say in real life.

Unfortunately, while likeability is not the most important quality in a character, what many writers think are fascinating antiheroes are actually just repellant characters the reader/viewer doesn’t want to spend even an hour following, let alone eight seasons.

And yet, there are shows that make these kinds of characters work. A great example is Hulu’s Difficult People (tragically canceled after three seasons). This half-hour comedy, starring Julie Klausner and Billy Eichner, is about two grumpy, judgmental, acerbic, self-centered New Yorkers trying to make it in show business. They are indeed difficult people. And yet the show managed to be charming, delightful, and even heartwarming, despite this acerbity. How did they do it?

“Difficult People managed to be heartwarming despite its acerbity. How did they do it?” #amwriting Click To Tweet

I’ve isolated six ways that Difficult People makes its “difficult” characters not just palatable but empathetic. These are great tools for writers who want to give their characters an edge without making them unwatchable.

1. Even Difficult People Have a Code

Too often, “unlikable” protagonists are just generic assholes who are indiscriminately cruel to everyone and have no core values or beliefs of their own. But even Omar Little, The Wire‘s most beloved stick-up robber, has his own ethical code.

On Difficult People, Julie and Billy are the heroes of their own stories. They have a particular worldview that drives their actions and though they do terrible things, they do have a set of ethics (artistic standards, loyalty to each other, opposition to Nazis) and in fact it’s these very ethics that continuously separate them from what they want most (usually love, acceptance, or career success) at the end of an episode.

2. Even Difficult People Love and Are Loved

A consistent thread in Difficult People is that Julie and Billy are infallibly loyal, generous, and kind to each other, even while being unrepentant jerks to everyone else. You’ll never see a storyline on Difficult People in which Julie is maliciously lying to Billy or Billy is callously using Julie.

The scene in season 2 when Billy dives across the stage of a Christian Siriano show to save Julie – even though it will make him look lame to the Cool Gays he’s trying to impress – was so heartwarming it nearly brought tears to my eyes. They are always in each other’s court.

Similarly, Julie’s boyfriend Arthur is a grounding force in the series because he loves and accepts Julie, even at her most difficult. Though Arthur rarely drives the story himself, Difficult People would be a lesser show without him. Because he sees good in Julie, we see good in her too.

3. Even Difficult People Encounter People More Difficult Than They Are

An old trick this show uses effectively is to bring in a character that is even worse than the protagonists to make the protagonists seem better by comparison.

Because Julie and Billy are so unpleasant, the villains on the show have to be almost cartoonishly evil – some recent examples were nazis, cannibals, and a millennial YouTube star. But it works. Even if you weren’t on Julie and Billy’s side at the beginning of the episode, by the end you will be.

4. Even Difficult People Suffer

In fact, if you want them to be empathetic, they probably have to suffer the most.

On any given episode of Difficult People, Julie and Billy are rejected, humiliated, physically injured, blacklisted, arrested, attacked, and emotionally devastated. As badly as they treat others, they always receive back ten times what they dish out. Seeing them suffer makes us empathize with them, even if it doesn’t seem to make them any nicer.

5. Even Difficult People Have Good Qualities

Julie and Billy are catty and selfish, but they’re also smart, funny, hardworking, loyal to each other, and truly passionate about the entertainment industry.

When a window of opportunity opens, they’ll stay up all night working to make it happen. They’re good at what they do and sincere about the craft and we feel they deserve to find success. These are all traits that make these characters more empathetic than they would be otherwise.

6. They Have (Slightly) Tragic Backstories

Ok, so neither of them grew up in a war-torn country or even lower middle class, but Billy never had a real father figure and he’s had a disappointing love life. Julie’s mother is a narcissist (albeit a hilarious one). Their backstories may not exactly be tragic, but they do occasionally elicit sympathy or at least some understanding.

