In Response To: Reprise: Testing size limits on individual posts. (Quirel)
: Mkay, now I have time to get back to this.
: Last time, I said that I would talk about what "The Prestige" has
: to say about storytelling. It's one of my favorite movies, because there's
: so much meaning to dig for beneath the surface.
: "Are you watching closely?"
: The first part of the movie
: "Every magic trick consists of three parts, or acts. The first part is
: called "the pledge".
: The magician shows you something ordinary. A deck of cards or a bird or a
: man. He shows you this object. Perhaps he asks you to inspect it to see if
: it is indeed real, unaltered, normal. But of course... it probably
: isn't."
: "The second act is called "The Turn". The magician takes the
: ordinary something and makes it do something extraordinary. Now you're
: looking for the secret... but you won't find it, because of course you're
: not really looking. You don't really want to know. You want to be
: fooled."
: "You went half way around the world... you spent a fortune... you did
: terrible things... really terrible things Robert, and all for
: nothing."
: "For nothing?"
: "Yeah."
: "You never understood, why we did this. The audience knows the truth:
: the world is simple. It's miserable, solid all the way through. But if you
: could fool them, even for a second, then you can make them wonder, and
: then you... then you got to see something really special... you really
: don't know?... it was... it was the look on their faces... "
: That's the art of storytelling. The yarn you weave, the epic fantasy you
: carve from raw tropes, it's not real. It's fake. But you're seeing
: something magical. It's suspension of disbelief, the willingness humans
: have to accept a story on its own merits, evaluate it according to its own
: rules. That's the interface between the storyteller and the audience.
: Suspension of disbelief is a funny thing. Like I said, people are willing to
: accept the oddest stuff, yet they get tripped up by internal
: inconsistencies. That's why the author's job is to try extra hard to weed
: these inconsistencies out. Like an engineer making sure that the bridge he
: is designing will survive the stresses it's expected to encounter. Be it
: character derailment, discontinuity, ass pulls, or just mentioning that a
: person has brown eyes when they've always been green, these harm
: suspension of disbelief because they break the rules that it relies on.
: Of course, there's some medias that have negative continuity as one their
: rules. That's why "Garfield" and "Ren & Stimpy"
: don't have continuity problems, per se.
: There's some techniques, some ways of writing that will preemptively disarm
: discontinuity. In Harry Potter, for example, the stairs move and the
: floorplan of Hogwarts shifts subtly over time. Rowling purposefully put
: that detail in, just in case she accidentally or intentionally changed the
: location of the classrooms. Another example would be ONI, even if their
: cover-ups are wearing thin.
: You could have fooled me.
: Hey, I don't own every bit of media either. I'm not interested in tracking
: down the figurines or the Megablocks or the ARGs.
: The difference is that I accept that whatever tells a story, and was made
: with input by Bungie, is canon. You regard it as fanfiction.
: Maybe that's too extreme of a statement, but I don't make it lightly.
: Your position seems to be that expanded universe not created directly by
: Bungie is
: A: Not permanent, as it can be nullified by later works.
: B: Not what the original writers intended, as the Halo story is apparently
: too deep and complex to explain it to someone who isn't in the studio
: seven days a week.
: C: Not something the original writers endorse, or ever intended to expand
: into.
: I'll argue against each and every point here.
: A: Yeah, we're going to argue until we're blue in the face over Staten's
: post, but I'll address that later.
: B: It would be hard to argue author intent with Bungie for two reasons.
: First, there's been a lot of material pre-Halo CE indicating that Bungie
: didn't have the story nailed down themselves. Remember the Cortana
: Letters? At least Bungie has been forthright about the canonicity of
: those.
: Second, Halo was a collaborative effort, a shared universe, from the get-go.
: It wasn't just one guy writing this all out. Each one had ideas,
: suggestions, and notions about what the story should be and what things
: should look like, and they had to make compromises.
: When getting Nylund, Dietz, and Buckell ready to write those books,
: C: There's a lot that the authors never intended. They probably never
: intended to make five games. They probably didn't intend to have a graphic
: novel made. Pre-Halo Success Story, it probably wouldn't have been
: feasible. But with Microsoft's franchise development behind them, and the
: opportunity arises... Why not take the chance to expand your universe?
: Now here's where it gets interesting.
: Where do you draw the line on 'Group of individuals'? Does Nylund get less
: say in the Haloverse than Peter O'Brien, because Mr. O'Brien happens to
: have been hired by Bungie? Note that Eric Nylund has been working with the
: Haloverse since the beginning, and O'Brien came in sometime around Halo 3.
: Both had access to the same material.
