*Spoiler alert: this article discusses the endings to popular movies The  Surprise Twist Ending Everyone hates the movie that ends with the hero waking up in bed realizing that it was all a dream.  They don’t hate it if it’s later revealed that it WASN’T a dream.  That’s an effective twist, but it’s been done. [...]

How do you know if your ending works?  When writing any story, you are open to so many possibilities, it’s often impossible to know what ending to choose.  Actually, you are open to the following possible endings: Good/bad guy wins (happy fairy tale) Good/bad guy loses but wins something unexpected (bittersweet ending) Good/bad guy loses [...]

Erik Bork – Throwing Rocks at your Characters Erik was another highly effective seminar leader.  Most of his material dealt with structure and came from Blake Snyder’s Save the Cat, which is a really helpful book on structure.  The one problem I had with Snyder’s book was that after reading it, I found it screwed [...]

The other day I attended a script reading that got me thinking about what was missing from his writing beyond the basic structural flaws, story issues, and underdeveloped characters.  The writer lacked one major thing: a basic understanding of the human condition. Sadly, a handful of people, writer included, couldn’t see that all the female characters were either bitches [...]

By now you have the series act breaks, story lines and story arc.  You’re not done yet!  You need to break down each act into scenes and note what happens when.  If you’re thinking, “I already noted what happens when while looking at the story arc”, you may have noted the major plot points for [...]