Wait, Did We Outgrow Archetypes?
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- čas přidán 11. 06. 2024
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linktr.ee/localscriptman
CONTENTS:
00:00 may thy knife bend and go boioioing
3:33 this thing I keep pointing to
4:10 one pill two pill red pill blue pill
8:30 good and evil are not character building blocks
10:08 weeb journalist show
11:03 more like joseph cantball
15:39 what is the v-shaped orifice thing, plz explain - Zábava
I had a dream you approached me in a supermarket, ridiculed the script I had in my hand and that’s about all I can remember.
A prescient vision no doubt 🧿🧿
@@localscriptman I’ll make sure to carry it in my bag every time I make a grocery run
@@localscriptman As written.
terrible purpose
@@localscriptman “May thy script chip and shatter”
bro had a villain monologue at the end.
he was the villain archetype all along... a tragic twist to be sure.
I gasped out loud because "get Ennegramed doofus" is the name of the Spotify playlist I made after watching your first vid about ennegram stuff, doing a two hour deep dive into what type I was, and then listening to a bunch of Marina songs.
.....so are you a 3 or a 4 🤨?? jk
@@bcar2263 I'm a fourrrr🙈
LISAN AL-GAIB
Marina is the ultimate 4
I totally agree; the autonomy of Chani and Stilgar in the movie adds such an interesting dimension to the story of Dune and gives the Fremen an actual perspective, which makes the universe feel more alive while benefitting the characters. I also like that they added an ideology that conflicts with the Fremen fundamentalists, even if it isn’t shown much.
I think Stilgar’s downfall is even more tragic in the book because it spends a lot of time showing how intelligent and perceptive he is through Jessica’s pov, only for him to become a follower. But the movie handles the downfall itself much better and conveys how his desperation has become radical messianic thinking.
I must confess I missed the majority of Stilgar's arc when I read Dune for the first time. It's actually very subtle if you're not looking for it. What sold it for me in this version was one scene:
The scene where Gurney is completely shocked that 200 fremen fighters have crippled spice production across an entire planetary hemisphere is so easy to miss because it does so much work so subtly.
It shows that the fremen are a potent fighting force, that Paul is gradually pulling leadership of the band away from Stilgar, that Stilgar is buying into Paul's myth, Chani isn't, and that Paul still has untapped resources from Caladan in addition to his growing base of power among the Fremen.
And it's all because of a handful of reaction shots added into an easy to overlook "walk and talk" exposition scene.
@@localscriptman‘Have you noticed, Stil, how beautiful the young women are this year?’
It seems like the consensus is that while it sucks that Dune was not adapted in the way Frank Herbert wanted, Dune’s initial premise was adapted very well, thus the thoughtful story in overtly Hollywood trappings.
@@iantaakalla8180 - honestly yeah. I think that's the best estimation of it
I go to a theatre and watch Dune 2, I go to sleep, and when I wake up there's a video from my local script man on it. Perfection
It’s Dune or get Duned on
@@localscriptman any more video after this one or is it just a _one and Dune?_
I have a list of movies I need you to watch to test this theory.
@@Imperial_Squid Oh I do videos in batches now, so I have a few more on deck
The reason that Joseph Campbell's hero archetype lacks human complexity is because it is intended to be applicable to all people. Complexity demands specificity, so any system intended to be universally applicable has no room for it.
You could theoretically build a bridge between the hero's journey and a more Localscriptman-type character sheet. It would read the hero's journey as a process of self-discovery, and would tie the character arc to the hero's process of understanding their core flaw and its source. Or you could do the same with any beat-sheet or plot template.
I agree I tend to see the Hero’s Journey as a classic plot templat than character. Although at least the Hero’s Journey tends to argue for an arc for the character at least.
@@andylozano5193 EXACTLY this. You don't learn who your character is from the hero's journey, you only figure out what they do in the plot. You also need to remember following any formula like a strict 'paint by numbers' is NOT a formula for success, rather the formula makes for a good way to set you off in the right direction.
Star Wars infamously breaks the hero's journey and doesn't follow it beat-for-beat, meanwhile Pixar seemed to think The Good Dinosaur would be fine with nothing but a hero's journey plotline and it's easily their worrst movie to date.
I personally think all writers interested in making grand adventure stories should learn the hero's journey and try planning a story with it to fully understand why it's so useful, even if they don't plan to use it for their own work. It was popularised for good reason, it's a good way to get you thinking and add elements to a story you might not otherwise have considered. At the same time, it's certainly no longer the be-all-and-end-all of writing adventure stories, and the formula alone is not a guarantee for success (because no formula is).
In the context of Campbell's politics, it makes sense that he'd want to smear people into a blurred pulp and fit them all into neat boxes. He wasn't a very nice guy at all.
I don't think The Hero's Journey and psychological explorations are mutually exclusive. I mean the entire idea of The Belly of the Whale is about introspecting the protagonist's beliefs. Most of the stories in The Bible as well as many other ancient texts are really about conflicts of ideals, so dismissing it all as "fighting dragons" is just a really ignorant way to say "New things good. Old things bad and for children. Old people are bad because they believed in spirits, and I'm an enlightened atheist that knows better because government institutions told me so." Whether you agree with them or not, these ancient stories have a lot of ideological conflicts to them.
I hate The Hero's Journey, because I think it's actually way too specific, and people try to use it as a framework for storytelling which is stupid, and people try to impose it on stories where it doesn't fit.
@@youcantbeatk7006 People have been looking for a single fundamental story structure for a long time, and I think that's why the hero's journey is so popular.
But god is in the details. A plot only becomes really interesting (to me, at least) when it's made unique by specifics. So if there IS a fundamental story structure, I imagine it would be so abstract as to be useless.
Singling Star Wars out for not having a complex character journey when the franchise sorta became famous for having the biggest plot twist in cinema history that explodes the main character's simplistic view of the world and forces him to reconsider everything he thought he knew is certainly...a take. Like, you can't watch Episode V and VI and come away thinking Luke's conflict with his father isn't somehow representative of a complication of the Hero's Journey. That's what makes the Vader twist so compelling; the Hero's Journey in part involves the reconciliation with the father figure, but in Luke's case, the father figure is also itself the dragon figure. They very evil he'd nominally be destined to slay in a normal story is also the very man who's legacy he's trying to uphold. And what that legacy even is, and his relationship too it, forms the inner turmoil he struggles with through V and VI; whatever Vader is capable of, he is capable of as well.
Like it's entirely possible to read Star Wars as almost iconoclastic. The binary good and evil morality that the first movie espouses is upended by the second film, and thoroughly deconstructed by the third (with the prequels forming a kind of framing device through which we can better understand this). Taken as a whole, the Jedi are repeatedly depicted in the films as being in the wrong, with only two characters in the franchise--Qui-Gon and Luke--able to see past the dogmatic view of the Force the Jedi had become complacent with. They do not know how to handle human connections in a healthy way and repeatedly make the same mistakes, thinking they can destroy the Sith because they've erroneously concluded that the Darkside is inherently evil--and that anyone who goes down that path is eternally damned, hence why the Jedi tried to essentially trick Luke into killing his father without telling him who he is.
Episode 6 rebukes that notion by having Luke save Anakin--something they deemed impossible--through the very thing the Jedi thought caused him to fall in the first place: love. That might make it sound like a trite "love conquers all" message, but Star Wars is more complex than that. Luke's love for Anakin stands in contrast to everything Anakin had been taught about the Force--by the both the Jedi and Sith. He'd been taught to shun attachments and reject the kind of love he desperately needed when he lost his mother, and later his wife, due to them being sources of anger and jealousy, which lead to the Darkside. Thus isolated, he felt used by everyone around him; his starting the story off as a slave is an important detail, as it illustrates Anakin having been a slave his entire life. First to Watto, then to the Jedi as a weapon to be used against the Sith, and later by the Sith against the Jedi. Only three people truly treated him like a human being in his life: his mother, his wife, and his son. And it's his son's deeply personal love for the man Anakin was, and could be again, that cuts through the dogma and self hatred the Jedi and Sith have wrapped Anakin in, and allows Anakin to spend the last minutes of his life finally a free man who threw off his own shackles.
That is a deeply personal family tragedy disguised as a hero's journey, and it's why in my mind Star Wars is the best example of what can be done with the monomyth if one understands its structure, and is willing to subvert it to create something truly profound. Dismissing Star Wars as lacking in dynamic humanity does a disservice to the films.
Great analysis
@@liamthellama8386 I appreciate that, I would also expand on my original comment with something I forgot to include. While the Jedi teach anakin to shun attachments, because of the potential for jealousy and anger, the Sith teach him to embrace the jealousy and anger. Luke and Qui-Gon have a unique perspective in that they embrace the connections Jedi shun while shunning the hatred the Sith embrace. That to me is representative of true balance. The dark side and the light side working in tandem with one another. If the Darkside is likened to the Id-the baser desires and needs of the psyche, attachment being part of it-than the Sith are a corruption of the Darkside, but the Darkside itself is nonetheless a natural expression of the Force-which in this reading is a kind of cosmic unconscious. Campbell was heavily informed by psychoanalytic theory, especially Carl Jung, and deployed Jungian thinking when writing his comparative mythology.
This necessarily means that the Jedi are a corruption of the Lightside; they had become so detached from the world around them, that they couldn’t see the suffering that was right under their noses. Again, Anakin being a slave on a planet that is being completely ignored by the Jedi and the republic is a significant detail. There’s a reason why episode one has that conversation between Padme and Shmi; Padme is appalled that slavery is allowed to continue in corners of the galaxy, but Shmi points out that the Republic-and by extension the Jedi-don’t exist out by them. They have had to survive without the supposedly infinite wisdom of the Jedi.
And notably, what happens after anakin is freed? The Jedi leave his mother to her fate, which is ultimately perhaps the first mistake the Jedi make. Because they actively discouraged his thoughts dwelling on his mother, Anakin is bereft of the kind of parental guidance he needed. Qui-Gon saw this, and tried to fulfill the role of father figure, but his untimely death sort of ruined that. Anakin then starts to project the role of father figure on to Obi-Wan, but as Kenobi famously says in episode 3 “you were my brother”.
Obi-Wan can’t be the father figure he needs, as much as anakin tries to project that onto him; it’s this inability to provide for anakin what he needs that forms the foundations of his deteriorating psyche, and general frustration with the Jedi. These cracks in the mythical armor that the young Anakin had projected onto the Jedi start to be filled in with the nefarious influence of Palpatine, who is raw Id incarnate.
