Tag Archives: Harry Potter

Transmedia, Talk Back, and the Power of Story

 

So my new project, Angel Punk, is a transmedia project, and I’m going to be on a panel at KidLitCon in a few weeks discussing transmedia.

“What the heck is that?” you ask.

Transmedia means storytelling through multiple forms of media: film, text, images, audio, blogs, tweets… you name it.

“How is that different from Star Trek?” you ask.

Good question.  Star Trek, Star Wars, Harry Potter, and other astronomically popular franchises started in one form of media,  a TV show, a movie, or a book.  It became popular and the story spread to other media forms.  Transmedia starts out in multiple places.  We recognize that there are multiple points of entry into a story both because some consumers prefer books or gaming or movies and because some facets of the story are more interesting to some readers than others.

One key component  to transmedia projects, however, is consumer (I hate that word but reader/viewer don’t cut it) participation.  More than ever we want to be a part of our favorite stories.  I have a quidditch t-shirt.  I geek out following Neil Gaiman on twitter.  I get sucked into online explorations of the Game of Thrones universe.  Most transmedia projects want talk back.  We want to know what people like and don’t like.  We want to include consumers in the process.  We want some collective consciousness on board for story telling.  If you think about it, it’s like that game where everyone takes turns making up a few lines of a story.  I love it!

See you around the social media fire pit for the next story session!

Eddard Stark, Dumbledore, and Death as Plot

For a story to work, and by work I mean, grab me by the throat and refuse to let me go, I must be fully invested in the characters. I want to fall in love, to believe in their reality to such a degree that if Eddard Stark walked through my door, I would say, “A mug of mead, Lord Stark?” not “Where’s the freaking costume party?”

(I know I declared my intent to discuss plot and yet digress to character.  I promise to get to the point.)

So in the space of one week, I watched the season finale of Game of Thrones and finished reading Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince to my children.  And…  well… two characters I fell in love with… they die.

Is that stupid story-telling?  Doesn’t that kill your plot (so to speak)?  What is the point of reading on if your favorite characters die?  That makes me think of BallyKissAngel. Thanks to Netflix, I was doggedly in love with Assumpta and Father Peter until – you guessed it – death reared its oh-so-permanent head.  I stopped watching.  

Why will I keep watching Game of Thrones and move right on to The Deathly Hallows but I won’t stick with BallyK?

Death drives plot forward when it is more than just death.  If the loss of a character turns the plot trajectory on its head by impacting other beloved characters so strongly that they start making different decisions, then it can work. Everything is different for Rob Stark, Arya and her sister when Eddard Stark falls.  And for Harry, his string of losses seems like more than anyone could bear.  No longer can he share his burden with Dumbledore.  Now his chance of successfully defeating Voldemort is slimmer than ever.

I have to know what happens!  I keep reading (or watching).

You writers out there, consider death.  By all means kill your characters, but make sure that what they stood for matters so much that the rest of the story will rise from the ashes like my buddy Fawkes.