Zombie Cliche Lookout: Turning Battle
Generally speaking, people don’t go into battle expecting to lose. Yes, there are certainly suicide missions, but even those are undertaken with the understanding that it’s still winnable provided they can slow down the enemy or divert their forces long enough for the good guys to mount a defence. Bearing that in mind, there is little more devastating to start a fight with confidence on your side, and then suddenly find that the tides have turned. Naturally, this gets even worse when you’re fighting zombies, because most, if not all, of your side’s losses are going to end up adding even more zombies to the mix.
With any luck for everyone involved, another trope will show up. I’m speaking, of course, of the cavalry riding in to save the day. In this case, that would simply be reinforcements from inside the cabin, although you never know when a third party might decide to pop in and help.
About this Episode:
One thing that always concerns me about zombie fiction is that the zombies often become less threatening as the story continues. This is certainly reasonable in some ways. Survivors will, after all, adapt and get better at dealing with the zombies. However, I don’t like it when things seem “easy”. In my mind, the zombies should always be dangerous, even if our survivors are becoming pretty capable.
Discussion Question: Too Many Characters?
This question is inspired by BrickVoid’s comments in the last episode: what do you consider to be too many characters in an ongoing series. I’m not talking about a single book, movie, game, or mini-series here. I’m speaking only about media that has an ongoing story.
When it comes to ongoing stories, characters are added for a number of reasons: challenging existing paradigms, exploring different personalities, adding antagonists, and countless other reasons. Of course, this can introduce a lot of other issues, from making things confusing to diluting the importance of already established characters.
So when does it become too much?
I think adding characters is a good thing, just as long as you handle them well. If you make to characters interchangeable then it gets annoying and confusing. But with some series, like walking dead for example, you’re characters are at constant risk of dying.
So when someone does die, you can do one of two things, fill in their spot with a new character(Which could help breath new breath into the characters as this person has a different personality and story). Or you could use that characters death as a advancement of other peoples characters and show how without them they have changed.
Ultimately, I say as long as you put WORK into your characters, you’ll be okay.
I completely agree HK. How do you think I’m doing with that?
Typo alert, About This Episode: “zombie fiction is that the zombie often ” Change bolded word to “zombies”. 😀
Discussion Question, First paragraph, first sentence: first occurrence of ‘in’–>is 😉
Fixed both; thanks BV.
Dave, I’ve found a continuity error: The zombie in the light blue torso with blue legs and brown curly hair that Stewart was dispatching got up, ignored Stewart, and started attacking Brent.
This is very weird to me, as it’s actually a lot more difficult than you’d think to get up and simply ignore someone who’s attacking you. This looks like bad writing up of scripted actions for the zombies. Either that or your continuity checker is SKOAL! 😀
You absolutely found a continuity error. Dammit.
The set got knocked over between the two episodes, and I just messed up when I shot this episode.
There’s two that match that description. One, with a white shirt, that Stewart is fighting, and another, with a light blue shirt, that was always standing above Stewart’s head (check first and second panels) and facing Brent.
Aw well, this one is my bad.
Dave. I cant speak in general but in this medium I think you max out at about 3 story lines. I don’t think you could maintain a good flow with 4 or more. Your readers would have to be constantly checking back in the archives to catch up with the story. That being said I cant see having more than about 8 or so main characters per storyline. Thats not to say you cant have a “Woodbury” type scenario with a lot of “extras” and a larger number of less developed characters. Or that you couldnt bring multiple storylines together and keep all the principal characters. (actaully bringing parallel sotrylines together might be a good opportunity to kill off a few developed characters, intorduce some new ones in the united line, then develop those when the stroyline splits again)
Characters are what a story is about. Stories tell the journey of the characters. How that journey goes depends on the other story elements. Break it down like this. On the one hand you have Game of Thrones in which the characters are so numerous its hard to remember them all but the story is the journey of the Kingdoms not necessarily the people in the Kingdoms.
On the other hand you had that Tom Hanks movie which was mostly him and a volley ball. The story was the volleyball’s journey and ultimate sacrifice to save Tom.
Since this story is not continuous in that only a small amount of story is given at a time, it is easy to forget characters so I would say a few characters would be best.
I think you should reshoot, republish, and start up an ‘outtakes’ link in the archives! 😉
Oh shit! I hope nobody dies!
In the previous episode, it really does seem rather odd that Steward couldn’t kill that zombie. My thoughts are that the set bump moved zombie he was attacking, based on what you’ve said, and that you never repositioned Stewart for the ‘kill’ hit with the machete and then used the extra zombie on Brent. 😀 I really think you should reshoot this whole mess, and get your continuity checker some help! 😀
@Ballinabricky: Yeah, that white shirted zombie does look ready to attack Stewart in the previous episode. But he never seems to dispatch the blue shirted one. Definitely continuity errors here. 😀
I’m trying to write “you” as meaning Dave, here. 😀
Well so far I’m in love with Inez so far. I didn’t even realize who she was till you said. I like her “No nonsense” attitude and feel she’s really going to survive this.
Also the story with Sam and Emma is interesting, he killed her family, and she shows him mercy, and now it’s them against the zombies. I think so far you got some good stuff and yet still I have to say I feel there are “Weaker” characters. I would say Stewart is by far the one that stands out the most. I mean so far all I know about him is he’s a teenager and he isn’t the sharpest tool in the shed.
But still, Murphy, Cheryl, Michael, Joy and others are interesting characters that I hope to see more out of.