So Anakin is a man who has been deprived of everything that he psychologically needs as a human being, but most importantly, has only ever been taught by all of his masters-Jedi or sith- that attachments lead to the dark side, and the dark side is eternal damnation. Strictly speaking, the Jedi and Sith, believe in fundamentally the same thing about the force. They believe that it is a moral binary that can only ever lead to one of two potential outcomes.
Luke complicated that notion.
When Luke defeats Vader in episode 6, he uses the Darkside to do it, but in perhaps the single most significant moment in the entire franchise, Luke decides to say no, and throws the light saber away, proclaiming “I am a Jedi, like my father before me.”
People often misinterpret this scene as suggesting Luke is fully embracing the Jedi code, truly becoming a Jedi, but he’s not doing that. In fact he’s doing the exact opposite of what the Jedi wanted him to do. The Jedi in no uncertain terms believe that Luke needed to kill Vader and the emperor. When Luke says that he can’t kill his own father, obi-wan outright says “than the emperor has already won.”
It’s important to recognize that Luke is not a very good Jedi. Not in the traditional sense at least. He questions literally everything they tell him and repeatedly does the opposite of what they want him to do. Every single decision he makes in the original trilogy is based on some sort of connection and attachment that he has with other characters in the movies. There isn’t a single stoic, Jedi code-driven decision that he makes across the entire franchise. And he pretty brazenly uses the dark side, even using dark powers like Force choke in the films, and dressing in black robes like a sith.
The difference is that he’s able to control his Id. He’s able to use the dark side but not succumb to it. When he says “I am a Jedi, like my father before me” he’s not talking to the emperor, he’s talking to Anakin. The most important part of that line is “like my father before me”. He has never stopped entreating to Vader to remember who he really is. By using the dark side to defeat him in battle, but pulling himself back and throwing the light saber away, proclaiming himself to be a Jedi, he’s not talking about himself. He’s begging Anakin to remember who he really is. By throwing away the light saber, Luke is also throwing away the Jedi. He is proclaiming “I don’t care what you, or the Jedi have to say about it. I will not kill my father, and I will not become like what you have made him.” He is willing to suffer the full power of the emperor, unarmed and defenseless, before he would ever think of harming his father again.
And this example of pure, unconditional love is what brings anakin back. Not the Jedi code, but the love of a son has for his father. Star Wars in my mind is one of the best versions of the heroes journey in fiction, and it has always frustrated me because so many people fundamentally, misunderstand and miss remember what those movies were actually about. Like the erroneous claim that Luke Skywalker, save the galaxy; he didn’t save shit. The battle of Endor would’ve happened exactly the same way without him being there.
No what makes him a hero isn’t that he saved the galaxy. It’s that he saved the soul of a man deemed by all to have been damned.
@@roberthesser6402 dam man, just post your own video.
I don't care what your voice sounds like, I would listen through it.
Nicely written.
💯🖤
I second this @@krispalermo8133
People nag on the OG trilogy way too often for its characters, I feel.
Like, I've heard praise for the sequel at the expense of shitting on the og, because Rey being abandoned by her parents was much more realistic portrayal of what a little kid would go through if that happened compared to when Luke saw his home on Tatooine burnt to the ground, with his uncle and aunt dead with it. But like, would the movie about this fun space adventure really benefit from a scene where Luke cries his eyes out over characters that ultimately do not matter? I don't think so.
His despair about his father's, sister's and other friends' fates are way more important and way more felt. You don't even need the outer context of the prequels to feel it. There is beauty in its simplicity, I think.
I like archetypes early on as foundations so I can deviate or deconstruct them which lends me into fresh avenues that feel unorthodox and very much worth exploring to me. It feels like holding onto the edge of the pool when I don't know how to swim but then eventually I figure it out and end up doing underwater handstands in the deep end.
If someone is writing something nowadays that sticks to the formula so to speak, then they better have the the Ace of all Aces to ever ace up their sleeve. Otherwise, it's over for them :)
People "deconstruct" the same shit over and over again, and make new tropes. The annoying part is that people praise the tropes for being original when they're not. Just look at all the evil Superman media that people praise despite it all being garbage. People praise Mashle for being a parody of shonen tropes (even though it does most of those tropes completely unironically without even being funny) even though Saiki K, One Punch Man, and others did the same thing way better, especially Saiki K. People praise Chainsaw Man and JJK for being a little edgy even though there's countless animes and mangas that are edgy in the same ways. Then there's also the trope of the "morally grey" protagonist that is either a generic hero, but there's a scene or a few of him killing children for the greater good or mercy killing someone, or he's just straight up a villain, and people can't separate heroes from protagonists. *Write stories that personally resonate with you, and stop just trying to copy shit for the sake of copying it or "deconstructing" or "subverting" tropes. Deconstructions and subversions are only good when they're better than the original thing.*
@@youcantbeatk7006 Hard agree on all of this. Writing competent characters that you can understand and convey is the first step, and subversions and deconstructions should only be done to service the message of the story better than what the normal white bread archetypes will allow for. And if you’re doing it solely for the purpose of shaking things up or keeping the audience awake, then it shows your fundamental lack of understanding on how to optimally use those archetypes.
On the whole evil Superman trope, it feels kinda redundant when Superman himself is meant to be a subversion of “absolute power corrupting absolutely”. He’s Superman BECAUSE he’s has the strength to always do the right thing in spite of being raised around humans and seeing how they’re corrupt, and he inspires others to do good as well.
It’s why I never thought Invincible was truly a superhero deconstruction. It’s just a different type of superhero story that plays the normal tropes completely straight instead of relying on the normal comic retcons and censorship as a crutch for actual progress.
@@arttech4347 I've literally considered writing an entire essay on why every part of Invincible from beginning to end is garbage. The show even makes it worse. Omni-Man's change of heart is impossible to believe in the show when they changed it so that he went out of his way to personally murder thousands of humans rather than all the deaths he caused aside from the Guardians just being collateral from fighting Mark. Omni-Man killing the Guardians, the inciting incident of the entire franchise makes no sense, because the Guardians were never a threat to Omni-Man's goal, and killing them would've done absolutely nothing but blow his cover and ruin his plans, which it did. He seriously didn't expect a guy named "The Immortal" to come back to life.
None of this even matters anyway because at the end of the story, Mark decides to overthrow the Galactic Federation and rule the universe like the Viltrumites always intended, and this is treated like a good thing. That was only after Mark went back in time and had the opportunity to prevent every death and tragedy in the series from happening, but he decided against it because he wanted to fuck Eve.
There's no reason for the majority of characters in the story to be blatant copies of other characters because there's no intelligent commentary or even commentary at all for most of them. Even the original characters suck, have designs out of a "How to Draw Superheroes" book, and have backstories that completely shatter the worldbuilding. Multiple characters get their powers from magic despite nobody aside from crossover characters ever using magic.
There's like 4 different villains motivated my "climate change" and "energy crises" despite countless characters having powers that allow them to generate infinite or exponential energy including every Viltrumite and other flying character, Eve, Rex, and all the characters that can generate heat and literal electricity freely. The yap about climate change is just Kirkman's shameless politics seeping into the story at the expense of the story's quality. This isn't even 1/4 of the critiques I have for the series.
I don't think archetypes are about WHO a character is, but rather the role they play in the story. An archetype like "villain" or "mentor" tells you what a character does, but not why. It describes behavior, but not motivation.
I might speak in terms of archetypes when constructing a plot, to see how the characters will enter into conflicts or alliances.
@@Halberddent I agree and I'd add that stories are more interesting when discovering why things are happening rather than what is happening or how it unfolds. The personal reasons define the context of external events and actions.
I don't think the others who replied quite understood my initial comment but I understand & share their frustrations to an extent. My goal is to tell stories I deem worthy of exploring. I'd never subvert a story just for the sake of it since I believe subversions need to be earned thematically/conceptually.
Bit of a category error here. Don't confuse character tropes for archetypes. Archetypes aren't complete people, they're aspects of the psyche; motivational and emotional forces. Myths aren't modern films & novels, they're distillations of other stories, more like dreams than everyday reality
Myths were a narrative structure that people used to explain the world around them in a pre-scientific age. The problem with calling films and novels 'myths', is that we are consciously aware that they are stories written by people and have no tangible effect on the world around us.
@@diemes5463 This is just a scientistic myth in itself that doesn't hold true if you study a wide range of mythological stories.
Plenty of myths were written by people with specific political messages for specific target audiences and are pretty easy to unpack when you know their origins.
@@diemes5463 Myths (and religious mythologies) are narrative tools to describe the world in altogether different terms than science. They aren't pre-scientific, they stand outside science. Myths don't attempt to describe the world in concrete terms. They describe relationships, not objects. Most films and novels and other modern storytelling forms are definitely not myths--myths are written by whole cultures over repeated sharings and retellings; they're not created by individuals, although some modern creators approach it or mimic the style.
It's important not to make the mistake made by this video -- conflating mythic narrative and mundane narrative, and measuring one by the technical standards of the other. It doesn't work. Myths don't render terribly complex characters, just as medieval art or modern abstract impressionism doesn't render photo-realistic images. Modern audiences often prefer realism that doesn't exist in actual myth, and generally don't understand the mythic narrative form because we don't live at all like mythic cultures did (and some still kind of do).
@@diemes5463 while i do aguree that myth was with the purpoce of explaining the world, ill add that it wasnt the only purpoce.
As the other comenter bellow added, people used myth in a political manner as well.
Personally id argue that knowingly or unknowlingly all of myth has one political messaging or another, tho at the time those people wouldnt use the same terms.
Since ideology is present in every statement and action, i think its safe to say that just as myth served an ideological purpoce then, so too do todays novels, films and other forms of art serve an ideological purpoce.
Art is one of those things which we cant eat, we cant drink, yet we can consume, and whille it doesnt have direct effects on our world, it cirtainly has tangable effects nevertheless.
If we can aguree that language itself has a tangable effect, than so too what is built with language, reguardless of its form, as long as there is someone to interpret it.
Words make people human beeings, for without them we wouldnt have the capabuility to create a civilisation nor to maintain it.
Its words which enable politicians to be in power.
Of course, alongside those wores are the emotions, resources, promices, logic and so on that are represented by those words.
But just think about the fact that most of us have never seen the money, or the houses, or the contracts, or the agureements that people have had with those individual politicians in power, yet we believe that those things must be there, because we were thought that one cant have power without those things.
Most we are given are words, and its hardly scientific if thats all that we base our conclusions upon, yet thats what most of us do, and the only material proof that we have is the concequences which other more convinced people than ourselves will do to us, were we to test those "leaders" of ours, including the cessation of resources that we need to live.
Once enough people believe a myth, it becomes a reality.
Tho not a reality in an absolute sence, just to the extent to which material reality allows for.
