Quantum Storytelling

Because my study of media franchises in movies, television, and games I began to think in terms of the series in everything that I do. Once this became force of habit, I started to create differently.

An idea for a second story in a series had useful influence on editing and reshaping the first story so that is better focused respect to the series.

Being a Serial Thinker

Story one defines the central character of the series. For example, in Raiders of the Lost Ark we get a great introduction to the primary hooks of the series: Indy hunting down sacred artifacts, a race of wits and time to secure the artifact before someone else exploits it, and of course, gratuitous use of the whip.

Indiana Jones is episodic more than serial, however. There is no overarching story from one movie to the next. A TV show like 24 is the opposite however.

In my opinion, serial is much harder to pull off because you have to treat it like you’re telling one big story and each episode is merely a chapter in that story.

My stories are a hybrid. Each story is part of an overall larger story, but I intend for them to be enjoyed on their own as well. How am I doing this?

I’m treating it like an onion. Each successive story peels back another layer of the onion. Whereas the first story for one of my characters involves being drastically transplanted from one reality to another and redefining an individual’s identity in the face of that, the second story illustrates that the conspiracy does not just revolve around the central character and is much more widespread than previously imagined.

“Complications ensue,” is a good phrase to describe not only escalating conflict in a particular episode, but also how a series expands out from its original ideas. The further you get in the series, the wider variety and more complicated the reality in which the characters are entrenched.

One show that taught me how to think like this was Stargate SG-1. I hadn’t seen a single episode before actually going through the series. I watched all ten seasons back to back on DVD. If you’re not a fan of sci-fi, I recommend doing this with any show with a significant number of seasons.

What I discovered, and what the SG-1 writers have admitted, is that they didn’t always know where the series was headed. They would just build upon existing episodes. If in one episode they discovered a robot girl who created invasive nanobots as pets, later on they introduced an evil race of nanobots on the fringes of the universe that come to find out, were created originally by this robot girl. The writers didn’t plan this. They took the premise of an earlier episode and expanded upon it in a logical way.

As you write, you may have ideas for a second or third story. Don’t block them. Write them down. See if there are any connection points to your current story, so that you may enhance those in a way that makes the series more cohesive.

When your brain starts making connections between one story and another, listen. Thinking serially isn’t hard, it just takes a bit of practice.