Whispers

We are at once the old beggars beside the road,
and the white knights on horseback.

But we are more like shades;
our voice, our presence, it pervades them.

In their despair, in the darkness, we can take shape.

But only to guide,
only to offer possibilities.

For in the end we are just whispers.

Errors, Intelligence and Intention

I got triggered by an article a friend posted recently. Not the content, just the title of it and several others on the site.

Errors in grammar, usage and spelling have absolutely no correlation with intelligence, strength of content or intention of the writer.

Sorry, they just don't. It's a nasty little myth that comes with the advent of intelligence testing and standardized education. Errors occur in everything, every day, and while they may indicate that a piece wasn't carefully edited, they do not indicate that the writer is a "numbskull" or "silly."

What errors can do, and the reason why you should always strive to eliminate them wherever possible, is that they can confuse your meaning, or dilute the clarity of your intention.

Obviously if I wish people would 'lose' the myth that writing and intelligence correlate, and I say 'loose' instead, that can definitely muddy my message. It does not however mean that I am silly, stupid, incapable of thought, or not worthy of being heard, nor that that I don't have something incredibly important that you should hear.

Everyone makes errors, it's impossible not to. [Not to mention: The rules you think are rules, aren't, and the grammar you think you know is probably wrong in some cases, and that's not just because it's constantly changing either.]

Wouldn't all our time be better spent talking to people rather than snickering at errors in their writing? Wouldn't it be nicer if someone asked you to correct an error because they were genuinely interested in making sure they fully understand what you are saying?

Don't be a grammar butt-munch for the sake of being a grammar butt-munch. Separate the person from the writing. And realize, the errors of today are the future spellings, grammatical structures and idioms of tomorrow.

Short Note on the Nut Graph

When writing for any browsable medium, whether news or online forum, you should use a Nut Graph. Where the first two sentences of your piece explain as succinctly as possible the reason why someone should keep reading at all.

It's an old news writing trick that more people ought to employ when writing for G+ and other places where people are far more apt to skim than to read something top to bottom.

The idea is simple enough, but it's not exactly an introduction. In a news article, you put the most important things first and then tapper them down to the bottom with the least important information. This serves two purposes, the first is that a reader will likely get the best details before they have finished reading the article, and second, editors trim from the bottom first when it comes to space issues. Thus the verdict, or the outcome isn't left to the reader's imagination.

But for those who write fiction, this seems tantamount to ruining their work. Like those pesky readers who flip to the last page of a mystery so they don't have to feel the anxiety of not knowing what's going to happen.

However, you're doing yourself and everyone else a favor when you use a Nut Graph to introduce what you're talking about, and a surprises first approach to the article. More people will read you, and better yet, more people will get what you're trying to tell them as well.

Is New Adult All About Sex?

In this article, I will attempt to answer the question, "Is New Adult all about sex?" I believe it is not, but there is a preponderance of evidence against me. Or so it seems.

Going Through Changes

Puberty is one aspect of adolescence, but not the central focus, despite its ability to seem that way. Most properly, adolescence is defined by brain development which begins around the time that secondary sexual characteristics start to emerge and thus is incorrectly correlated with it.

Adolescence is a period of time lasting almost fifteen years, from around eleven or twelve until almost twenty-five, in most cases. During this time, while the body is undergoing various sexual developments, the most important changes are occurring in the brain.

Pathways are opening up and being developed which allow for a higher level of reasoning. Jean Piaget worked with many children, finding that about the time of puberty they began to move from very black and white thinking to being able to understand abstract subjects and reason beyond simply right and wrong, yes and no. Middle School teachers will tell you he was right.

Alfred Binet was able to show that various intellectual abilities were already present and would stay almost unchanged throughout the course of a persons life, and yet teenagers lack fundamental reasoning skills adults find common place. There is something beyond intellectual capacity that goes into distinguishing an adult from one that is not yet.

Adolescents Only Care About One Thing

Lies! Damn lies! But true, sort of. Here's the thing, when you get a new toy, you play with it. It's human nature. Biology gives adolescents this new shiny thing called sexuality, and then society says, don't play with it, do your homework, clean your room, and pretend you're still five.