Whille say, a god believer wouldnt be able to manifest god with enough followers, they can follow the rules of that god, and donate to the rich megachirch preachers, indoctrinate their children to do the same, then those children might become soldiers because they believe that they are fighting for the freedom of their country.
Disgustingly enough, every nation has a vatiation of this logic, and so they trap us devided through thease stories of our greatness and our naighbours sinister cunning.
Of course, some of thease stories are somewhat descriptive of material reality, but most if not all of them plant the bitter lie that we must suffer in order to be safe, that we must die in order to create and maintain even a halfassedly great society, and that it will never be possible to build a world ontop of the ideals for human wellbeing, but instead, that we must accept that some should have overabundance, whille others have nothing.
And hell, people eat it up because ita comforting when choices are few, and because maybe one day they will be on top whare there is no need to toil and waste their lives.
Stories are just that powerful.
And most of what they take is childhood indoctrination, lifelong repetition, and a whole planet of people knowingly and unknowingly conspiering towqrds this end because they have been left isolated and with little choice before they gain enough material resources and an even stronger story.
But such us life. No point in getting depressed over it. Its just thesaga we were born in, eventually a better story will turn up.
Have a lovely day
“Epics and empires”, from the CZcams channel/TikTok channel Nathanology, actually goes over this quite well, summarizing how stories can, in fact, justify conquest by making it divinely ordained, or by tying it into a prized history you want to be a part of. Modern examples that are not long running include the Aryan myth that justified some of Nazi Germany’s stuff, and whatever is being done to convince people that there was an idyllic past in the US that is being snatched from surreptitiously.
It should also be noted that as far as US myths justifying political action goes, US myths are so potent and numerous that at this point the US is a myth made manifest and because of the US being a “leader” in trends, we also drag down the entire world with our myths as well. Yes, they are made to fit in specific countries, but some trends (like corporatist stuff or the right-wing resurgence everywhere) are universal and have the US as a leader for it or at least have some part in it. Heck, even condemning the US for its outstanding wackiness is part of that myth because it allows the lowest of bars people can technically be above.
This channel actually gives good advice that changed my writing instead of just “show don’t tell”. It’s genuinely refreshing when your videos come out. Keep up the good work man. Also I think watchmen is a pretty good movie that takes “hero archetypes” and spins them on their head while also exploring humanity’s darker side.
lol this dude is a Fake:
It is because he believes in the postmodern ideology. The video is more of an activism than a serious analysis. Deconstruction by reducing complexity. In order for his arguments to work, things must be used that can be criticized through selective analysis in order to put in your own views or shortened arguments. If you know this philosophy, then you can see in each of his arguments what he is trying to put in...postmode justice!
Intellectual Impostures - Alan Sokal
@@mmz-entertainment what are you on about? Quit yapping
@@celise605 Everything is fine, follow your hobby ideologues.
@@mmz-entertainment bro what are you saying? I genuinely have no idea what you’re on about at this point
@@celise605this guy is a massive cope
I will never not appreciate the flat-out clarity of your explanations, my dude. Thank you so much. You're using English words with your flesh mouth, like a lot of other people do, but when you say the words next to each other, my brain just fkn gets it for some reason...
You must be the Liscal-Scralpt-Mainb or something. A+
flesh mouth
I loved your use of words in this comment.
Some really interesting ideas here, and I have some core disagreements, though I find a lot of merit in what you have to say here. Archetypes, meaning "First Form" are not so much what Campbell portrays them as. Campbell has some interesting things to say, but overall, he is a second rate thinker, at least in comparison to his forefathers, especially Carl Jung. Campbell, also, only breaks down one type of Mythic story, the masculine Hero's Journey. He doesn't break down Creation Narratives, Deluge Stories, Apocalypses, Goddess mythologies etc. "The Hero with a Thousand Faces" is a fun tool, and there is value in such structuralist thinking, but Campbell simplifies to a level where information starts getting lost.
Jung , in his book, "Archetypes of the Collective Unconscious" (A far better analysis on the human mind, and structuralist concepts) argues that Archetypes are something like the organs of the Collective Unconscious, that we can't really get at. We will never know the archetypes in their full form, because we cannot comprehend them in their vastness of applicability. Therefore, we only recognize Archetypes by seeing things like them in dreams or in narrative found in myths and stories. In my opinion, a writer shouldn't use archetypes to structure their characters, the collective unconscious already puts that structure onto the characters we create. When we try to use things like Campbell's Hero's Journey, or Jung's archetypes to make characters and structure stories, they will always come out as one note. Myth can help us understand stories after the fact, but these archetypes and patterns emerge on their own because Archetypes are omnipresent in the human mind.
Dune's author, Frank Herbert, fell into this trap by making his core characters reflections of Jung's core Archetypes. Paul the Individual who seeks integration, Jessica the Great Mother, Leto the Great Father, Jamis is the Trickster, Chai is the Anima, Alia is the child/maiden, etc. While this gives Dune a lot of depth and room for analysis, it makes smaller characters like Chani, fall a bit flat. I think therefore, that Villeneuve's changes are well reasoned, and help with certain character's depth.
The core disagreement I have with your video is your characterization on past culture's Mythologies. (Full disclosure I study World Mythologies in University, so I'm not totally unbiased) The ancients who told and retold the stories of Perseus or Gilgamesh, etc. they did not make those stories based on some Campbellian ideal of what a Hero's story should be, they constructed characters that spoke to them culturally and individually. It just so happens that those character's stories tapped into the collective unconscious, the home of archetypes, and therefore, were able to speak to them and us, regardless of time and place.
I think what you respond to negatively are artificially made archetypes, and rightly so, but characters who genuinely tap into archetypal concepts, do so unconsciously, and therefore seem more genuine and compelling. I think what you are doing, breaking down the enneagram types and trying to make compelling characters who connect to the story in meaningful ways, that is the right way to go about it. But hopefully, in doing that, you will stumble on something that looks like the immortal pattern of the archetypes.
We can't outgrow archetypes, but hopefully we may stumble upon something that looks like them.
Most people just cite Jung when they talk about Archetypes but don't use an actual Jungian perspective and use a Victorian pre-Jungian definition of the term instead. They aren't wrong about Archetypes in the most commonly understood use of the word since Jung is just one of many writers on the topic but they are wrong to bring Jung to add pseudo-legitimacy to pre-Jungian or at best post-Jungian conceptions.
Then there are people who say Jung when they mean Mircea Eliade and have no idea that inspite of being friends who discussed their ideas those two did not actually have compatible perspectives on anything. Cambell and Eliade weren't wrong to use Archetypes their way they were just thinkers who took some inspiration from Jung without being Jungians but get mislabled anyway leading to people mis-citing Jung on ideas that go back decades before Freud and Jung started seriously looking into mythology after returning from their trip to America.
Jungian archetypes work for character creation if you're telling a psycho-analytic story where each character isn't meant to represent an entire person. The problem is when writers unconsciously misuse techniques from that kind of story telling when the audience is expecting a drama or ensemble adventure story.
I'm not a fan of using Jung to examine mythology but will admit that there are some stories it does help with. Freudian mythological readings are probably under-rated and have a similar hit rate while also being just inapplicable at times.
"People doing people things" is my writing ethos. Nobody ever sets out to do evil, aside from anomalous psychopaths that just don't go far and usually end their journey in jail because their pathology for cruelty makes them short-term thinking and stupid. No, most evil starts out as good, highjacking the human desire to work together for something greater, whatever it is. Of course we have to fight the The Other, why, they are not like Us and want us to stop being Us and be the Other, and we're just good lil' guys wanting to be left alone. And this is fine and heroic even, up to a certain point.
But this is also why I think Campbell's archetypes aren't yet destined for the garbage can. Because even though it's not necessarily great writing or fully universal, people DO think like this. They DO like to boil things down to simple good vs evil narratives, they DO want a simple view of the world because unending deluge of complexity just doesn't feel good to our monkey brains. To have every action, every news, everything we see and hear to be constantly scrutinized and weighed and measured against whether it's true, good, necessary - it's just too much. It's why youthful activism often ends in a depressive, anxiety-ridden spiral. We just can't deal with problems that we cannot directly influence with measurable, visible results. With time, we burn out if we keep coasting on ideals alone - so our brains spare our sanity. They detach us from reality, they try to save that critical capacity for stuff we deal with in our personal lives, our imminent dangers, and replace the people on the world stage with caricatures and mythical thinking to "solve" those issues and put them away in a box of stuff we don't have to think too hard about.
And that's why Dune book series is so damn good. Perhaps too cynical at times, perhaps a product of its time in others, but it does scratch at that very uncomfortable human truth - we really do crave a messiah. We really just want a charismatic leader that does what we think is good and right, and feel good being accepted by that leader. But such people are not real, can never be real. These evangelized leaders are just men - they are flawed, they are sometimes irrational, they are often fallible, and they can never ever live up to some fantasy ideal people have created in their heads, least of all because to each person that ideal of a leader is completely different! That is why any historical character-based movement really takes off long after the glorious leader is dead and buried, when they can be safely held away from the mundane fallibilities of man.
I can't wait for Dune Messiah. Right next to God-Emperor, it's my favorite part of Dune. It's probably the most human depiction of struggling with the hero myth, cult of personality, hero-worship and finally succumbing to it, despite one's best efforts. Deep down inside, despite our rational thoughts and arguments, we all desire for that Voice from the Outer World that will guide us to Paradise, that will give our personal struggle the worth we've always secretly felt, place it at the center of the universe and acknowledge it with divine grace. And what's a small little atrocity or two if it's for that glorious ideal? It's not an atrocity, really, the Other deserved it anyway, right, and really when you think about it, it's for their own good... so no harm done at all, quite the opposite!
Great video, can't wait to see the final character design flowchart.
What you’ve written in your second paragraph is something I thought a lot about lately. People don’t like black-white characters, it’s almost always criticized when a modern story features a clearly evil and a clearly good side. However in real life people feel the constant need to put real life people and situations in these neat little black and white boxes. Just look at the political discourse surrounding the recent wars: There’s always a good side and a bad side and very little nuance. While the world isn’t black and white, and people know it isn’t, they’re are still seeing it through black and white tinted glasses. Your take makes a lot of sense to me.
@@c.s2193 Yeah, definitely, and I think it's something derived from what Local has touched on in the past - characters aren't people.
With fiction, we have the time and luxury to just put it down, take our time with it, go through it again and again to really get into why this character does this, what makes them tick and so on. In real life, we just don't have that luxury - at best, we have crumbs of incomplete, yet "good enough" information and then we try and piece it together as much as the pace of events allows. In fiction, we can rewind, and read up supplemental material, and discuss, and re-watch or re-read it again with new information in mind, seeing more. We have the author's intent in mind, we have discourse surrounding the work, we have the other works that are influencing this one... There is a lot of voluntary depth to fiction that we may engage with at our own volition.
