Podcast

Thursday, November 10, 2022

The Expanded Ultimate Story Checklist!

I’m expanding The Ultimate Story Checklist!  

The Checklist came to be when I took all the advice I’d offered up to that point on the blog and rephrased the posts as a series of questions you could ask about your manuscript.  Each question linked back to the original post that inspired it.  Then I later rewrote everything when I turned it into my book, The Secrets of Story.

Later, I kept studying examples and came up with various posts called Rulebook Casefile that backed up my points, and various posts called Straying from the Party Line that seemed to contradict them.  

For the expansion, I’m redoing every entry to use the text from the book, tacking on any Casefiles or SftPLs afterwards, and including a chart of how 30 movies answered that question.  

This expansion is ongoing.  So far, I’ve only done the first three Parts and the rest still link back to the original posts that inspired them.  

If you still want to read the original posts (and the original comments), I’ll leave that version up, too, underneath this one.  

I’ve used this list to evaluate my favorite stories and my own work. The result: my favorite stories all pass and my own work always fall short. This tells me what I’m doing wrong.

The goal is simple: Try to answer yes as often as possible. Of course, every story is unique and no story that I’ve evaluated has answered yes to all 122 questions, nor should it. Check out the Checklist Roadtests over there in the sidebar, to see how lots of great movies did. If you want to try it yourself, a downloadable version of this list as a word document is available here (link fixed!)

(This list is primarily for stand-alone stories such as
screenplays, novels and plays, but don’t worry, theres a separate “pilot” checklist for the first episode of continuing stories such as TV series, book series, web series, and comics)

PART 1: CONCEPT

The Pitch: Does this concept excite everyone who hears about it?

Story Fundamentals: Will this concept generate a strong story?
 Does this challenge represent the hero’s greatest hope and/or greatest fear and/or an ironic answer to the hero’s question?

The Hook: Will this be marketable and generate word of mouth?
 Does the story satisfy the basic human urges that get people to buy and recommend this genre? 

PART 2: CHARACTER

Believe: Do we recognize the hero as a human being?

Care: Do we feel for the hero?

Invest: Can we trust the hero to tackle this challenge?

PART 3: STRUCTURE (assuming that the story is about the solving of a large problem)

1st Quarter: Is the challenge laid out in the first quarter?

2nd Quarter: Does the hero try the easy way in the second quarter?

3rd Quarter: Does the hero try the hard way in the third quarter?

4th Quarter: Does the challenge climax in the fourth quarter?

PART 4: SCENEWORK

The Set-Up: Does this scene begin with the essential elements it needs?

The Conflict: Is this a compelling collision of competing agendas?  

The Outcome: Does this scene change the story going forward?

PART 5: DIALOGUE

Empathetic: Is the dialogue true to human nature?

Specific: Is the dialogue specific to this world and each personality?

Heightened: Is the dialogue more pointed and dynamic than real talk?

Strategic: Are certain dialogue scenes withheld until necessary?

PART 6: TONE

Genre: Does the story tap into pre-established expectations?

Framing: Does the story set, reset, upset and ultimately exceed its own expectations?
 Is there a dramatic question posed early on, which will establish in the audience’s mind which moment will mark the end of the story? 

PART 7: THEME

Difficult: Is the meaning of the story derived from a fundamental moral dilemma?

Grounded: Do the stakes ring true to the world of the audience?

Subtle: Is the theme interwoven throughout so that it need not be discussed often?

Untidy: Is the dilemma ultimately irresolvable?

Whew! So how did your story do? Go check out the Checklist Roadtests to see how some great stories line up.

1 comment:

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