Freud was spot on, when you deny impulses in one area, they sublimate into another. Young Adult books actively restrict exploration of sexual content, so it's invariable that it will burst forth in New Adult. But that doesn't mean New Adult is all about sex.

Stages of Development

Going back to Psych 101, Piaget was concerned with the mind's development, as was Binet. But Erikson wondered about how we grow up in relation to others. Adolescence spans two major stages of life: Identity vs. Role Confusion, and Intimacy vs. Isolation.

Young Adult, coming of age, that's the Identity vs. Role Confusion, the "Who am I?" of Spider-Man. Intimacy vs. Isolation begins even earlier than it used to, and it is predicated on sex, or more accurately the current system of capital, and therefore power, is sex.

Shirtless YouTube Sensations

Sixteen to Nineteen year-old boys across the world have figured out that if they take off their shirt and talk about the most random thing in the world, they get money. Sexuality is capital; and late teens, New Adults if you will, learn that they have some amount of worth as a sexual being.

But this isn't about sex. It's about power and relationship, same as earlier in life, only this time it's innately tied to you as a physical being. This is about "Can I love?"

Part of that is "Can someone love me?" And to test that, 18-25 year-olds go through various schemes and machinations, some involving outright sex, certainly, but far from all.

Changing the Conversation

New Adult isn't about sex, and adolescence isn't about sex. It's about taking that inkling of who you are as a person and figuring out how to relate with everyone else while being that person.

So, there's still "coming of age," there's still identity formation, there's still existential angst, only now it's further complicated by the 'other,' the prospective partner with all the vagaries that inhabit that in-between space of modern dating.

Scary German Words

New Adult is not Bildungsroman. I'll break this down separately in greater depth for those who enjoy literary criticism, but for now I'm going to state emphatically that while the hero's journey and a lot of Young Adult can be considered Bildungsroman, New Adult is systemically different.

What the German genre looks at is growing up, casting off childhood foolishness and eventually maturing into a societally productive adult. Firstly, New Adult skips forward from childhood as the German's would understand it, though still takes place inside adolescence. And while some authors may choose to add elements of growth to their characters, I would venture that few would consider their characters foolish, or in need of casting off their childhood in order to be productive members of society.

In fact, I believe New Adult represents a reaction to this very idea, that there is something fundamentally flawed about adolescents which much be grown out of.

Yes, compelling drama leads to changed characters, but the most interesting thing about New Adult is not that the characters are casting things off, but that they are exploring and accepting that which they already are.

Toward a new definition of New Adult

I'll likely write several articles that further explicate this concept. But I started this article asking: Is it all about sex? So let's return there.

Late adolescence is about transitioning from 'Who am I by myself?' to 'Who am I in this larger world?' Thus, New Adult will contain themes of growth and change, and yes, sex. But it is fundamentally about Intimacy vs. Isolation, in the words of Erikson. It is about being both one's self, and being with others. Relationships, friendships, marriages and families all contain elements of this.

Sex is the capital upon which the emergent self-esteem is valued. Even among friends, sexual appeal garners distinctions and power. It is inescapably part of being human.

I don't argue that we try, but I do argue that sex is a symptom. A compelling, marketable symptom, but not the underlying structure under examination.

New Adult is not about sex. New Adult is about moving from the more rigid structures of mid-adolescents into the near free-fall of psuedo-adulthood and the compelling angst and confusion that process creates in individuals whose brains are still settling and forming.

New Adult is about the quest for self-definition, not absent the world, but in relationship with it. Heroes do not quest through the underworld for some personal enlightenment. They cross the swampy nether regions of their own world and attempt to keep their head above water while learning to live not just for themselves, but for those they care about as well.

New Adult will never be without sexual power and politics, but it need not find itself solely concerned with it either. Every late adolescent must face the possibility of isolation and the question of intimacy, and while sexuality is the capital upon which that is traded, the value of it to each individual is markedly different.