So it well may be that people do love complexity - it's just that they settle with black/white thinking when they are pressed for time, attention or both. The more stressful and harsh the days, the less we care about nuance and just want to get through the day. Fiction ultimately has to make sense and mean something - whereas our real life often has truly bizarre events without rhyme or logic in their pointless tragedy.
Damn good comment. Saving this to my journal, thanks!
@@c.s2193 Compulsive fence-sitting is another type of evil.
Campbell is leaning pretty Buddhist by the end of the book. Far from talking good vs. evil, he's describing the "apotheosis" step of the hero's journey as being about dissolving the division between the two. The ogre-father and goddess-mother are the same entity. The fully realized hero basically gets enlightened.
It's dubious that the stories Campbell analyzed were actually about that, (except for the story of the Buddha, which definitely was,) but I find it more interesting than the simplified version you get on most of the flowcharts.
Another local script man banger! The love interest in the Hero's journey reminds me (and is probably one of the first examples of) the Satellite character, whose entire existence revolves around another character. When it comes to more major characters, this is a problem, and its something i worry about creating
The satellite charactwe can, in my honest opinion do well, as long as they actually are a CHARACTER. If that's a story you want to tell, I'd day tell it. Just make sure that character stays consistent. For an example, I'll use Sakura, a character from Naruto. Sakura is in love with Sasuke, and that's about 80% of her character in one sentence. 10% goes to being a friend of Naruto, the main character, and another 10% to being helpful to people in need. And that could be okay, if that's what you were TRYING to do. But if your point is that she's an independent person who has drives and goals, she's been characterized horribly and the people in her life take precedence over everything she ever said or could have said. So long as Satellite is a personality trait and not a description of the character as a whole, you can do great things.
I know a great satellite character IRL. the spouse is a functional member of society, intelligent, knowledgeable, empathic and social. a soft wonderful person who I describe as a fairy to my friends.
their partner is a mess. cant keep a job, mentality unstable, withdrawer and completely dependent on their spouse. like to the point you ask them a question and they look at the spouse to figure out how to answer. some people refer to this person as 'the troll'
here's what makes the dynamic great. the 'car-crash in slow-mo' has had so many job they can do everything to some degree, having had a violent background they are martial as hell and because of their dependence on the spouse exabit the kind of loyalty one only sees in movie archetypes.
They also live in a country that was, for years, the crime capitol of the world. in the city that was until very recently the worlds murder capitol.
so what you have is a fairy who makes no sense in the context of their world, being watched over by a devoted troll who cant function in that world but suits it.
I actually saw the troll spend 4 hours sanding down their metal gate because the fairy cut her hand on it.
so a couple that together and individually, sounds like a terrible idea, that's has and continues to function and flourish for over 30 years now.
@@tsk5328 while this is interesting to learn about, I feel you shouldn't apply tropes to real people. The reason a character is a satellite character is that they were written as some other character's friend/family member/love interest/etc. without considering what they'd be on their own. All motivations relate to the other character, and since they are a fictional character, that means they never existed at a point where they lived life with this other character, as characters only exist when they are onscreen/written to exist. Real people, on the other hand, exist as soon as they're born, and their personality is shaped by their life experiences. No matter how clingy and dependent the spouse is, they were not created solely to be the other person's spouse, and there was a point in their life where the two hadn't met.
@@Wince_Media I thought that a point so obvious it did not need to be said, but good catch, the internet is vast and in any if its proven anything stupidity is far more common than anyone ever though.
i'm glad you just helped me avoid adding to any stereotypes.
ps. ever heard the stereotype song?
I can never tell is it acts against or further spreads them xD
@@tsk5328 I remember listening to the stereotype song and hating it lol. While the song is explicitly against stereotypes (one of the lyrics literally said "if you think these stereotypes are true you are dumb"), it still enforced them for comedy (when, for the most part, the singers werent targets of any of these stereotypes), and you can see a TON of the comments saying "yknow what they say about stereotypes, there's always some truth to them!" (Despite the song itself saying otherwise), so I'd argue it's both. While the singer/band is against these stereotypes and has a line of lyrics stating as such, 90% of the song is just "hey look a stereotype isn't that funny?" While many of the people laughing are laughing because of "its funny because it's true". Also keep in mind that, for people who are targets of said stereotypes, they've most certainly heard it before because they've probably been ridiculed based on said stereotypes.
cool to see someone else talk about the Enneagram, it's a great tool that I agree has been mishandled
Heavily commodified yes, but it’s legit the most helpful tool I’ve ever encountered and I wish people didn’t immediately brush it off
@@localscriptman Yo, have you ever read Jeff Kitchen's book "Writing a Great Movie"? He has an entire chapter about enneagram there, and if i may, i wanna hear about your opinion about his writing book if you ever continue the " Not all writing book are created equal" Series' part 2 or 3 or whatever.
I think you've undersold the character work of Star Wars. Luke is not just trying to help people. From the very start we're told he wants action, that at some level he wants to do all of it because it's COOL and he's bored out of his mind in his literal hole in the ground, and because he's probably attracted to his sister, and after episode V because of his hate for and denial of his father. This leads to him being over eager in his training rather than actually waiting until he is ready to help people. And having Luke be the protagonist is the perfect set up to then reveal that the central arc wasn't even his but Anakin's. Luke and Darth Vader and even Palpatine are more than archetypes. There are reasons that Willow or even LotR or Dune aren't Star Wars, beyond the music and the designs.
In the book, Paul does worry about the blind hero worship of Stilgar.
Thank you
It's nice to encounter areas where I *don't* agree with you, because your writing advice has been some of the most helpful *because* you're so different from me and you say things that my own brain doesn't but which I need to hear. Like treating this as a job and a business and a craft rather than getting lost in the art and the vibes and the love. I write stories about universal human drives, or at least even if that's not literally true, the vast majority of everyone experiences some form of survival instinct and sexual attraction, and large swaths of the population will resonate with it. So it was interesting to notice how entirely you discount those as 'like boring bro,' and more importantly why, which you articulate excellently.
Well, mostly. Implying that Star Wars is easy to write and that the only reason it got popular instead of a million others is like marketing or whatever is peak, well, marketing brain. No wonder you have disdain for the idea of appealing to the audience. I would ofc agree that seeing people as humans is way better than as avatars of light or possessed by demons, I'm a materialist as well, and that is distressingly far from a universal opinion IRL, but your categorical disdain of archetypal stories as if that has to follow logically is just a crying shame. It just reeks of the same sublime arrogance of like a 1950s sci-fi writer saying that we will 'outgrow' the concept of religion or whatever the hell.
I'm much more of an escapist, like many creatives you've seen online, and there's a lot of ways where I don't *want* stories to reflect reality or how things really are, I hate that shit. Or at least could really use a break sometimes, and that includes power fantasies and wish fulfillment for days. But at the same time there has to be that connection back to humanity, the part that does read as true. Not really here to argue you into adoring Luke Skywalker's journey or whatever, just to sound off and say that I always find it deeply moving and resonant, and in fact more psychological than many people give it credit, obligatory shout out to So Uncivilized, but also that the archetypal part calls to me too.
Your work is a great lesson in how creative output comes from someone's worldview and philosophy though, and how to recognize that, analyze it, try and express one's own worldview that same way. It's a thing that just happens with stories, but like a lot of the subjects you cover, better to be conscious and deliberate about it. Discovering your channel is one of the big reasons I'll ever actually end up writing something that I can feel proud of, because I understand things, myself, all that stuff, thanks for that.
Simple question - after all the philisophisication ... Have you produced anything that sold sufficiently to pay a bill?
Humans interpret reality through internal narrative. Which means that our perception of reality is easily corruptible by stories.
Advocating escapism for escapism’s sake is extremely irresponsible in my opinion.
We do not have the education in place for people to consume irrational information at such a large scale.
The reason why religion is still prevalent is because they are all fine tuned to prey on our internal narratives, and then they set up communities to reinforce said narratives. There is no room to think against it as they have replaced your main tool you use to interpret the world, with one of their own making.
It is peek propaganda.
I think writers should be aware of this and try to occasionally reground their writing in the current agreed upon reality. Whatever that may be.
Going off the deep end into irrationality doesn’t benefit people, it just adds more noise to our fairly primitive information networks.
Some noise is ok, that is how we get innovation. But complete noise is just madness.
No, that's why I'm here trying to get his advice, because Lucas has. Here's one back for you - do you think the only value something has is its price?
@@RoyalFusilier nice clapback
I do respect this comment, and honestly I can agree on several things. However, (comma), I also want to talk about Star Wars here for a brief moment, more specifically the Original Trilogy.
Local / Lucas doesn’t *only* ascribe Star Wars’ success to marketing, and I’ve seen another comment leap to that assumption, so I want to share this response where I can. In fact, Lucas continues on to further explain his point, ultimately saying that what makes the Original Trilogy successful is arguably everything *but* character depth. And that’s okay by him.
I like Luke Skywalker, but largely in the same way I like Gawain from the medieval narrative poem Sir Gawain and the Green Knight. There’s a connection we can have to Gawain and his struggles, but the interiority of his person is unexplored and does not influence the nature of the poem in any significant way. That’s cool, the story doesn’t have to hinge on his depth as a character.
But Lucas deals in characters, in their nuances and dimensions - for his work as a writer and consultant he applies totally different constraints than he does as an audience member or reader (something he mentions in other videos, although I forget how long ago this was said). If he doesn’t take his stand on this front, then he won’t have a process that’s cohesive or self-contained. And as with all significant choices, there will be those who agree and those who don’t. I’m glad you’re honest and respectful about your own views here.
As for me, I don’t always agree and I cannot make use of his own process from start to submitted story, but I’m fond of his smooth directness in these videos and his decisive approach. The ever-present «human condition» is fun, but there’s a tension between the universal and the specific that must be pulled both ways to see the gamut of our stories.
Also, I’m glad to see someone who is a self-described escapist that doesn’t completely misunderstand those that aren’t so, or aren’t to the same extent.
You're totally on point with Neo. I used to be confused about breaking The Matrix down because it's very blunt and yet very subtle at the same time. I've always believed that Neo's flaw is that he needs to have control of his life, which is in contradiction to "you're the one, just because".
He even states it "I don't like the fact that I'm not in control of my life".
It's having FAITH in a greater destiny vs self-determination and CONTROL over your own life (a stark comparison in Morpheus and his team are putting their faith over a prophecy against the logical machine like enemy that controls humanity).
