In real life, things happen for completely inexplicable reasons. People are random. They kick a dog in the morning and donate a kidney in the afternoon. That’s what makes humanity so interesting. Because we are so unpredictable, despite our love for stability.
Just as we frequently replay those weird events in our mind and wonder how they happened, we’re apt to do that to stories we encounter to. Why would any logical protagonist do that? Why would this be feasible? How can you love two people at the same time and go to the graveyard of a third person that you used to love?
This happens even more so when you’re a writer, and even more so with the inciting incident. Why today? Why must this story take place at this specific place and specific time? Why not tomorrow?
And you can ask an infinite number of whys to each reason you give for justifying it. I recently learned that it’s called the Regress Argument, when you ask ad infinitum, why something is the way it is.
It’s not productive and that’s certainly not going to get you a better story. How do you get past this? How do you stop asking yourself why Power Rangers begins when Rita Repulsa escapes from her 10,000 year imprisonment, why not when Rita Repulsa began her attacks, why not when Zordon first became this energy being, why not when the first Power Rangers appeared… you get the picture.
But you feel so safe and secure when you overanalyse. Because you feel it’s getting work done. And after all, you can always rationalise it away as making the story better.
Well, kick the habit. And when you relapse, here are four reasons why you should stop overanalysing that plot.
It’s not productive
You get to the point where you’ve got a workable inciting incident, but it’s not perfect. And you want to hack and carve away at it until it’s perfect. And you’ve spent 9 days on the inciting incident and there’s just 1 day left for the rest of the story. But it’s all so worth it because you’re analysing it!
Well stop it and write. You’re a writer. Write the story, not analyse it. You can analyse after you’ve written, but not while or before (see my note on when to edit your work).
You restrict your possibilities later on
Sometimes you just don’t explain so much, simply to prevent any restrictions later on. Of course this can backfire on you, like on Lost, where the lack of knowing anything is so rampant that it seems like nobody on set knows where the story is heading.
But it’s good to leave loose ends, if only so to leave viewers craving the answer to your questions. And you might not have the time, or the creative energies left to create the best possible justification that will generate the most conflict. So think of it this way – you’re leaving this portion of the story for when you’ll have the most resources to spend on it.
One really good example of leaving loose ends without seeming like a lost bear is in Beast Wars: Transformers. They frequently pick up loose ends that you’ve forgotten about (mainly because other, bigger ends are resolved) and turn it into the biggest plot twist of all.
It’s unnecessary detail
Well, you don’t need to know the entire family tree of the bad guy (unless it’s the BBEG, and even then, you only need to know enough to explain his motivations). You can have all that detail in your head and it will enrich the characterisation, but to explicitly spell everything out and leave nothing in your mind will make you seem long-winded and boring.
Be concise.
You can edit it later
Here’s the biggest reason why – you can and will edit it later. Remember the bulk of writing is in the rewriting. It will be changed. There will be much remodelling done from this first draft to the final product. So if you’re not satisfied and you don’t have a lead, just leave it.
It will be edited.
So go off, write, and stop reading about writing! Rewrite. Edit. Just don’t read tips about things when you can be doing them for yourself.
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