Conclusion

In conclusion, it’s ok (even desirable) to write characters with glaring flaws, just make sure you give the audience something to care about and to empathize with. Some ways to do that:

  • Make sure your characters have a specific set of values and beliefs that drive them, however misguided, so they aren’t just generic assholes.
  • Stories need a lot of conflict, but make sure at least some of the characters sincerely love and/or are loved. In a sea of sarcasm and irony, audiences need a flotation device of sincerity to keep them above the waves.
  • If you want your protagonist to be a jerk, it helps if you make someone else an even bigger jerk.
  • If your characters are going to do crappy things to other people, it can make them more sympathetic if even crappier things are dished back at them.
  • It’s ok – even desirable – to give your character flaws, but if you want them to be watchable and empathetic, give them some genuinely admirable traits too.
  • And when all else fails: tragic backstory.
“In a sea of sarcasm and irony, audiences need a flotation device of sincerity to keep them above the waves.” #amwriting Click To Tweet

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What Zack Morris Teaches Us About Plot Density

I recently watched the first episode of the Funny or Die series Zack Morris is Trash about the terrible protagonist of early 90s teen comedy Saved by the Bell. It taught me an important lesson about plot density.

I was a huge fan of Saved by the Bell as a kid in the early 90s, but what I did not remember about the show (in addition to the fact that Zack Morris is a monster) is how much plot they packed into less than 25 minutes of television.

A common problem writers have is to not have enough happen in the course of an episode – too much exposition, too much dialogue that doesn’t move the story forward, and too many scenes that repeat a beat we already hit earlier in the story. Saved by the Bell is hardly a show anyone would hold up as a paragon of its genre, but it was certainly very popular at the time and remains a nostalgic fave.

In the two-part episode deconstructed above, the following plot points take place (I actually went back and watched the original two-part episode):

Part 1 (~23 minutes)

  • Act 1
    • Zack wants to go to a Dodgers game during school but can’t find an excuse to get out of class.
    • Kelly and Lisa bring homemade cookies to Jessie’s house to greet her new step-brother, Eric, who is moving from New York, but Eric turns out to be a jerk who has a crush on Lisa and wants Jessie’s bedroom.
    • The next day at school, Eric challenges Zack as top schemer of Bayside High – he tricks Screech into being his personal assistant and steals Jessie’s diary and threatens to sell it to Slater.
  • Act 2
    • In algebra class, Eric stalks and harasses Lisa for a date. The teacher tells the class that tomorrow is Rosh Hashanah and Zack gets the idea to pretend to be Jewish to get out of school.
    • Screech tapes the Dodgers game for Eric which he watches in Jessie’s bedroom without her permission. Jessie walks in wearing just a towel and gets mad.
    • Eric sees Zack on TV catching a foul ball at the game when he was supposed to be observing Rosh Hashanah.
    • The next day at school, Eric blackmails Zack.
  • Act 3
    • Jessie complains about Eric invading her space.
    • Eric blackmails Jessie with a tape he made of her making out with Slater – she agrees to let him have her bedroom.
    • Slater threatens Eric and destroys the tape but Eric tells him he has 20 more copies. He says if Slater lends him his car he’ll give him all the copies of the tape.
    • Kelly is mad that everyone is being so mean to Eric who is new and doesn’t have any friends.
    • Principal Belding shows Slater and Zack the new convertible he bought for his wife and asks to hire Slater to install a new CD player in it while he’s out of town for the weekend.
    • Zack hatches an elaborate reverse blackmail scheme – he volunteers Slater to install a new CD player in Principal Belding’s new convertible so that Zack can get access to the car.
  • Act 4
    • Zack offers Lisa MC Hammer tickets if she’ll go on a date with Eric.
    • Eric asks Lisa out and she says yes.
    • Slater gives Eric the keys to Belding’s car, pretending it’s his dad’s car.
    • Eric and Lisa go on their date and actually have a really nice time.
    • Eric lets Lisa drive the convertible, not knowing it’s Principal Belding’s car.
    • Slater, Screech, and Zack hide in the bushes to take a blackmail photo of Eric driving Belding’s stolen car.
    • Screech jumps out to take a picture of Eric driving the car for blackmail, not realizing it’s Lisa driving, and Lisa is so startled by the flash that she crashes the car.