For some, it may hold no value at all.

Choosing the Right Storyteller: 1st vs. 3rd Person

Though closely tied with the point of view you choose, and somewhat prescriptive of the narrative distance in your story, choosing between first and third person is a related, but separate issue that can be summed up in one simple question: Who is telling your story?

Do you really want a Storyteller?

Most of the time, your answer is going to be no, because a true narrator, what we'll refer to from here on as an independent storyteller, is secretly your main character whether you want them to be or not.

So the first thing you need to do is decide if you need the framing device of someone telling the story, and realize that this someone is your main character whether you intend them to be or not.

The Never-Ending Story and The Princess Bride are two excellent examples of books that use a distinct and necessary storyteller to frame the narrative. In both cases these independent storytellers are themselves characters and they add to the narrative experience by becoming the hero in a way.

So again, you probably don't want an independent storyteller, or if you do, you may actually be thinking of writing in the first person so you can make comments and narrate in what is called "stream of consciousness" which can be as entertaining as an old man rambling on about his life, and as dense as Finnegan's Wake.

I'll cover the proper use of an independent storyteller in a future article. For the present, we'll return to the discussion of choosing between first and third person.

Revisiting Narrative Distance

The biggest difference between first and third person is how far away the action is from the actor. First person is the actor themselves, narrating their own world through use of internal monologue. Action originates from within them and happens to them. Third person, even tightly narrated, is still outside the actor.

Let's refer to film for a moment. The POV shot is used sparingly, but it is the equivalent of first person in film. The camera becomes the eyes of the character. Horror films like this because it puts the audience in the same peril as the characters, it closes the narrative distance.

Third person has many more levels of distance, but the closest is the "over the shoulder" shot used very often in filming a conversation, especially one where the characters are close or deeply connected. In this technique, the camera shoots literally over the shoulder of one actor.

Of course, we're also used to seeing wide shots, where more than one character is in focus, or even extreme wide shots where we see whole towns in focus.

And that's the key here: Where is the focus? 

Even if you choose third person, you still need to decide how to vary the narrative distance, something that first person distinctly lacks, and to my mind the biggest deficit. Not, as some would say, the lack of information to the audience, but the inability to ever pull back from the situation. In first person you are in the midst for the whole ride. You never get a chance to let up, to back away and to breathe.

So when should I use first person?

To complete the thought above, when you want to force the reader to stick with a character through every moment of every scene. When you need the reader to be a part of both the internal and external worlds of this character. When you require intimate identification with the protagonist that would otherwise be lost if viewed from the outside.

Additionally, when you want a storyteller to color the narrative, to skip around, even to jump quickly between time and space, you may find that what you truly desire is to be within the mind of the protagonist and to truly follow their thoughts wherever they may go.

It feels more natural to be told things in first person, than it does in third. And the author can be very creative in stringing present events into revealing exploration of thought while still maintaining the "action" of the narrative if she employs the first person and establishes a "stream of consciousness" tactic to it.

What the Protagonist doesn't notice.

It is, however, more difficult, though far from impossible, to slip information directly to the reader which the protagonist does not know themselves while using first person. I will give you a brief example, and save more detailed exploration for a future article.

You must separate your protagonist's ears from their thoughts. This is key, because as in real life, the sound waves strike the ears regardless of our mind's focus when they do. When you want to slip something to the reader, the protagonist can hear it, you can report the statement on the page as dialogue, but true to human nature, the protagonist is distracted by what the speaker is wearing, or emotionally reacts to the tone of voice rather than the content.

Are you ever going to talk about third person?

Briefly. Because it's actually so ingrained in you, even if you want to write first person, especially in the present tense, you'll find yourself slipping without noticing back to third. We're raised on third person stories from birth.

But that's exactly why third person is so common in narrative, and why it often feels better to both reader and author. However, as with all narrative choice, you should make yours intentionally.

So, where first person is intimately close narrative distance, third gives you a range of choices, and often using several throughout the course of a work aides the reader in pacing and focus.

