Why Modern Movies Suck - Setup And Payoff

Want to help support this channel? Check out my books on Amazon: www.amazon.com/Will-Jordan/e/B00BCO7SA8/ref=dp_byl… Subscribe on Patreon: www.patreon.com/TheCriticalDrinker Subscribe on Subscribestar: www.subscribestar.com/the-critical-drinker

The director of Joker said the only way to get a film made in today's climate is to dress it up like it is a superhero film to fool the producers.

The problem: “I (the writer) want the worms to find them in the store, but the worms only detect vibrations and the heroes know that and avoid making vibrations” Good solution: “introduce a broken fridge early on, a background thing, that vibrates when it malfunctions. They’ll forget about it because of the stress of the worms and their focus on being quiet themselves. They’ll think they are safe because they’re doing everything right, but there’s something they didn’t account for” Modern solution: “um… they get in a fight and start wrestling, and that attracts the worms” I’m so tired of protagonists acting like idiots just so the plot progresses

Just watched the kung fu panda series and its pretty insulting that these kids movies deliver so much more on their setups and payoffs than the whole sequel trilogy.

I remember when Die Hard was considered a dumb action movie. Just re-watch it and compare it with almost any modern action movie, and you see how neat and clever it is in comparison.

"Not winning any Oscars" is a compliment at this point, not going to lie.

I love how The Last Jedi has come to be used as a reference for everything not to do for creative writing.

I'd always thought it was quite clever how in the film, "The Incredibles", there is a piece of dialog that sets up two payoffs later. Mrs Incredible and her son Dash, who has super speed, argue that he should be allowed to compete in a running race if he promises not to use his super powers. She says it's unfair on the other boys, Dash says that he's special and she replies that everybody is special. Dash responds that that's just another way of saying nobody is special. Later in the film Mr Incredible is up against the bad guy who says he is going to sell his super hero tech so anybody can be a superhero and if anybody can be super then nobody will be super. So that leads back to the earlier conversation. Even later in the film, Dash is allowed to race but is mature enough to hold back so he doesn't win. So that setup dialog leads to two payoffs later. I just hadn't thought of it in those terms.

Aristotle said there are 6 elements of Tragedy: Plot, Character, Thought, Diction, Song and Spectacle. They are always listed in this order. The more you invest in the plot, and the others toward the beginning, the less you need of spectacle and the ones toward the end. With a great plot and interesting, well developed characters, you don't need to sing while blowing shit up. CGI has made the industry lazy.

"A special effect is a tool, a means of telling a story. A special effect without a story is a pretty boring thing." -George Lucas (of all people)

When I was a kid, I was genuinely excited about the future of special effects. Now, in the era of perfect CGI, I realise that not once did I ever contemplate that writing would become a lost art.

10:28 - "...you chip away at your audiences investment in your story, because they realize that at any moment, some random bullshit device or character that's never been mentioned before could pop up and completely undo everything that's happening." Nailed it.

As Chekhov, one of the best play writers, put it: “If there is a rifle in the room, at some point it must fire” :)

"Somehow Palpatine returned" Atleast give us some reasoning. He was brought by the Dragon Balls or he had the monkey's paw up his ass anything but "somehow"

Leia: "They're not monitoring for small transports" A New Hope literally begins with the Empire tracking escape pods FROM HER SHIP!

Something that i live by when building a story: the best Chekhov's Guns are ones people think have already gone off. You THINK the squealing cooler is just there to show the relationship between Walter and the duo of Val and Earl. So you write it off as a story element that has fulfilled its purpose. Fast forward and the group has forgotten about the cooler, you've forgotten about the cooler, and when it starts screaming as they're hunkered down to avoid the graboid's notice, their 'oh shit' moment is also your 'oh shit ' moment.

The fact that they came up with the idea of Palpatine being Rey's grandfather in the last minute should speak volumes.

This reminds me of an interview they did with Trey Parker and Matt Stone on how they write South Park. They said when they story board an episode they never use the word "then" for a next scene, they always have to use the words "Because". This makes South Park such a great show because the stories in each episode have situational humor that builds on itself on an insane but rational way.

The Last Jedi has become the standard-bearer for how not to write a script. These days there’s too much ego, too many agendas and too much interference from executives.

Writing is all done by focus group now, which is what makes the storytelling so bad. My brother worked for MPC. While there, he worked on Ad Astra (he is in the credits). The entire orangoutang scene (which has nothing to do with the plot) was added because focus groups said the first half of the movie was too boring.