Part II (~23 minutes)

  • Act 1
    • Zack, Screech, and Slater figure out the car will cost $600 to fix.
    • Zack hides the damaged car in the school’s auto shop.
    • Lisa tells Jessie about Zack and Slater’s scam and the car crash.
    • Lisa invites Eric to the MC Hammer concert.
    • Zack holds an illegal ticket raffle at school to raise $600 so he can repair the car before Principal Belding finds out it was damaged.
    • Jessie confronts Slater about the scam.
    • Principal Belding comes back from vacation early – Slater and Zack try to buy time by pretending they had to order special parts for the CD player.
  • Act 2
    • Zack hosts the drawing in the algebra teacher’s class, making him think everyone loves algebra, but Zack pulls a fire drill so that Screech wins.
    • Eric overhears Zack and Slater’s scam in the bathroom and threatens to tell Principal Belding.
    • In retaliation, Zack tells Eric that Lisa only went on a date with him because Zack gave her MC Hammer tickets in exchange.
    • Eric confronts Lisa and breaks up with her, Lisa cries; Jessie comforts her.
  • Act 3
    • The auto shop students find Principal Belding’s car and plan to fix it, but Eric convinces the teacher they should dismantle it for parts instead.
    • Zack and Slater come in with the new parts they bought for the car and find it’s been dismantled and that Eric stuffed Screech in a stack of tires.
  • Act 4
    • Jessie approaches Eric to convince him to give Lisa a second chance but Eric tells her that he took apart Belding’s car; Eric tells Jessie she’s “just a chick” and she punches him.
    • Zack and Slater realize they made a mistake in escalating this conflict and that they need to tell Belding the truth.
    • Zack and Slater try to tell Belding the truth but he thinks they’re kidding.
    • When Zack and Slater take Belding to the car, it’s been put back together.
    • When Belding leaves, Eric slides out from under the car – he’s the one who put it back together.
    • Eric says he’s moving back to New York – he gives Slater the blackmail tape of Jessie and Slater making out and gives Zack the tape of the baseball game.
    • As Eric packs, the friends come over and apologize to him and tell him to stay.

A few thoughts about this:

  1. A lot happens in these episodes considering they’re less than 25 minutes each.
  2. Everything has a cause and effect. None of the problems are random; they are never “and then,” they are always “therefore or but.” For example, the auto shop teacher could have instructed the class to take apart Belding’s car on his own, which would have been random but semi-believable, but it was more interesting for Eric to instigate that as payback for his feud with Zack.
  3. The raffle drawing scene could have been easily held at the diner or in the school hallway, but holding it in the algebra class creates a callback with the earlier scene in that classroom and also adds an extra layer of conflict as Zack has to hide the raffle drawing (and the scam) from the teacher.
  4. As silly as this show is, the writers do a good job of escalating the stakes and conflict throughout the story, giving the characters (particularly Zack) new and increasingly challenging problems.
  5. They also do a great job of balancing the characters, giving most of the characters an active role in the story and their own conflict (Kelly is the only character who is pretty weakly represented in this one – she isn’t even in the second part of the episode).

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Story Structure Breakdown: Guardians of the Galaxy

Story Structure Breakdown Series

In this series, I’ll breakdown the timestamped story beats of several critically acclaimed, commercially successful films and TV episodes and see how they stack up against four popular narrative formulas:

(The last two are both based on Joseph Campbell’s concept of the Hero’s Journey.)

Guardians of the Galaxy

Guardians of the Galaxy

The first film I’ll cover is the 2014 Marvel hit Guardians of the Galaxy. I chose this movie because it was commercially successful (it earned $94,320,883 its opening weekend) while also being critically acclaimed with a 91% fresh rating on Rotten Tomatoes and a score of 8.1 out of 10 on IMDB.