In third person, you are the filmmaker. You have two things you can control when you write. 1) How close you are to the action. 2) How deep the focus is on your description. Hollywood actually had a sort of rule book about how a director was allowed to use shots in sequence, and an author needs to consider having a similar aesthetic for their own use.

But, when you break the rules, you can create interesting effects. Most emotional scenes are close, in the character's face, the tears or rage striking the reader directly. But what if you pulled way back, and narrated the crowd ignorantly moving around the character?

Third person is a choice to give yourself choice, to give yourself the ability to change the distance from the action. First person can only choose focus, the camera is bolted to the protagonist's head. Third person gives you freedom to subtly shift the narrative distance, allowing things like outside information affect the reader and not the character.

It is also highly drawn to action and less so to character. Because you are outside the character, only what they do is readily apparent. You must cheat at times to show what the character is thinking, and these cheats come across that way to readers as well. They allow them, they accept them, but like voice over in film, you are cheating and we all sort of know it.

When you choose third person, you should do so because you are confident that you can capture all the necessary character change mostly through what the characters do and say, and not because you know you can read character minds when it's convenient. That's a lazy use of third person, and results in a weaker story.

Special Considerations for New Adult

The exception to this is a limited third person, a sort of permanent over the shoulder, and is the reigning choice of many Young Adult authors. Rowling used this in Harry Potter. Like first person, she attached her narration to only one character and stayed with him even if distant action was occurring elsewhere. (Something she savored in book six when she finally got to skip a Quidditch match, the bane of her writing existence.) You have most of the benefits of first person, including the ability to read the characters mind, but you also have a lot of the deficits of the first person as well.

It's a toss up, but personally, I think you're giving up too much in both directions, and it restricts your story in ways that you may not have to deal with should you choose one or the other. Again, book seven proves this point out. Rowling was stuck with Harry, and she really needed to be other places in the quest story she was writing.

Because New Adult is exploring the inner dynamics of late adolescence, I will say that either first or limited third fits better with the voice and the intent. Even though Riordan is using multiple points of view in his latest Percy Jackson series, he is sticking with a limited third person narration style that keeps the reader right with the action. This is a trend we are likely to see continue for a long time. It's accessible, it's easy, it can be broken on occasion when necessary, and readers are used to it.

But I urge New Adult authors to study film, to look more closely at narrative distance, and to intentionally make their choice of storyteller so that the narrative gets the exactly right treatment for the subject at hand.

Quick Note on Suspension of Disbelief

While there are some occasions where we are indeed forced to watch or read some fictional thing, most of the time, when we pick up a book or sit down to a movie, we are willingly prepared to engage with it.

We are willing to "suspend disbelief" that what we are about to encounter is not real, and is in fact all made up of very entertaining lies.

A lot of authors think that to achieve this, they must layer lie upon lie, details upon detail, in a vain attempt to rationally explain every bit of the physical reality in which their story takes place.

This is a fallacy

Suspension of Disbelief relies upon the 'just enough' principle. You must make your world just believable enough that a reader does not stop and ask the question that should make you shudder: "Wait, how is that possible?"

Once this question is asked, problem after problem will ensue. But the problem is not with everything that follows after, but with what caused the question to be asked.

Imagine you are gliding above the surface of a piranha infested river. You have a long way to go and only a little bit of fuel. To arrive at your destination safely, you have to use just enough power to keep yourself out of the water. But if you even dip your toe in, you are likely to be swarmed and killed by hungry little fishes.

That's the trick to suspension of disbelief, getting ever so close to the river, yet never getting wet. But if you try and fly too high, you will run out of narrative fuel and crash and burn, Icarus reborn.

This is where beta readers are uber-helpful. Not with their questions about how this could possibly do that, but to tell you where in your story you first got wet. Fix that, and you'll likely get much further down the river.

Single vs. Multiple Points of View

Actually POV is sort of a misleading name, but it's widely used to talk about either following one single character through a whole story, or following more than one. It can also mean using first or third person to do that, but I'm going to break out the benefits and drawbacks to those in the next article.