: And O'Brien comes out on top, just because he's a Bungie employee?
: I don't agree that the original work is the only metric by which a new entry
: must be judged. It is a strong one, but other works that fit in the cracks
: and work well enough as a stand alone story have their merits. This is
: ODST. This is Contact Harvest.
: Contact Harvest had compelling (Covenant) characters, explored new ground,
: and shed light on the origins of the Covenant war against Humanity, which
: directly ties into the events surrounding the Halo Array. The Fall of
: Reach deconstructed what it took to make the protagonist of Halo: CE, and
: illuminated the plight of Humanity as of the opening cutscene of Halo: CE.
: Halo3: ODST followed some of the side characters, told a more human story
: against a background of destruction we hardly saw.
: Halo Wars simply retread old ground, reused old formulas with uninteresting
: reflections of the trilogy characters. It contributed nothing to the
: Haloverse.
: In a sense, I suppose you're right. The installment of the Halo franchise
: that least needed to be made was the one with the least connection to the
: main games.
: Would you rather be respected, or disrespected?
: Currently, you fall under the first category.
: I mean, I would love to hold an extended conversation with you over this,
: addressing each of your points as they come up. Alas, I have too many
: irons in the fire, and your ability to rapidly draft large posts with
: thoughtful content outstrips my own.
: I can see where you're coming from, but I can't agree with it. Not as it
: applies to Halo.
: When you look at the books, you realize that Bungie really hadn't been boxed
: in by 'external canon'. Fan rewrites here on HBO have shown how the exact
: same game (Reach) could be redone with the same missions, and people,
: while still staying true to the novels and comics.
: Again, the novels generally created more history than they revealed. The Fall
: of Reach gave us the Human-Innie conflict, detailed what the war against
: the Covenant entailed, and introduced ONI. Ghosts of Onyx gave hints that
: humans knew more about the Forerunner than we thought, or at least had
: been picking around Forerunner ruins.
: There's a difference between having mysteries and details to speculate about,
: and having nothing but wild mass guessing to go on.
: Because half the retcons we've seen (Mostly in Halo Reach) have been
: completely unnecessary.
: This gets into why Staten's post cost him a couple of respect points from me.
: It's flippant. It approaches the issue irreverently. It's an easy out that
: doesn't engender trust in the readers. Going against the story and
: concepts you've been building for your readers should be treated as
: nothing less than "Yesh, I just screwed up, and I want to fix
: it."
: Furthermore, it's a fundamentally broken system. I can understand not wanting
: to treat advertisement material as canon (Such as the 800-Colonies thing
: that Bungie has been vocally against) because it might not be created with
: input from Bungie, or the need to advertise might get in the way of
: storytelling.
: But , as a sort of automatic process, it elevates genuine mistakes to the
: level of canon, without a process for weeding them out. Take the 900-meter
: range of the XBR-55 in Contact Harvest. It's a pretty good figure for a
: designated marksman rifle. Now take the Halo Encyclopedia. Range is stated
: to be ~285 meters, less than that of a decently-made AK-47.
: By Staten's system, that 285 meter figure is now canon, even though it makes
: no sense. It's like a recording replacing a genuine person on the help
: hotline (And not a person from India). There's been times when someone got
: ahold of Nylund to ask him about a mistake or retcon in his books, and he
: was able to say "Yeah, that's a mistake."
: Personally, I've got the Known Space Universe in mind. Cthulhu Mythos is a
: little too disorganized, not a whole lot of other multi-media franchises I
: can think of off the top of my head.
: What I'm arguing is the following, I guess.
: A: The retcons in Reach were entirely unnecessary.
: B: The Halo franchise has the potential to be something special here, because
: of who created it and how well it was maintained.
: C: That the Halo EU is Expanded, but neither ancillary nor of less
: importance.
: I think you misapprehend a lot as well. I think you underestimate other
: people's ability to contribute to what Bungie started. I think you
: misapprehend lack of original intent with 'Don't want it, never will.' I
: think you misapprehend financial interest for an integrally bad thing.
: Look at the works of the Reniassance. Many of the statues and paintings of
: biblical figures were designed with the visage of the patrons. E.g, the
: guys with the checkbook, the merchant class of Italy. And yet these
: artists were able to rise above petty financial motivations to create
: genuine works of art.
: Even if Bungie was forced to work with Nylund to produce tie-in novels, they
: had the opportunity to rise above the forced nature of the partnership and
: create true extensions of the Haloverse that the fans could enjoy.
: From what I read, they took that path.
: The value is, the story of Halo becomes a sprawling epic, made with the
: varied strengths of many people, and more than what a single author could
: craft in a lifetime.
