Legion A Study In Inconsistency & Implausibility, Part Two

LEGION: A STUDY IN INCONSISTENCY & IMPLAUSIBILITY, PART TWO If you haven’t read the first part of this two-half post, please jump again to final week. I’m going to dive in today with out preamble or additional apologies for seeming to be appearing like a film critic. Last week we talked about setting then following the foundations of your SF/fantasy/horror story. This week we’ll sort out the other vital component to good story telling, regardless of genre: motivation. Here’s a dictionary definition: Motivation (noun) 1. the reason or reasons one has for appearing or behaving in a particular method 2. the general desire or willingness of someone to do one thing For our purposes, motivation means: Why are these characters doing what they’re doing in this story? If the answer comes down to: Because in the event that they don’t, there won’t be a narrative, you could have failed miserablyâ€"and I imply so miserably that I insist that you simply not inflict your unmotivated, pointless writing on the innocent studying public. It’s on your personal good, by the way. They will hate you for it. Every single character in any story you write in any genre all the time has to have a reason for doing something and everything that she or he (or it) says or does each time he, she (or it) says or does anything at any point in your story. That having been said, a character’s motivation can take on infinite selection. And you don’t essentially have to go deep into the back story of the man standing guard at the palace gates who resists your hero’s efforts to break in to rescue the princess that the guard’s boss has taken prisoner. We don’t necessarily should know that the evil overlord used to take him to baseball games when he was a child. The incontrovertible fact that he’s a soldier, who will endure extreme penalties from his ruthless boss if he doesn’t do the job he’s being paid for is often enough, however then how much more interesting will your story be if the hero feels just like the guard isn’t re ally giving it his all? Maybe that guard’s sick of being treated like a slave by a tyrant he hates, and is just kinda making it look good so in case the hero doesn’t win the day he has some out when it comes time for his court martial. There’s a little bit of a deeper story. But then you need to find a approach to talk that to your readers. But tertiary characters like the odd gate guard apart, you could have to have the ability to answer on your readers this simple question: So what? So what if we don’t rescue the princess? Why is the alien invasion such a bad factor? Why are the aliens invading within the first place? Why did the vampire come to this small town out in the middle of nowhere, and why ought to we give a crap that he’s there? I hope that most of you might be reading this and saying, “Yeah, Phil, duh.” I imply, that is very Storytelling a hundred and one stuff here, but then why accomplish that many people screw it up? Case in point, our new favorite film , Legion. Last week we talked in some element about how the monsters (people possessed by evil angels) labored, and how inconsistently their guidelines had been applied, but not only was there no clear indication of what they could do, however that inconsistency of their rules set brought out, or maybe was fueled by, some vital holes in their motivation. The movie tells us that “God got bored with all of the bullshit.” Yikes. So even then, that line uttered by a personality who spends the movie telling us she has no concept what’s occurring, why, or how she might presumably have something to do with it, is just about all of the motivation God is given for killing what we’re led to consider could also be hundreds of thousands of individuals. Even from God, I’m going to want rather more than that. There has by no means been a weaker statement of character motivation than: “God moves in mysterious ways.” In reality, what that old saying really means is, “I actually have no f-ing clue what’s occurring here.” You could find yourself in situations like that in real life, but for the love of all that’s holy, think about this: How do you react to uncertainty in actual life? If you begin with, “What is this? What’s occurring?” do you allow it at that, or do you set out to figure out what’s going on and how you can cease something unhealthy from taking place? If your debit card is declined on the tremendous market and you’re positive you've $2000 in the account, do you just shrug and say, “Oh, well, the Bank moves in mysterious methods,” or do you get on the telephone, log into your online banking web site, and in any other case begin to figure out why your card was declined? So sure, regardless of the title card initially of the film: “Come, ye Children, Listen to Me. “I will Teach You the Fear of the Lord.” â€"Psalm 34:11 the complete movie hinges on God and his angels destroying the world on some kind of transitory whim. I go away you to puzzle over the theology behind that one on your own. So God Himself lacks clear motivation, what about his soldiers, the possessed individuals who encompass the remote desert diner? The first of those possessions we see happen is in the back streets of Los Angeles. An angel possesses an LAPD officer instantly in sight of the archangel Michael, who's standing only perhaps ten toes away from him. The question needs to be answered at this point: If the evil angels can possess a cop on the streets of LA, proper in front of Michael, whose presence they'll apparently sense from afar, and anyway they know that the numerous unborn youngster is there in this diner, why not simply possess one of many people in the diner? Instead, God (or his general, Gabriel, and that in itself is unclear) possesses individuals somewhere outside then hurls them against the diner, starting them outdoors our protagonists’ area of fireside. This one level alone just blew my enjoyment of this movi e on the primary viewing, especially because it was really easy to repair. All we needed to hear, from Michael (who we should always be capable of assume has some clue of the fantasy physics involved), is that the angels can’t possess someone who’s inside some range of the significant unborn child. This would clarify why they may possess the cop proper in front of Michael, but as soon as he met up with Charlie the Waitress of Destiny, the angels are held at bay. Gee, and I thought telling my dad and mom was going to be the onerous part. Right? That’s the thing: You set the rules and your audience will accept those rules and fortunately suspend their disbelief, however only if those guidelines are consistently dealt with. And one of the important causes for having guidelines like that in the first place is so that your characters and the actions they take are properly motivated. As the film progresses, the possessed folks proceed to behave in inexplicable ways. Please remember here that I selected that word, “inexplicable,” very fastidiously. The film itself fails to explain why the monsters are doing what they do. And I don’t imply in some ham-fisted “Before I Kill You, Mr. Bond” sort of method, but in any means at all, nevertheless elegantly obscure. Hopefully all these flies don’t stick round too lengthy. Why do the flies