Neo says at the all or nothing moment;
-"Morpheus did what he did because he believes something I'm not." ... "Morpheus believes in something and he was ready to give his life, I understand that now. That's why I have to go. Because I believe in something. I believe I can bring him back. "
He proves this change when he challenges the agents(which he is told not to do) because "he's starting to believe".
"If you can write a Theoden, you can write an Aragorn."
This is a funny statement, as these characters are similar by design, and employed in a complementary way to explore themes of duty and leadership.
Denethor is too, but only for the benefit of the reader.
Aragorn's character arc only reaches its conclusion thanks to Theoden influencing him.
Theoden is afraid to lead, because he compares himself to his greater forefathers.
Aragorn does not want to lead, because his ancestor failed.
Denethor is unwilling to let anyone but himself lead, because none are capable in his eyes.
Denethor tragically fails.
Theoden tragically succeeds.
The story concludes with Aragorn, who steps up to do his duty.
LotR is a great story, and there are many stories within it, this being one of them.
It seems you have changed your mind on how complex characters *should* be in a story,
judging by this video compared to the utilitarian way you talked about character writing in your Avatar video.
("But they are one-dimensional." ... "So? Did you think that characters in a story were supposed to be realistic?")
I saw a video about creating fictional mythologies recently and it brought up an interesting point about epics vs fables. It described fables as tending to be focused on deeper moral questions and relaying a message to the audience, such as with Hansel and Gretel, whereas epics are more focused on entertainment through grand adventures, just like the Odyssey.
And I think this thinking can be further extend to modern fiction: the "epics" would be more archetypal stories, such as Star Wars as you brought up here, and the "fables" would be more in line with what you tend to preach about on your channel: deep moral complexity as an anchor to character behaviour and development.
I just think it's interesting to look at how such different types of stories can attract different people, as one might be praised for its more "objective" storytelling, what with character arcs and deep themes and whatnot, but another could be loved for just being a simple yet entertaining hero's journey.
A lot of fables are still pretty short and simplistic though. They're telling a clear message about what's correct.
The destruction of the archetype is itself an archetype. The archetype of "breaking the stone tablets."
People hear and talk a great dealabout archetypes without understanding what Jung actually meant by them and have a very narrow perspective on them as "patterns."
Jung defined the entire universe as what the collective unconscious looks liek from the point of view of consciousness. The collective unconscious is the totality of all instincts; all archetypes.
So, no -- if you go by the Jungian understanding of what an archetype is, the only way to outgrow or exist in any way independent of archetypes would be leave the universe.
Yeah idk about Jung this is more about Campbell’s model, the literature-heads are definitely gonna get on me about the title, might change it
@@localscriptman Tbh I always hated archetypes in general, because I too believe they limit the writers. Let's leave archetypes to those Jungian readers and stick to our core belief models, those are much more fun
@@minanikolic1456 Archetypes are by definition limitless, and there are an infinite number of archetypal stories and characters that can be grouped into larger archetypal patterns. Archetypes are to be read into after the fact, they shouldn't be part of the writing process, they should emerge naturally.
@@LucasGonzalez-rj9bk Yeah, exactly. That's why they should be left to readers to think about :)
Yeah Jung and Campbell are very different people who are talking about completely different things. Campbell archetypes are incredibly restrictive and do not cover the totality of all instincts.
Local script man make a video without mentioning the ennneagram theory challenge: impossible
I think my issue with Chani is that she changes more than any other character. Villeneuve moving things around or adjusting a few traits is one thing, but her characterization is so far removed from her book version that I struggle to think of her as Chani.
I can still recognize Stilgar, Jessica, Feyd, Irulan, Leto, even Jason Momoa's Duncan, but I don't see Chani. I just Zendaya dating Paul for a while and then breaking up.
I also don't think making a love interest "interesting" necessarily means they have to fight and dramatically break up. Not that they can't have conflict, but I seriously think people have an all or nothing approach to writing romantic relationships. For example, the idea that your wife is in love with you and also *worships* you is an uncomfortable enough moral conflict in itself that could've been interesting to explore.
I agree with your first point about the hero's journey but I think the whole "star wars didn't catch on in china" critique is sort of misleading. The war of the stars didn't catch on in China because China wasn't able to watch Star Wars until 2015. It hasn't had nearly the same amount of time and discussion that it has in western society because we've had it for almost 50 years and they've had it for less then 10. Still an awesome video, just wanted to bust a common misconception.
im so happy you reminded me that i forgot to assign enneagrams to my current project's cast. time to pull out my old giant ass enneagram books and get into note taking study mode ig 😭
Do it for the (ennea)gram 😤
I have indeed been giving types to all my characters now, it's startling the number of times they match up even before I knew what them inner grams was.
Why did Luke Skywalker cry when he found out Darth Vader was his father? Because that's the dad he never knew, and his human need to be close to his father was part of the reason he wanted to become a Jedi. Finding out the symbol of everything he's hated for three years is, under the mask, the man he tried to pattern himself off of hit him where it hurts most. Why did Luke Skywalker want to save him? Cause that's still his dad. Why'd he do that and not something else? Because he's the hero archetype. I think you can write archetypes as humans you just need to be tricky about it.
It's a fair point, but archetypes are just so satisfying, especially in escapists stories. I love a good human story, but if I want to escape and go on a fun adventure, give me my archetypes!
And you can swap in and out archetypes and complex humans for narrative purposes, like a person has become so much an apotheosis that they are an archetype, or that they are too dedicated to a job, or it is a way of showing they fall to evil or something like madness/thrall/brainwashing. Or that they want to bring about a new world so badly, or to demonstrate they are an apotheosis’s opposite.
An escapist story is just a human story with a corny moral like "the power of friendship," or "never give up on your dreams."
Meh. I don't think having more archetypal characters really makes stories more fun for me.
I had a stick lodged deep up my ass when I was typing this.
You are single handedly getting me back into personality typing with your yapping about the enneagram
I think there's room for both. I watched Marriage Story recently and it was extremely realistic, but I wouldn't want to watch that kind of movie all the time. There's times you want a cheesy romcom where everyone is happy, and ideal love is real.
When Star Wars came out in the 70s lots of movies were gritty and depressingly realistic. By creating a heroic, idealistic fantasy it captured the imagination of a generation.
Comedies like Friends where everyone is far more quick-witted than real life - I'd rather watch that than a divorce drama. There's room for both the real and the ideal in fiction.
Those aesthetic differences don't contradict what he's saying about character writing. You can write a light hearted, feel good romantic comedy with the same tools.
I think this video is interesting, but I also disagree with several assumptions you seem to have in it. It's way too much to go into a CZcams comment, tho.
Suffice it to say, I think you understand the archetype well enough on its own, but you don't understand the proper, broader context in which to put that knowledge. Just the fact that you can't bring yourself to find the utility in it should be a sign you're missing something. It's good that you're getting deeper into character psychology though, I've always found that interesting, and you've got a knack for explaining what you mean in simple terms! But also, your understanding of morality as something completely external that we add onto our thoughts and motivations after the fact is just wrong; you'd need to get deeper into the philosophy of ethics for that subject, also super complicated for a CZcams comment. However, good vs. evil is a fundamental human concept for a reason, and things like selfless love is a fundamental good in both the Western Christian and the Eastern Buddhist circles. And it's not an external thing, it's a state of being, of mind, almost like a psychological format.
Humans are very indeed complicated, and yes we're understanding more all the time, but complicated isn't always useful. Our thoughts, feelings, and motivations as we grow older can often become so complicated that we get in our own way of accomplishing what we want. Being too "morally grey" can make us blind to the good that would help use get our way, and blind to the negatives that make our lives harder.
Archetypes aren't supposed to be real characters, nor are they an exploration of real-world psychology, they're supposed to be purified representations of certain facets of human psychology, and what those parts of us should be (there's "being" again). It's sort of a way of cleaning house, mentally. Archetypes aren't generic because the ancients didn't understand humanity, they're generic because they're more like depictions of different individual parts of our psyche without clouding the picture with too many complicated interactions. More complicated than that, but close enough.
Also, yes the Hero's Journey is male specific, everyone knows that, but I'm curious if you are aware there's actually a female specific version?
"The feminine journey is about going down deep into soul, healing and reclaiming, while the masculine journey is up and out, to spirit." - Maureen Murdock. (Spirit, in case you didn't know, is not some mystical thing, it's just a reference to being.)
I do not get why people say the Hero's Journey is male specific when most men do not go through life slaying evil monsters. It seemed like an dramatization that can be applied to the simplest mundane things and applied to anyone.
@@s.ivainesu There's more than one reason, but basically it's because it's told from the male's perspective of wanting to be a hero. That's why it's called "hero's journey." If you think about it, you could make the hero's journey even more generic than it already is so that it could apply to any old mundane thing: face problem, not want to face problem, do it anyways, overcome problem even through pain, return successful. But it actually doesn't do that.
How is traveling to the underworld part of overcoming some simple problem with a little drama thrown in?
No, it's not about the problem you're overcoming, it's about overcoming something "important" enough that it makes you feel like a hero, especially in the eyes of a "maiden" and in the eyes of society. A woman is more likely to challenge what she doesn't like about society than she is to risk her life for it just because she has something to prove. That's very much a male perspective.
@@davidpo5517 I thought women were often the most conformists to the ideas of their people/family/nations, at least in the real world. In stories, characters like Mulan, Katara from Avatar and Éowyn from LoTR, all risk their lives, despite the resistance from the status quo, to protect those whom they love; while males characters are more so concerned with changing the status quo, while going through strong flows and challenges of identity and self-worth all that.
Can you list me some stories that you'd say go for that perspective of yours instead? I am curious.
I'd like to point out I agree with everything else you've written though.
@@iug5672 I'm not sure, you'd have to explain more of what you mean, I think. I don't remember Katara well enough cuz it was years ago, but to me Eowyn and Mulan are good examples of what I was referring to. Both of their stories start with them defying social norms, not conforming. I don't quite see how you think otherwise. Men wanting to go off to war is conforming.
Status quo just means the way things are. Both men and women are concerned with changing the status quo, with changing how things currently are, because that's what story depends on.
I'll try to give more examples once I get what you're saying.
@@davidpo5517 They don't really seek to change the status quo (except maybe Katara?), they just want to defend their homes and way of life, despite the fact that it is not what's asked for them.
They go into battle to defend the status quo, despite the status quo, because they stand against an evil power seeking to corrupt it. There is not really a rejection of the call of duty, like it is often the case in male's stories, because there is no call of duty from them -- but they wish to go regardless.