When I saw this movie in the theater, I was struck by how well plotted it was – it’s funny, exciting and emotionally moving with no boring parts, and it has a satisfying resolution. So I was curious to see how the story beats would line up with popular story structure timelines.

For timestamp and story percentage purposes, I excluded the opening and closing credits, including the bonus scenes that play during the closing credits, and also the short prologue that plays before the opening credits. While important for the viewer to see, I felt that the prologue existed outside the main narrative arc. I started the film when adult Peter Quill (Chris Pratt) lands on the planet Morag to search for the orb. Based on this cut, the movie “starts” at timestamp 04:24 and runs for 110 minutes. My timestamps came from the version streaming on Amazon Video.

Syd Field’s Three-Act Structure

I’ll start with the basic three-act structure as interpreted by Syd Field. In this structure, Act I should fill the first 25% of the story, which means it should end at minute 32, and the Inciting Incident should occur halfway through Act I (at the 12.5% mark).

Syd Field defines the Inciting Incident as the event that sets the main story in motion. I felt this moment was when Gamora, Rocket and Groot all simultaneously jump Peter on Xandar (Gamora to steal the orb, Rocket and Groot for the bounty on Peter’s head). This is when the four of them meet and it’s what leads to them being arrested and taken to the Kyln space prison together.

Based on Syd Field’s formula, this moment should take place around minute 18, which turns out to be exactly when it happens.

Syd Field says that Act I ends when the protagonist makes the decisive choice to pursue the first major goal of the story. At this point, the story twists in a new direction that the hero can no longer turn back from.

I felt this moment was when Peter chooses to save Gamora from Drax and suggests that she, Rocket, Groot and he should join forces to break out of the prison and sell the orb to the highest bidder. This is an important moment for the characters’ inner journeys because it’s when all four go from going it alone to trying to work with a team. It’s also a moment when the protagonist makes a definitive choice that sets a story in motion that he cannot turn back from.

Syd Field thinks this moment should happen at minute 32, which is exactly when it happens.

Guardians of the Galaxy

According to this formula, Act II should run from minute 32 until minute 87, with the Midpoint occurring at minute 59 and what Field calls First Culmination happening just before it.

The first part of Act II is when the protagonist pursues his goal, encountering obstacles but not yet aware of how truly difficult the journey will be. The First Culmination is the moment when it seems like the hero has achieved his goal, then everything falls apart leading to the Midpoint.

The First Culmination is when the teammates finally arrive at The Collector’s lab and are about to sell him the orb. He’s explained the significance of the item and is about to pay them for it and it seems like the story could be about to end. This scene happens between minutes 56-59, which is exactly when Syd Field says it should.

The Midpoint is when it all goes south – something unexpected happens that twists the story in a new direction, proving just how difficult this journey will really be. In the first half of Act II, the protagonist tries to solve the problem in a way that’s similar to how he normally would, but after the Midpoint it begins to become clear how much the hero will need to learn and grow to achieve his goal.

I felt the Midpoint was the moment when The Collector’s attendant grabs the infinity stone, blowing up the lab and killing herself and The Collector and nearly killing everyone else. This is the moment when the heroes learn how powerful and terrifying this orb they’re carrying really is. It’s also the moment that ruins their chances of selling the orb as planned. The story has twisted in a new direction and they will need to take a different approach. Stakes are raised and the story’s direction changes. This moment happens at exactly minute 59, just as Syd Field said it would.

Guardians of the Galaxy

The rest of Act II is predicted to last from minutes 59 to 87. Screenwriter Doug Eboch says that this half of Act II often contains what he calls fireside scenes, chalkboard scenes and emotional revelations. All three of those appear between minutes 59 and 82 in this movie.