attack then disappear, by no means to be seen again? Apparently it’s so as to drive our protagonists back into the diner, however that’s simply another instance of habits motivated solely by plot necessity: If they’re capable of leave the diner, of course they will, probably individually since it’s established early on that they’ve come to the diner individually or in small groups and don’t essentially even like one another. So we want some gadget, nonetheless disconnected, to keep them bottled in. After the preliminary attack of the possessed old lady, quite a lot of time passes before the demons attack again. All of a sudden it’s night time. They’ve been ready around for apparently hours, long sufficient for our heroes to barricade themselves in, and all the whereas, God leaves the diner’s inhabitants alone to make their preparations and pair off for bonding momentsâ€"why? Because the movie wants to inform us who these persons are by having them talk to each other rather than do things, and who-knows-what different priorities: Maybe that they had a restricted finances for makeup and digital results, in order that they wanted to spend a while on the one set with simply the disheveled actors. That’s reasonable motivation for a unit production supervisor, however not a storyteller. So then God ideas his hand again by dragging within the ice cream truck man, who's menacing in a rule-breaking means however easily shot down. After the dying of the ice cream truck man, more cars method and we see the folks inside shaking in the supernatural method that says they’re in the strategy of being possessed. But if they’re solely just now being possessed, what’s compelled them to drive method out into the desert to that very particular, lonely locale? And anyway, it’s dark, they usually’re in vehicles, so our heroes on the roof of the diner can’t see them shaking, however they open fire anyway, blindly spraying automated weapons hearth at strange trying automobiles. After a giant explosion set-piece our heroes cease shooting, for no specific reason, and allow the possessed to slowly, menacingly, and peacefully exit their automobiles and take up position around the diner. There seem to be dozens, even lots of of them, however at no time do the monsters rush in and certainly overwhelm the diner. They just stand there. Then all of a sudden they’re simply gone, and a minimum of one character takes credit for driving them off, though we’ve seen him do nothing of the type. The solely rationalization for any of this I can decide is that the filmmakers knew they wished a giant firefight with cars exploding, they usually wanted the creepy thing with hundreds of possessed individuals silently staring on the diner, lit by flashes of lightning, but they also needed the folks in the diner to die one after the other till simply the important thing “trinity” of the would-be father, the unwed mom, and the significant child are left alive. That proper there is a shining instance of what to not do: String cool stuff together with out the support of correct, clear motivation, and name it a narrative. That’s not a narrative, that’s a collection of scenes. Then there are all the little issues: Hi, God, it’s me, Michael. At the very starting, when we first meet Michael, he enters the hidden armory through the door, then exits by blowing a (ugh) cross-shaped gap within the wall. Why? Why is he drawing consideration to himself? This is why the two cops cease, and that leads to their deathsâ€"so that we can see a possession occur and the filmmaker s can set up the child in query. That’s another nice example of what not to do: have a personality do some nonsense factor that’s clearly opposite to his personal best interests to be able to make a plot point. Why do the lights come on and off? Why does the radio work typically and never different times? Why does the telephone work generally and never other times? It seems to be implied that the possessed people have some management over electrical energy, however that’s again applied solely when the filmmaker wants or needs it to be gentle or dark. Even Michael appears confused by this. And oh, yeah, simply having your characters touch upon how nothing makes sense isn't a substitute for motivation and consistency. If your characters sense something is mistaken, please hearken to them, and put them in a story that they, a minimum of, can follow. Only after Gabriel reveals up and it’s looking mighty grim for Michael does he inform Jeep (I suppose his name is Jeep): “Find t he prophets, learn to read the instructions.” No one, together with the viewers, is told who the prophets are, although it’s clear that the instructions are the tattoos that magically switch from Michael to Jeep. This is the secret upon which the whole story hinges: The instructions on the way to save the world, ostensibly from God Himself, and I assume these instructions may even clarify why this is all taking place, leaving apart that every one things thought of we currently stay in probably the most peaceable, most enlightened time in all of human historical past. During a time when dictatorships are continuing to fall everywhere in the world, folks give billions and billions of dollars to charity, institutionalized racism from the American south to South Africa has fallen away . . . and now God thinks we’re full of shit? Not throughout, say, the Holocaust or Apartheid, or the millennia during which girls and women have been treated as property, or all that point we had bee n invading one Native American tribal territory after one other, or . . . ? No? Now is when he will get pissed. Okay. Jeep has no idea what Michael is speaking about, and neither do we. Could Michael have spent any of the hours they were together hiding within the diner from the passive monsters to clarify in any element in any way what Jeep and Charlie have to do to revive God’s faith in man, or no matter? They spend an awful lot of time bonding over each others’ petty sins, but let’s not actually speak about what’s happening, why it’s happening, and exactly how we get out of it. This is just not how anybody behaves in a stress situation. Why, toward the end, do the possessed half before Jeep, Audrey, Charlie, and her child, then just let them drive away? At the very end of the film we see our Holy Trinity driving an old SUV filled with weapons. Who are they shooting? We simply saw a huge crowd of the possessed half before them and permit them to go on their merry means w ith but a couple of random snarls. And how do I even start to discuss Legion’s final and most mortal sin? The deus ex machina, or “Machine of God” has always been the one thing that everyone who’s ever taught anybody about storytelling in any format in any genre has all the time warned towards. And this film actually goes there. God just suddenly decides that Michael was proper all along, and punishes Gabriel for doing exactly what he was commanded to do by God Himself. Wow, that’s quite a fickle deity you’ve got there, and hey, if it’s all been settled and God and Man are buds again, why do Jeep and Charlie want all those guns? Like Charlie, Jeep, and I even have to assume their child, too, we will never know. Or will that each one be made clear in Legion 2? Yeah, too late. â€"Philip Athans About Philip Athans