Definitely agreed about archetypes and the Hero's Journey. I remember being really into them in my earlier fiction writing days, and I recently came across them again. But yeah, beyond being occasionally helpful food for thought, they're unfalsifiable concepts.
That said, I think it's allure comes down to how prescriptive it is. I've been trying to make sense of Kenneth Burke's work on the Dramatistic Pentad, and - while it feels super accurate and not *nearly* as pseudoscientific as MBTI, Jung, and the like - it's built up as more of a retrospective, diagnostic tool than a way to chart out what should come next, or how character's are likely to respond, and in what sequence.
While having more complex characters is always more interesting and 'deep', it would be a mistake to say that they are necessarily better. I would argue that stereotypes play important roles in culture. They make understanding the world easier.
I like to think Christopher Walken just talks to aliens on the regular.
I think I'll always remember sitting back after Dune 2 in awe of how fresh and alive the characters and every interaction and line of dialogue was. Chef's kiss!
LocalScriptMan and returning at the best possible time for me to continue my writing, name a more iconic duo.
At this point I might have to make my own video explaining why star wars (outside of the very first film) is not a simple story about good vs evil. Its highly character driven and I would say breaks several typical archetypes of the time and we just forgot because we've been around the movies for so long. I'm aware this was a small part of the video but I get tilted everytime someone says it. I wont rant about it here but the long in short of it is that star wars only seems to be about external struggle whilst is actually about internal struggle.
"Lucas isn't telling stories about good and evil people - he's telling stories about people who can *choose* the light or the dark." - So Uncivilized, the GOAT
I was definitely gonna say!! I'm nowhere near as versed as this topic demands (I'll take up RoyalFusilier's _So Uncivilized_ recommendation) but for all the ~Vague Evilness~ Palpatine represents, he also does a damn good job finding not "tangential" but _specific_ insecurities in both Skywalkers (and in macro, the failing Republic).
Also I'm reasonably sure Luke has Opinions, although it's 3am and it's hard to articulate past "hates being called Wormie" and "sees Empire pilot academy as a necessary evil to get off planet" so I'll have to come back with a better understanding of these things later
@@CelestiaLily well he sure has a much higher opinion of attachment than the other Jedi. He was willing to risk everything on the chance that there might be something redeemable in his father. He basically bet his life on the thought that he could resist the dark more than his dad could resist the light. And it almost didn't work. People can frame his choice in the end as easy but it really wasn't. Palatine's ultimatum was basically "kill me and all this ends. You get everything you want, save your friends and the rebellion." All he had to do was compromise his principles and guess what, if Vader hadn't stepped in, he would cut that old man down. He was about to fail the test. He even nearly kills the father he came there to save. Only after being confronted with the fact that his father had walked this same path as him but chose wrong does he finally turn around and let go of anger and choose mercy. And that mercy is what motivates Vader to finally turn back and save his son. Now someone try and tell me those aren't some dang fine character arcs.
Now knowing that Luke was on the precipice of failing even his own appointed goal of saving his father actually justifies Luke almost killing Ben Solo. He certainly has a very large capacity to do good, but he never is as resolute as he can be.
Not sure if stories are meant to be fully realistic, or if characters are meant to be fully human. Archetypes are part of the language of storytelling, and the realism enters the story as any other theme would. Without types, stories are just rambling and characters are just animals
This video has so few views compared to your others, and I just wanna say that this video and all of your other ones have helped me so much in my understanding of storytelling. - Unfortunately I think this is a case of the algorithm being shit, and that really sucks cause this is awesome.
I loved the books, so take this with a grain of salt, but I did not care for the Chani rewrites at all. Denis makes her a more dynamic character in the film, but there's no on-screen characterization to make it believable or even endearing.
In the book, Chani initially distrusts Paul because she is cautiously xenophobic, and bonds with him over recently losing their fathers. She gets called a doormat by a lot of readers, but her loyalty and outwardly obedient nature are supposed to reflect how rigid and communal the Fremen society was. She had major objections, doubts, and fears, but only criticized Paul in private, because acting on emotions/impulses in public might risk stability, and ultimately, survival. That kind of self-discipline is the mark of a good leader or follower, and it makes readers/viewers respect a character if you do it right. It also reinforces the theme of survival, making the world of the Fremen feel very real.
In the movie, Chani distrusts Paul because "erm if supernatural real why colonialism happen." There's no caution to her xenophobia, and she never entertains changing her mind about Paul. He is an off-world "white savior" (Denis practically screams this from Zendaya's mouth in the first act) and the only reason she bonds with him is because apparently no one can resist the Timmy Smolder. There is no dead dad bonding because Denis recast the father as an unrelated woman with 30 seconds of screentime, which was essential for some reason. Apparently, a handful of 3min cuts of them doing googly-eyes at one another was a more compelling script than "our fathers both died, we are being killed by a mutual enemy, let's set aside our differences and do a scene or two where we learn to work together." Also, movie Chani is outwardly insubordinate, repeatedly trashes her people's religion and elders, and diminishes the Fremen's image as a unified, self-disciplined society. It feels very 2020s, and it's immersion-breaking.
Most importantly, Chani's biggest conflict with Paul in the film is that he played up his supernatural religious role (which is literally the truth, he is the supernatural being the Fremen think he is) to organize her people enough to defeat a mutual enemy, which, for the record, has been ruthlessly massacring them for hundreds of years while they squabble over "fundamentalism," which is not explained ever. It's not enough for Paul to make the omelette, Chani wants him to do it while keeping the eggs intact.
Audiences don't need to be handheld, but there are very few dots to connect for why Chani does anything in the movie. She just comes off as selfish, pouty, immature, and susceptible to twink rizz. If I were rewriting Chani to make her more dynamic, I'd have Paul do literally anything objectionable in the first act and put them in a situation requiring them both to hash it out. Instead, it's just a succession of scenes where Paul makes necessary, morally icky decisions while Zendaya seethes in the background because it's not unfolding like a Disney movie.
Artistic merit is not dependant on realism.
That doesn't just mean visual style, it also applies to character psychology.
Efficient writing beats realistic writing when it comes to impact and simple, archetypal characters are often highly efficient.
I also don't understand why people keep talking about "complexity" like it's a good thing.
You obviously want to minimize complexity.
“An idiot admires complexity, a genius admires simplicity.” ― Terry Davis
While i do think the campbellian model of archetypes is a bit over used and large void of depth.
Archetypes themselves prove useful because they prime the audience with certain expectations that can be explored in interesting ways.
If i say the words: orphan boy, magic sword, wizard. A story shape is already taking place in your mind and certain expectations that can be leaned into and or subverted.
The book dune has all the beats of the chosen one storyline but nothing happens for the traditonal reasons. The chosen one is formed from careful eugenics and superior training. The signs of his coming have been planted by missionaires whom have trained their operatives to manipulate for their gain. The princess isnt married in earnest but as a poltiical manoeuvre.
The reason why I dislike movie chani is that she speaks like a real 21st century western person, and not like a backwards fremen. She does not fit the story. On what grounds would a word like "fundamentalist" leave her lips? What frame of reference does she have for any other way of life, or alternate means of government? The fundamentalist tribe and the non fundamentalist tribe spend their days doing 99% of the same things. Conserve water, fight harkonen and hide, the difference being one prays more than the other. Thats it. Chani has critiques on fremen culture, knowledge that the religion is poisoned by bene gesserit propaganda, knows the concept of propoganda, and objections to Paul's demonstrably (by fremen standards) competent rule. But this is also a person that doesnt believe there are worlds with abundant water🤷🏿♂️
I think a mixture of both types would be good. Not every story needs to be a to be a deep dive into the human psyche. I think simple characters about good and evil will always have a certain appeal. With that said I would like a ton of story that don't just follow archetypes.
That outro throat singing goes hard. Imma need the sauce.
it's the sadaukar scene from Dune 1
There's also like 10 hour versions out there if you need background noise or something
Lofi humborogir to chill/study/slay the emperor's enemies to
Hard to see Star Wars' success came from marketing, since I think there's been at least 5 other movies that have also been marketed that people didn't really like still.
Local/Lucas doesn’t use marketing in the literal ‘this is advertisement’ sense, but also other manners of promotion like fan hype and word-of-mouth - and nor does he say that it’s *only* due to marketing, because he continues on to make the point that what makes Star Wars (and especially the Original Trilogy) popular is arguably everything *but* character depth. It’s a space opera in perhaps the most literal sense, a newer epic inspired by older tales and paying homage to these works of archetype that came before it in a setting both familiar and otherworldly at the same time. We can love OT Luke, but he’s more akin to Gawain in the medieval poem Sir Gawain and the Green Knight than to Oskar Schindler in Schindler’s List.
Does that clarify things? I hope so!
@@jonharker9028 that is not what was said in the video - also the 'it is not hard to write Luke' makes 0 sense otherwise everyone would do it - dude sounds like he doesnt respect the craft.
I'm hella hyped for your common sense enneagram video, after your first one I went down the rabbit hole and even stooped as low as reading a BOOK (Character & Neurosis) about it.
You are overly simplifying book Chani.
Granted, she is not *that* complex. But she is more complicated than you give her credit for, in regards to what she is to the story.
She is not merely a Campbellian non-descript female presence that only serves a role in regards to the hero.
She is the counterpart to Stilgar. This is to the point of them being almost identical characters.
They are archetypes. Archetypal Fremen. All Fremen are archetypal in the first book, and Chani and Stilgar are how Paul, and the reader, gets to know them.
They give the reader the greatest breadth of insight into what it means to be Fremen. (Perserverence, Faith, Pride, attitude of the knife, etc.)
Mindset is what makes the Fremen, and that this story is largely about mindset, is what is shown in the first introduction to the story by Irulan, when she tells the reader that Paul Mua'dib, although not born on Arrakis, is *of* Arrakis.
He has adopted their mindset, and thereby their strength. He is Fremen (mindset) first, and Paul (upbringing) second.
Them changing Chani, from a deeply faith-based character into a sceptic, will have them run into hurdles in terms of world-building in the next movie.
In the second book, any religious dissenter is thrown in prison or murdered. Mua'dib is the godhead.
Chani though has plot armor, so the whole society in the story needs to be changed around her to accomodate her not believing in the Mahdi.
Additionally, if Chani is a non-believer, this lack of uniformity in belief on the side of the Fremen implies other non-believers, who would find in her a leader. This is a movement in the making.
And that is not even talking about how she would be motivated to have children with the false messiah who cruelly and dishonestly threw her people into a war under false premises, and destroyed their culture in the process, all for his own gain.
So maybe she will be part of the conspiracy in Dune Messiah? But I see no Children of Dune happening after this set-up.
Perhaps Chani will take the place of blind Paul in Children, and Paul will take the place of Alia? Who knows. It's all very muddled.