Syd Field says that Act II ends with another reversal that spins the plot in yet another new direction. Typically, this is the moment when the hero finally realizes the true solution to his problem and it’s a solution that involves the synthesis of everything he’s learned. It’s also a solution that seems nearly impossible, but is unfortunately his only hope. This moment occurs when the team sets their plan in motion to warn Nova HQ of Ronan’s attack and then kill Ronan themselves. This happens at minute 82, which is a few minutes earlier than when Syd Field thinks it should happen (minute 87).

The rest of the film is Act III, which Syd Field says includes the Climax (Second Culmination), which is the point at which the story reaches its maximum tension (the final showdown between protagonist and antagonist) as well as the Denouement, which is the brief period of calm at the end of the film. He thinks this act should last between minutes 87 and 114 in this film, but it actually begins at minute 82. This act includes the Climax (the moment when the team joins forces to defeat Ronan once and for all) as well as the Denouement (the calm period at the end when the team reflects and looks forward to their next adventure).

In a future update of this post, I’ll analyze the structure of this film based on Blake Snyder’s Save the Cat formula, Christopher Vogler’s The Writer’s Journey, and Dan Harmon’s Story Structure 101.

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How to Build Suspense: 5 Lessons from The Walking Dead

how to build suspense

How to Build Suspense: 5 Lessons from The Walking Dead

Whether it’s the mounting dread that any second now a zombie is going to jump out at you, or the pit in your stomach as tension builds between two characters and you know one of them is not making it out of this episode alive, if there’s one thing The Walking Dead does well, it’s build and maintain suspense.

But how do they do it?

Here are five effective tactics they use a lot that work really well.

NOTE: This post only contains spoilers through Season 3.

The Bomb Under the Table

In a now famous conversation with François Truffaut, Alfred Hitchcock said the difference between “surprise” and “suspense” is that surprise is when a bomb unexpectedly blows up from under a table, and suspense is when you see the bomber put it there.

A great example of this from The Walking Dead is in Season 3, Episode 13 when Rick and the Governor meet to discuss a possible truce. The Governor makes a big show of putting away his weapons and convinces Rick to do the same, but after sitting down, we see that the Governor has a gun taped under the table. This makes the scene much more suspenseful because as tensions rise in the room, we know that the Governor has a gun, and we know that Rick doesn’t know.

gun under the table S03E13

Several times during the scene, the Governor’s hand moves near where we know the gun to be and suspense builds – will he go for it? Similarly, there’s a moment when Rick lowers his guard and takes his eyes off the Governor for a moment. We want to shout at the screen, “Keep your eyes on him, Rick! He has a gun!”

The writers could instead have not shown us the gun but had the Governor suddenly pull it on Rick at an unexpected moment. This would have been surprising, but not suspenseful. We’d have spent the whole scene thinking the two were having a pleasant chat over whiskey and might have gotten bored.

On the other hand, they could have not shown the gun and not had the Governor pull the gun, but then shown after the scene was over that the gun had been there all along. That’s an interesting approach, but it would not have been as effective in this particular scene.

The Takeaway: Surprises can be great, but it doesn’t always have to be the audience that’s surprised. Sometimes the most suspenseful thing of all is when the audience knows something a character doesn’t.

The Silent Treatment

In several episodes through the series, the episode’s cold open (the part before the title credits) has no or almost no dialogue. Two examples are Season 3, Episode 1 (“Seed”) and Season 3, Episode 13 (“Arrow on the Doorpost”).

These scenes are incredibly suspenseful, even without the context of knowing where the characters are or what exactly they’re doing, and part of what makes it so tense is the lack of dialogue. We wonder why everyone is being so quiet – are they hiding from something?

S03E01 silent cold open

Also, the extreme quiet makes us think something very loud is about to happen. It’s not a bad guess.

The Takeaway: Not every scene needs dialogue. If you want to ratchet up the tension, try taking out the talking.