For this article, I'm going to focus on why you should pick either Single POV (one character, one desire line), or Multiple POV (many characters, many desire lines).

What is a Desire Line?

I know it's odd to focus on desire, but it's sort of the central trade-off when you choose between Single and Multiple POVs. The reason drama (I'm using that word loosely to mean story tension) works is because somebody wants something they can't get right now. It's the classic question to move from character sketch to actual plot.

And it's what you are weakening when you choose not to follow just one character for the entire story. By weak I don't mean ineffective, just that when a reader has more than one character to root for, the overall effect of any one of their desires isn't as strong as when there is only one.

The desire line is what glues the character's actions to the plot, and moves them from just making a series of odd or even bad decisions, to moving toward or away from some larger goal.

In single POV, you are clearly tied to one desire, usually making that desire stronger simply because it is the only one. Bad writing excluded, Single POV is necessary when the character has desires that are more internal, more emotionally and less focused on overt plot moments.

In multiple POV, you have one desire line for each character who gets "screen time" with the reader. Even if everyone wants to save the princess, they don't want to do it out of the same desire. The lover wants a mate, but his buddy who you also follows wants to please his best friend. And the rouge that they meet along the way just wants gold. So the desires are always going to be different, and when you have more than one of them, overall, the strength of the story's desire line is weaker.

What is Narrative Distance?

Though it isn't the same as first or third person, it is very closely related to that choice, as I'll explain in the next article. For this discussion, narrative distance is how close the description of the action is to the character you are following.

Close narrative distance would be almost, if not, inside the character's body. Action originates from the character, and what others do must be observed by the character. Often this is done using first person, but it is not necessary to do so. The narrator is close to the character, if not the character herself. Thus you don't see distant action, and everything that happens is colored by the character.

Harry Potter is a third person, close narration, though Rowling does use prologues and other devices to get away from Harry occasionally. This is also referred to as the "Limited-Omnipotent" narrator, though that is actually most precisely a case of medium narrative distance. The narrator will make occasional comments, or see things the character does not. So it's helpful to ignore the idea of a narrator in this discussion and focus simply on how close to the character the description is.

Medium and Far Narrative Distance are normally done in third person, as it would be very odd for a first person narrative to see things that the charter isn't physically seeing, but I won't tell you it's impossible, just that it's likely to be weird and off-putting to a reader. (Confession: My main character, Xanatos, sees through other's eyes. So I have used a 1st/3rd split in some parts to show distant action that he is sensing via supernatural means.)

Jurassic Park is a prime example of medium narrative distance, bordering on far. The characters are followed, but Crichton hints and plays with reader anticipation at the same time, very clearly foreshadowing danger to increase tension and reader engagement.

So, why should I choose Single POV?

Are you telling an emotional journey? Is the main desire line romantic in nature? Are you exploring the inner dynamics of families, or inter-personal relationships in general? Have you created the world's coolest Anti-Hero? Are you talking about an amoral, or even kinda of bad desire like revenge?

All of these are good examples of when Single POV is going to net you better results than Muliple POV. It's not hard and fast, but a lot of the time, when the interior of a character is important, you want to be right there with them for all the gritty angst. And if the character is going to do things that the reader may balk at, Single POV gives you a chance to normalize and even create sympathy for what is otherwise an evil action, or a bad decision.

Single POV gives you close narrative distance almost by default, and strengthens that narrative tie between reader and character, allowing you to develop a deep appreciation of this character's life and desire.

You should use Single POV when the internal changes of a character are paramount to external plot elements.

Okay, so when should I choose Multiple POV?

Are you telling a quest story? (And it doesn't have to be literally going on quest, but are your characters after some boon that will help them fix/solve a problem in their regular lives?) Is this a thrilling ride of suspense and terror? Are you looking at external issues like spies or the collapsing economic market? Do you have an amazingly awesome party of uber-sexy heroes? Is the desire line relatively simple and easy to understand?