I find this change to be a shame.
As a book fan, it feels like they, in taking away her unwavering faith, they have taken away Chani's identity as a Fremen.
At that point in the story of Dune, this attitude feels out of place.
I recently re-watched Kingdom of Heaven, and having that entire movie in medieval Jerusalem not show a single faithful christian, felt similarly out of place.
Chani is a badass in the book. As unforgiving as a sandstorm.
Many wish to duel Paul, before he rises to be leader. She kills many of them. Not to protect him, but simply because it has to be done. (Fremen mindset right there)
She did not *have* to be changed, and I think she *should* not have been.
1:27 why did you stop, it already began😂
I never actually interpreted the Hero's Journey as a character archetype, but as a story archetype. Grated it's still erroneously treated like The One And Only Story That Can Be Told, but it strikes me as the type of story that many different kinds of characters with many different levels of depth could slot into. If it's being used as a character template, that's not going to lead to very compelling characters at all.
Stilgars charactarization wansnt really an ADDITION by the film, cause that side of him was elaborated on in Dune: Messiah.
I don’t think we’ve outgrown archetypes at all. We’ve just developed different ones for our current era that WE like to take at face value. Because they describe how WE categorize our fellow man. The Virgin, The Chad, The Soyboy, The Chud, The Incel, The Stacy, The Hag (name?). All timeless in our present day relative to us, and so get retroactively applied to the heroes and villains of yesteryear. All developed by our current year conception of psychology and our cultural framework of ultra-relativism.
We’re conforming to these archetypes without even realizing it. We’re at the stage where the archetypes haven’t been deeply and cohesively analyzed because they haven’t been fully formed yet. My guess is that in about twenty years we’re going to get our Joseph Campbel. And a couple decades after that we’ll get another generations of writers who think it’s cool to shit in that guy’s cheerios.
Same shit different generation.
The modern archetypes are that of atheist cynicism. Just look at all the evil Superman stories. Hell, I'm an atheist cynic, but I'm annoyed by how people think stories of heroism and villainy are childish, and how everything's truly good and bad, and how we must all be neutral fence-sitters that don't believe in anything, but if you disagree with radical centrism, you're ironically the only evil. They believe the only sin is acknowledging sin, and these defines their beliefs on storytelling.
@@youcantbeatk7006 You think people don’t think of the Chad as good and the Soyboy as bad? Or the Hag as evil? The answer is yes to all those questions. Don’t get caught up in terminology. The ideas they reference are the same as ever, all that’s changed is the aesthetic. If you don’t like the new aesthetic, well, then you don’t like it.
@@z_is_for_zombie7423 These people with fence-sitting ideologies are the ones who get overly offended by terms like Chad and soyboy, and get wojak content banned.
@14:45 The times change, people don't. That's WHY the past carries so much weight; fact or fiction. That's WHY people look for these universal themes and patterns of behavior. Analogy, archetypes, and storytelling are mediums so flexible that they can still communicate their relative messages even after the facts or context are no longer physically relevant. And if we start thinking we know enough in our modern era to judge which stories were "real," then we risk learning the hard way that even "correct" or "factual" histories are just lies that everyone agrees on.
I didn't know a screenshot could side-eye someone so hard they are murdered. Jiminy Christmas! What an educational video.
[The directors thought about Neo as a character, not an archetype.]
Character is not antithetical to archetype -- in fact, all character are archetypes at the same time -- unless what you and I call "archetypes" are not the same thing.
Your videos have seriously inspired me to start writing and approach character building with more deliberacy.
“As a society are we done with holo archetypes ?”
Five minutes later starts talking about the enneagram types.
For real tho I enjoyed this discussion
very much like this manic episode, it feels like you're building into some big climax about psychology and I'm all here for it yes that's a parallel to story structure I'm very smart
"what is the v-shaped orifice thing, plz explain"
looks inspired by elephant trunks. they can make a large variety of sounds with their trunks and have even been documented imitating human speech
great video as always
6:32 he has several, wdym? People corrupted by the dark side aren’t beyond saving, the Jedi are an institution that must be reinstated, it’s important to have attachments but not let your feelings control you, etc. Was this supposed to be a dunk on Luke Skywalker?
Also, yeah, even in the trashed sequel trilogy the point was made that because Luke thought Ben was beyond redemption, it did, in fact, make Ben beyond redemption because he also viewed the Jedi as hateful people. For all the sequel trilogy throws out, the nuanced usage of the force and how the Jedi do not live up to it are preserved.
end card was peak
I'd argue that the heros journey is another example of confusing aesthetics with substance. In Star Wars Luke doubts his capacity to change the world around him but learns to trust in the forces greater than himself telling him he can, he completes the arc by trusting the force and refusing to kill Vader despite literally every good and evil character telling him he should. In lord of the rings Frodo is forced into this burden of carrying the ring and over the course of the story learns why (the connection between Evil(tm) and power). These stories have very distinct main conflicts despite being the two most obvious examples of the hero's journey I can think of off the top of my head. (That being said I'll admit that these stories are less about the heroes' philosophical struggles than killing the bad guy with a big sword)
I think the hero's journey is more about plot structure than anything. I don't think that it in any way works against having strong characters. But because it's a universal framework for a coherent plot, it allows writers to create a working story around underdeveloped characters/deemphasize the central moral conflict
I love your take on Enneagrams and I hope to see the "Story Themes by Enneagram Type" video soon
16:29 this as an outro theme goes kinda hard not gonna lie.
Doesn't this contradict the "characters aren't people" shtick?
Yes because he has no idea what he's talking about and has a history of taking strong stances on opinions, and then 180ing them later. That's why a lot of his old videos are down.
Keeping track of so many things within a character is the wrong way to create. Traits and characters own story is enough to create.
This guy is creating content for CZcams. And will grossly misguide and confuse a begginer writer.
Awesome rant dude!
The way I always viewed the heroes journey was always more as a model of personal grouth. Grouth not neccesarily in a strict positive sense, but in the "I got myself into a situation outside of my comfort zone, so I had to adapt kind of way."
A character enters the ufamiliar world, faces challenges and comes out as a more fully developed person.
I think the love interest stems from the fact that we historically tend to view "getting the girl" an important part of becoming a man.
With this interpretation, it seams completly compatible with your psychological approach in a lot of cases, but if never actually read "The Hero with a Thousand Faces", so that might just be, because I stripped it down a lot already.
Btw. do you plan on making stuff about the more plot side of things in the future? Im really interested in your insights into things like impactfull reveal of information, changing the dynamics of the story during turning points, as well as setups and payoffs.
If what you say is true, about archetypal stories not having a lot to do with character moments, these aspects are what keeps people engaged. What seperates a good plot from a bad one etc.
your mention of the common sense version of the enneagram that you're working on reminded me of one of my personal grievances about the enneagram (or moreso about the instinctual subtypes) and it's the sexual instinct being called the sexual instinct. it probably wouldn't bug me under alternate circumstances, but it just so happens to be that i am a "sexual" type 6 who is. also literally asexual! so the label just straight up makes no sense for what i am despite the fact that its supposed to describe me. like yeah the sexual instinct isn't *inherently* sexual but that's literally what it's called, which caused so much confusion for me while i was first researching this stuff and it's been awkward as hell to try and explain it to people
so i usually refer to myself as a one-to-one six but that's also a little annoying (albeit significantly less so) because it throws off the abbreviations lmao. as much as i don't like the sexual label it gave us so/sp/sx as the three abbreviations that all kinda match but then you change sx to oto and it just throws the entire groove off!! what the flip!!!
but yeah it doesn't annoy me *that* much i just like to ramble. i've also been working on my own version of the enneagram to send to my friends who i'm working on a writing project with but we'll see about it. good luck on yours!!
(also, big enjoyer of the channel. stay funky fresh king)
I remember reading the hero's journey a decade ago. The first few chapters were interesting. But has the book went on you could see the guy trying everything to bend reality so it would fit his model. A prime example of motivated reasoning.
I that time I couldn't put into words what was wrong. It just seemed like a weak model to me.
Thus I thank you for your very tasty explanation.
Re: Enneagram, what would be really helpful would be a matrix of conflict dynamics between the different personalities.
on god
Love the vids, but I gotta disagree with what you said about archetypes. Carl Jung originally coined the term and described it more as something that emerges from the subconscious depths of human psychology.
It's not a template to be consciously followed by story writers, but rather concepts that naturally arise through stories and myths. The hero's journey is just one. You also have the wise old man, the trickster, the lover, the creator, and many more. These are archetypes that are found across virtually all cultures.
Not all modern stories have each archetype and not every archetype is always explored fully. I think it's actually the subversions of the archetypes that make it more realistic and relatable to people.
I haven't read Campbell's work, but it sounds like he was piggybacking off Jung's ideas, which has much more nuance and substance that can be utilized as a writer than campbells "universal story outline" imo.
It is because he believes in the postmodern ideology. The video is more of an activism than a serious analysis. Deconstruction by reducing complexity. In order for his arguments to work, things must be used that can be criticized through selective analysis in order to put in your own views or shortened arguments. If you know this philosophy, then you can see in each of his arguments what he is trying to put in...postmode justice!
Yeah and then he says "hero's journey just isnt a thing in eastern culture" as if it doesnt have cultivation stories like the sub genre of fantasy china has called xianxia, or journey to the west, etc that all use heros journey lol. Even their Wuxia (martial arts) movies are all hero's journey most of the time.
hell one of the most popular webnovels in china, Lord of Mysteries is heros journey. Same for martial Peak.
This is the first comment I've found down here that I commend the premise of. I think the issue local has encountered here with archetypal character models mirrors that of the issue people take with personality theory models such as the eneagram, in that the general perception of its application leads people to believe that its purpose is to act as a set of rules with which to govern one's understanding of a given subject matter, which is simply not the case, for either.
And obviously I couldn't blame anyone for not seeing that, because that is the perception that it is natural to come to, but I do think that this type of misconception is more common among people who do carry out certain aspects of their lives under the guidance of a set of overarching ideals. (One might give religious folk as an example, but to do that would be in itself a demonstration of the principle, as again, it is simply a misunderstanding of the concept to say that the purpose of religion is to be followed dogmatically, and that thus anyone involved with it is likely to do so.) Essentially, I think people tend to get blindsided by their interpretation of what looks to be a set of rules, and condemn people who champion them under the assumption that they interact with them for the purpose of adhering to them, rather than simply utilizing them. I think once we make the transition to interpreting concretized viewpoints as not things to combat but to take into account as individual ideas, we truly open ourselves up to our ultimate potential for creative thought.