: Wait, what kind of logical fallacy is this? False dichotomy? Don't quite
: think so...
: Merely adapting the story of a book into a film, or novelizing a movie, is
: often a minefield, though the latter is easier than the former.
: We saw this at work with the novelization of Halo: CE.
: However, aside from the Motion Comics and The Flood, there have been no
: direct cross-media adaptations. So, your assertion here is a bit of a red
: herring. Or worse...
: "Ladies and Gentlemen of the Jury, if Sergeant Johnson lives on Harvest,
: then you must acquit! It does not make sense!"
: And people call me cynical.
: I honestly don't like it, though I couldn't quite say it's Dietz's worst
: book*. The characters are shallow, and the scenes borrowed from the movie
: are redundant and uninteresting. But can I call it a cash grab without
: being vindictive?
: No. Not without knowing more of what went on behind the scenes.
: And therefore, he is obviously a liar who doesn't know what he's talking
: about, of course.
: /Sarcasm.
: For better or for worse, the novels are canon.
: Wait, what's that last bit in there?
: "The novels are canon."
: For better or for worse? Aside from a crappy newspaper comic strip that was
: mercifully ended recently, doesn't that basically mean "Even with the
: flaws, the novels are canon."
: In such words? No. Somewhere else in this massive post, there exists my
: rebuttal to this.
: Oh, great, I get out of Philosophy 105 for this?
: XD
: Just kidding. I enjoyed the heck out of that class.
: What you're suggesting is that "Participation in brainstorming sessions
: and approving outlines and drafts" is commensurate with "the
: writer has no frickin' clue what Bungie wants."
: Extra. Connected. Made with assistance by Bungie, fitting into and expanding
: the Haloverse.
: *Shrugs*
: Whatever.
: *Holds up rock*
: Hem-hem.
: In the time that First Strike was written, and Halo 2 was being made, Bungie
: knew that they were bringing Johnson back. That, my friend, is when his
: survival was hammered out.
: "Hey, Sarge, when are ya going to tell me how you got off Halo?"
: "Right now. Y'see, I'm secretly a Spartan I, with heightened combat
: reflexes and endurance. I managed to fight off the Flood (which you
: probably don't know about) and escape to safety, where I met up with an
: ODST, pilot, and ONI agent. From then on, we hooked up with the Chief
: here, captured the Covenant flagship, and did a whole bunch of crap that I
: can't get into right now, because the spooks just showed up."
: ...
: "Hey, you asked ."
: Your loss.
: You want to bet?
: Straight from the dev blogs on the Halo Wars website.
: "First thing we always do is start gathering as much reference material
: as we can find; downloading screenshots from the internet, getting
: marketing material from Microsoft, and the most obvious one, asking Bungie
: for all their art files. That last one seems like a no brainer right?
: After all we are both part of Microsoft and they own everything, right?
: Nope. As it turns out it’s really hard to get in contact with someone at
: another studio to provide assistance, when that company was behind
: schedule on their latest installment of Halo AND we had no idea about the
: negotiations they were having with Microsoft about becoming an independent
: studio again. It didn’t take long to realize that our concept department
: would be on their own in figuring out this art style. "
: Emphasis added.
: Having had sufficient time to ponder this subject, my answer has changed
: little from my initial impressions.
: Ensemble. Didn't. Care.
: Look at their track record. Look at their approaches to campaigns. It's never
: more than an excuse plot, a thin veneer of narrative slathered over
: typical RTS objective-missions. Look at the pathetic excuse of an MMO they
: were building. Having tracked down the blog of one of the people who
: worked on it, their whole business plan was to copy WoW, give it a Halo
: skin, and ship.
: If anything, this says "Be careful about who you contract with"
: more than "Don't build a massive continuity."
: It's about the same as getting J.J. Abrams to do the next Star Trek movie, or
: hiring Kevin J. Anderson to do a StarCraft novel (The less said about
: that, the better!). Some people have genuine contributions to make to the
: franchise. Other people will just drop their trousers and piss on it.
: I think that your problem (And Mr. Miller's problem) is that you evaluate the
: entries in the Halo Franchise solely on their relevance to the main
: trilogy. It's a decent metric, but not the only one.
: Mkay.
: I once met an artist who had a... something he made in a back room of his
: apartment. It was a very abstract bit of art that took up the whole room,
: and to which he was gracious enough to part so I could check some
: electrical conduit.
: He insisted that the art was there for the sake of art. It didn't matter if
: nobody saw it, it only mattered that it exists.