Everybody’s Right

If you break down the average episode of The Walking Dead, you’ll see that a large portion of the story is groups of characters in various combinations debating what to do about something. In a single episode you might have three separate debates raging between three different collections of characters. We rotate between these debates with episodes of zombie hunting (and other “fun” scenes) sprinkled in like seasoning.

What makes these debates interesting to watch is that in most cases, all of the characters are right. Or at least they’re partly right. Or they’re wrong, but you understand why they feel how they do and you wonder if you would feel the same in their shoes.

everybody's right S03E13

There are no easy answers and we can’t predict with certainty how things will end. The opposing sides of the debate set up two or more possible directions for the episode to take, like a Choose Your Own Adventure book you read as a kid.

We follow the debate like a tennis match as each side volleys its argument over the net, and the suspense comes from wondering who will finally win. Hint: sometimes when you win, you really lose.

The Takeaway: Show your audience two or more ways the story could go and have different characters lobby for each option. Make all the options equally bad, but give the characters good reasons for wanting what they do. Keep the audience on the edge of their seat wondering who will win, and what price they will pay for winning.

Somebody Screws Up

This is a situation where things are already tense, but then someone does something stupid – they make a noise when they were supposed to be quiet, they go outside without a weapon to check out a strange sound, etc. It adds suspense because it creates that classic horror movie trope where you scream at the TV: “DON’T GO IN THERE!”

This is a dangerous one because it’s wildly overused and can be frustrating for the audience when it isn’t earned. It works best in my opinion when two qualifications are met:

(1) the stupid thing the person does is surprising, and yet

(2) the stupid thing the person does is exactly what they would really do.

It doesn’t work, for example, for a kid whose constantly whining to start whining at the exact moment that the family is silently hiding from the killer. That’s annoying because it’s not surprising (the kid is always whining) and it’s also not super believable (they’re hiding from a killer). What does work is for the bratty kid’s toy he stole earlier and stuffed hurriedly in his pocket (but that you forgot he had) to suddenly roll out of his pocket in front of the killer’s feet. That’s surprising, but is also exactly the kind of stupid thing that kid would do.

A good example from The Walking Dead is from Season 3, Episode 14 (“Prey”). Andrea and Milton are talking about the Governor while standing in an open catwalk above his torture chamber when the Governor unexpectedly walks into the room below. Milton immediately hides, which is smart, but Andrea continues standing in the open, watching the Governor, where she’s in grave danger of being seen by him (which would likely result in him killing her and Milton).

S03E14 somebody screws up

This is incredibly stupid since the Governor could look up and see her at any moment, and it’s surprising because it’s so phenomenally stupid, but it’s exactly what Andrea would really do in that moment – she’s much braver than most people, is not afraid of confrontation, and is incredibly curious, especially about the Governor, so it makes sense that she would stay in the open where she can see what he is doing, even though that means she’s also in danger of being seen by him. That scene is incredibly suspenseful and would have been much less so if Andrea had ducked out of sight like Milton did.

The Takeaway: If a scene needs more tension, maybe somebody needs to screw up – just make sure they’re screwing up in a way that is both surprising and yet also in character.

I’m Ready for My Close Up

Next time you watch this show (or any scary movie), notice how often the camera crops close on a character’s face during a tense scene. This serves two purposes:

(1) it zooms in on the character’s facial expression (usually fear or tension), which heightens our emotional response as we naturally empathize with the character, and

(2) it restricts our view of the character’s surroundings.

This second part is important. All we can see is the character’s face and maybe a sliver of out of focus background, but what we want to see is the place the character is in – is there something behind them? Is there something around the corner ahead of them? Look out, look out, look out!

S03E13 suspenseful close up

This is a directorial choice but it’s something we can do as writers as well. It’s basically a tactic of withholding information when we know the audience is very anxious to get that information as soon as possible. Maybe more on that in a future post.

The Takeaway: Withholding information can make an already tense scene even more suspenseful. Think about how you can do this with your writing (and look forward to a future post on the topic).

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