@@jaytopia2924 Even in more popular media, battle shounen is very much hero’s journey. A person who may or may not have powers is thrusted into a weird world. They find their strength, they confront some philosophical conundrum, they make it through with friends and for a philosophical stance. They are enriched, then they live their lives how they want. This is what people think battle shounen is like, and it was like that in 90s-00s, and it is very much hero’s journey.
@@iantaakalla8180 yep
I like archetypes not as some universal truth but a tool to understand how different personalities interact with each other and conflict
Sort of like *pulls out coins*
Movie Stilgar seemingly starts halfway through the arc he takes in the books. (comparatively) He seems like he was always a true believer, and that makes his folly (and the way things unfold for him in Messiah) much less tragic. When this shifts the guilt of the Jihad (slightly)away from Paul, It also undermines the primary theme of the movies, of the dangers of power/cults-of-personality. (Which is just one of many themes explored thoroughly in the books)
I think Campbell works best when applied very very loosely, but I feel like that's its charm. I like to look at it less as a rigid story template and more as a "this is how people adapt" template, because ultimately, that's what a lot of stories do, they show a protagonist adapting to new circumstances. Campbell is the hero that does so in the best possible way.
So to me, Campbell looks a bit like this:
1) To make people seek out change, they must be pushed by an outside force, it's rare for anyone to move on their own accord (Call to Adventure, Crossing the Threshold).
2) There are often many different ways to solve a problem, people naturally gravitate to the deceptively easy one, which will often not solve their problem but make it worse (Temptress).
3) There have been so many people before you, someone is bound to have solved your problem or a very similar one (Mentor).
4) You can't just learn something in theory, you need to put the new thing to the test, and it has to prove itself (Slaying the beast).
5) Learning something new changes your view on the world, and you will see people who haven't learned what you've just learned differently. But you can now be their mentor, when the time comes (Return with the Elixier).
Nothing in this says that anything has to be an epic story about gods and monsters or even maidens to be rescued. All of those can be added to cast the parts into something tangible, but what they are cast as can vary widely. The example I always use is Campbell in the kitchen:
A young man moves out of his parents home to study in another city, but he never learned how to cook, and now he has to provide for himself (Crossing the Threshold). In the beginning he gets by on ordering out every meal (Temptress), until he realizes that his funds are not going to last long like this. He gets himself a cookbook (Mentor) in order to learn how to make a meal for himself that doesn't cost too much. At the same time, he meets a girl and decides to invite her for dinner. Now it's time to show that he actually learned something and can cook a decent meal (Slay the Beast). Later, his younger brother calls, he's just moved to study himself and asks if the protagonist knows any good places to order food from (Return with the Elixier).
Now substitute the girl with his screen writing group he invites for dinner, and it still works, the girl is just a common trope to add stakes to the scene, but it works without her.
And sure, not every story has to be like this, but at the same time Campbell is more than just "slay dragon get girl" to me. It's about growing in the face of adversity, in whichever form that may come.
Now it doesn't really say why someone would need to change or along which dimension or whatever. And that's fine, it's too broad for that. It's more a template of how change occurs inside a person as a reaction to a change on the outside, the pitfalls and obstacles that come with that. The why needs something else, and Campbell will fall flat if you don't provide that, definitely.
I love the pointed recommendations based on the subject matter. It would be awesome if each video had a 'book club' style movie/book to use as examples for the subject of the video and review with that lens. Lush video as always. Also, any good resources for researching personality types?
It may be more interesting than having basic archetypes, but I feel making everything grey and human kinda makes things more mundane and kinda nihilistic. I feel as though there needs to be a fine balance between the two.
We're all just made of stardust, chud. Nothing matters. Everyone born before us is stupid and right now is the best time to be alive. Do whatever you want, just don't be hecking racist!
Y'know, you've helped me a lot with writing, but there's one director I'd be curious to hear your thoughts on, David Lynch.
Gotta watch the Worm movie 2 so I can enjoy the splendor you've touched us with today. Oh boy!
This video is gonna stick with me. Nice one, mate.
I want that character sheet.
On my website in resources tab
@@localscriptman thanks m8
Human Truth must transcend the mind, because the questions "Why the mind?" and "Where did the mind come from?" precede the minds inquiry into the truth.
8:06 if you didn't have the glasses on I'd believe you.
Dude, if you write a book or something about using the Enneagram for writing, I will buy the hell out of it! I've been studying it ever since your "Pseudo Science is Cool" video, and it's extremely useful, but I've been frustrated at all the woo-woo goop I have to wade through to get to material I can apply to character creation. I haven't found anything good that's writing-focused.
you'd be better off organizing people into homestuck classpects than enneagrams. How many times are we gonna reinvent astrology
"... and there's no Queen of England."
I could listen to you talk about anything, Lucas. You're awesome. Looking forward to that take on the enneagram.
By the by, your reaction to the hero's myth here is simply emblematic of the vibe/task of our time, which goes by various names but metamodernism is a decent one imo. Do you call the zeitgeist anything in particular?
Strangely, Pat Verducci, screenwriter and professor at UCLA's MFA program says she relies heavily on the Hero's journey to write female protags. There's an interview of her here on the CZcams. Just sayin.
She also addresses archetypes and points out the reason for their existence in screenwriting. In the most common protags, the protag transforms in some way. With archetypal protags, they transform the environment, people, etc around them in some ways. Forrest GUmp--not an easy movie to write--is her example. Gump don't change, but he creates profound change by being Gump. Sometimes that's what the sotry is about.
These are just different tools for different types of stories. I think you're being a little pedantic in focusing on one type of story and thus excluding tools that apply for other types of stories. I understand these are the types of stories that interest you the most, but clearly stories with archetypes do resonate with large audiences.
Love your videos. Hurry up and get that new enneagram one done, dammit! ;)
This isn't a video about Dune at all, is it?
Hey happy to see you're back.
All the archetype talk at the middle of the video made me think. Do you think any of the stuff you said could apply to the ace attorney series ? You've put some music of it in earlier videos and i'm a big fan of the series so i was just curious.
I luh me some Ace Attorney. Yeah I’d totally do a video, just need to think of something meaningful to say
@@localscriptman you don't know how hype I am for a potential ace attorney video. I'll be first there when it happens lol
I didn't like Chani in the movie at all, but I didn't read the books, and the final duel where he's constantly catching glances at her was just too much.
thank you sir
The Ace Attourney music makes me hopeful that there might be content about it's writing in the future :>
Eh, it’s pretty commonly used, so I’d be surprised. Not to shoot you down or anything haha
@@beans9288 Even if he is into AA, I doubt he'd make a video about this one specific thing he's into over all the other things he's into
Evidently not, because the book is about overcoming archetypes and the movie is just archetypes.
I think that all adaptations of 1900s sci fi should get this kind of treatment. I recently read Foundation, and so much of it felt like a series of scenes rather than a complete story. Even knowing that the book was originally published in 5 parts, it still felt so disjointed.
I'm watching the show now, and I already like it more. The characters feel more like real people instead of just "Yeah this is the one who resists the empire because we need someone to do that"
The problem in that case is by individualizing it into modern psychological whatever, it goes literally against the entire point of the original story. Like, modern Dune furthers the questioning of heroic archetypes that Frank Herbert was clearly always intending. That's different from taking a story that is explicitly about the grand sweep of history, social forces, and specifically going after the notion that a single individual can make such drastic impacts, into a story where in fact, that's just true like many others.
I've seen criticisms of the Foundation TV show on just that basis. And not because of sticking to some authorial intent, as much as, there's already tons of stories with individuals overcoming historical forces or just not having those at all.
@RoyalFusilier I'm on episode 3 and they just did a 20 year time jump and we're following different characters now. I fully agree that the part of the point of Foundation is meant to be that no central main character is responsible for all history, but that doesn't mean the characters need to behave like cardboard cutouts.
This definitely isn't meant to be a story about one influential person taking on the evil bad guys while overcoming emotional trauma of some sort, and I like it for that. These characters have their role to play, but they are also people with lives and relationships and hopes and dreams
KILLER!!! I fucking LOVE how Denis Dunestilled the other approaches and improved upon them. Truly the most pertinent example of “knowing your stuff”
Star Wars did blow up in the east. It’s huge in Japan and Taiwan. It didn’t matter in China cause they were super underdeveloped in 1977. I agree with most of your observations about Joseph Campbell, but your point with the east vs west ideology is a very American take.
It is a bit confusing to have you, on one video, say to not write characters as people, and then watch this video, ngl.
1. He amended that concept a couple months ago in a short piece on story logic.
2. I'd say the concept of characters not being people still holds generally here, bc that claim is all about not trying to jam 50 different sub-personalities into one character. You still need at least one.
Dude... You are great!
It felt like my ideas about writing were a todler and after watching this video evolved into a teen. Thank you!
I honestly never liked the hero's jorney. Nor did I like all the tropes I've seen in those type of stories. Like "Evil monsters who are evil because they are evil? Naaah, give me monsters who have reasons to be agressive, but actually pretty cool guys, who you can be friends or even lovers with, if you find common ground and connect on a deeper level!" But I never really understood why. "Why exactly do I not like those tropes? I mean, isn't that how you SUPPOSED to write good stories? Why do I not like it in them than?" And now I DO know. The characters who follow them don't feel like actual human beings to me! (I mean, I kinda already knew that, but I just called it "bad writing" and stopped at that.) And now I get why.
When I read or watch a work of fiction and see those hero's jorney tropes in it, I feel like I am being lied to. That's the true problem here! Not the "bad writing" that I called it.
And now I know what I want from my own characters. I want them to be people first and serve the theme and the plot later.
So, thank you! I understand what I want from my own stories much better, and all because of you.)
Thanks for offering a fresh perspective on the enneagram. My initial reaction to a lot of personality test stuff was “classifying people/prescribing them prepackaged traits is reductive” but looking at it as a writing tool/spectrum of core motivations that can be used to explain and find the roots of traits and behaviors is actually super helpful.
Just to clarify my understanding, could two different types could have a very similar-appearing outward demeanors but those demeanors are really the manifestations of very different core motivations?
"Chani the Fedaykin" is a movie I'd watch. Not that it should exist but I'd watch.
The craziest thing I've ever heard is the Denis V plans to make Chani the protagonist of the next instalment. Having read DUNE MESSIAH, I know this depiction couldn't be further from the truth of the novels!
i think its wrong to dismiss Star Wars as "easy to write" just because Luke is a goodguy character without much depth in the original trilogy (which isn't even entirely accurate). Maybe in the first movie thats true, but even in V and VI he is an actual character. And thats not mentioning the rest of the cast and all the other movies/shows.
Apperently no, Cathy bates from misery to "pain"