: While I suppose a weak argument could be made for that, I still feel that the
: artwork could have been of greater value if it was shown to the world, and
: people were able to evaluate it and apply its meaning to their lives.
: Not that it was a great piece of art, by any chance. I had no clue what it
: was supposed to be, but I imagine other people might.
: I apologize for the tangent here. Fun little stuff that lets me ramble keeps
: me from being a complete jerk.
: I can understand honest-to-God mistakes and misprints. I can understand that
: some things might be changed for gameplay (Because a Scorpion with the
: endurance of a real tank and a true High Velocity cannon would be
: overpowered) or for... 'artistic license' (I might not like some cases, I
: think that it's gone too far in a number of cases, but I UNDERSTAND it)
: What I'm against are mistakes that have been done from carelessness and/or
: outright disregard for what has come before. That is not a problem of
: "Too much canon" (At least, not yet) but one of sloppiness and
: disrespect.
: Here, I think you contradict yourself.
: A: The details are important, because thought has been put into them.
: B: They aren't important, because changing them does nothing.
: If thought has been put into them, then the details are what they are for a
: reason. Even if the MA5C only uses 7.62 rounds because it's a common
: caliber today, there's a reason for it.
: If they're important enough for that level of consideration, they are
: important enough to keep track of, both by fans and by writers.
: After all, you never know what kind of details might by left to introduce
: mysteries... or purely as easter eggs.
: And now, back to my comments about suspension of disbelief.
: Within reason, the illustrations and representations you give your audience
: are the images they are supposed to keep in mind, to associate with the
: objects and people in the story. I say 'within reason', because there are
: exemptions. When watching a play, you have to imagine that its King Lear
: in proper battle dress, and not some pimply 19-year-old in armor crudely
: constructed of cardboard and duct tape. Also, when you look at the cover
: of a book, you have to keep in mind that it was created by an artist who
: probably hasn't read the book, had little communication with the author,
: his agent, or his editor.
: So, when you're building this character in the reader's mind, you're working
: with expectations. This is not to say that characters are static; there is
: character development and hidden character depth just as much as there is
: character derailment and ass pulls**. But there's those details that make
: the character. Luke Skywalker has blond hair and a green lightsaber, post
: ESB.
: Anyway, when you're working with audience expectations, I guess there's just
: so much you can get away with changing. The Arbiter armor had a slightly
: different color in Halo 3, but was otherwise a faithful updating of the
: Halo 2 model. In Halo 2, the PoA model got a total screen time of one and
: a half seconds, not enough time or detail for people to notice the
: difference.
: With the Halo: Reach cutscenes, I saw the difference on my second playthrough
: (once I wasn't overawed with accomplishment) as soon as the Pillar dropped
: out of slipspace.
: Sometimes, it's unavoidable, like when the original actor for Dumbledore
: died. But when someone, who isn't even the guy who designed it in the
: first place, changes that much because they've got a hundredfold more
: polies to work with, that just doesn't wash.
: Don't agree.The new model only increases the inside/outside problems, and
: where the Hell did those Bismark Turrets come from?
: Mkay. I get it. You're a Bungie fan.
: Bungie bungie bungie bungie. So fun to say. But query what you're loyal to.
: Are you loyal to the original guys who did Halo: CE, Myth, and Marathon? Are
: you loyal to someone who came in post Halo 2, and was therefore not around
: for the initial development of Halo? Are you loyal to the people used to
: work at Bungie, but moved on to other companies?
: Politely, sir, I disagree.
: Bungie at large hasn't pulled a Lucas. But I would very much like to know
: what went on behind the scenes on Reach.
: *Insofar as I have read his books, that would be 'At Empire's Edge'.
: Maybe it's supposed to by YA, maybe he needed the advance to pay the bills.
: But it was awful.
: **Anakin Skywalker slowly succumbing to the Dark Side of the Force? It's
: alright, if a little wooden. If you haven't seen the original trilogy,
: there's enough foreshadowing to see it coming.
: Artoo suddenly sprouting rockets to save the day. Open wide, Lucas. Put that
: Goatse guy to shame***.
: ***If you don't get this, don't look it up. No, I mean it. It's schmuck bait.
: You're wondering what the fuss is all about, and you figure you might as
: well look it up to satisfy your curiosity. But trust me, there are things
: you will be much happier not knowing.
Nice, thoughtful post. I agree with almost all of it.
I find it hilarious that you managed to infuse the 'Chewbacca Defense'. :) Made me smile.
The moral I took from this: If you've provided a bunch of stuff that the fans will pay attention to, the thoughtful thing would be to pay attention to it yourself. It will help the next thing you do.
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