These are prime cases where Multiple POVs are going to net you better results. When the exterior plot elements are your focus, you are going to get more milage out of using medium or far narrative distance to really show how the world is working together to create the drama in your characters lives. It's hard to be scared if we don't see the signs of things to come, if the  character isn't looking at the hand writing on the wall. We can't fear for the heroes life, if we don't see the shadow creeping up behind her. When the desire line is more universal, too many character details can actually bog you down. Knowing that your rogue is troubled by past relationships is better than knowing the intimate details of every one. Far narrative distance and switching between a few selected POVs means you can focus on the plot, the external elements, without getting bogged down by character angst.

Multiple POVs are usually told in third person, and usually set you up with at least medium narrative distance so you can show the whole world through which these character are trying to make their way. It allows you to focus on the plot and the inner workings of the group so the readers develop a deeper appreciation for the task at hand, rather than the individual lives of the characters.

How does this apply to New Adult?

New Adult tends to focus more on the emotional journey of the character than on overt elements. The final Harry Potter is an example of how this can be a problem for an author. It is a quest story, and would have been better told using Multiple POVs, showing how things at Hogwarts were worsening, and making the angst in the middle more bearable for the reader. (Because it would have been half as long.)

But Rowling had already established the series as Single POV using close narrative distance, so she was stuck and did the best she could with the plot she'd worked herself into.

Which means you should learn from her example and think extra hard about what you're really writing. It's entirely possible to have New Adult books that don't focus on the emotional journey, but there is something about the voice of these books that doesn't feel complete without the emotional aspect.

I definitely think you should keep your narrate distance close, even in third person, and even in Multiple POV. Part of New Adult is the psychological changes of the life-period under review, and the reader needs to be connected enough to get that aspect of any character that gets "screen time."

If you choose Multiple POVs, stick to three at most, unless you really have the time and space to develop them further. Three is a good number, it makes sense to humans on an instinctual level. You can have a 'hero,' a 'lover,' and a 'buddy' or 'villain,' for instance. Even more interesting and slightly more advanced is two heroes, who are each other's villains. Deathnote does this almost well.

Though your audience is likely older, you'll want to separate POVs by chapter at minimum. Riordan puts the characters name at the start of each chapter. That's probably a bit much for NA, but it won't necessarily hurt you to be clear when you switch. Following a pattern can be formulaic, but also helpful. Riordan does this as well, though I wish he'd broken it for the climax sequences.

And finally, the desire line is the only thing that will keep a reader going. If you loose that, you just have a bunch of scenes with no purpose. So make sure you understand how the POV you choose will affect the desire line of your story. Don't shoot yourself in the foot before you even start running.

If You Plot It, Will They Come? Dredd 2012 A Case Study

While I won't say it's necessarily universal, most people would agree the first Judge Dredd movie with Sly was too heavy and over-burdened to carry it's plot.

The new version, released just last year, took a 180 opposite approach to the subject, and even went so far as to nail each of Larry Brooks plot points nearly on the nose, in an attempt, I feel, to erase the problems of the gargantuan plot issues in the first movie.

UK native, Alex Garland went through various idea trying to eliminate the problems of the first movie. But he found himself straying too big as well, as he fell into the mythos of the Dredd world, something graphic novel adaptations constantly deal with, but I think is shared by fantasy authors as well.

Then in 2011, The Raid: Redemption garnered international recognition, about a S.W.A.T. team trapped in a hostile tenement. I think this is where Garland found his focus, a tightly controlled setting for a tightly controlled plot.

At $50 million gross, Dredd has been considered successful enough to warrant sequels, though whether those will come is to be seen. What I'd like to explore is the relationship between that success and the movie's ability to hit the 'money shots' that Larry Brooks very eloquently enumerated.

I'll leave the discussion to decide whether it was strict adherence that made Dredd a success, or if there was more to it than that.

Main Plot Points

Hook 

Dredd is alone, pursuing a trio of addicts in a Volkswagen. They kill a pedestrian, motivating Dredd to move from pursuit to attack. Cue special effects, flip, flip, crash. Blood. One gets away. "This is not a negotiation" says Dredd, and pop goes the weasel.

Analysis Two key ideas are shown with extreme precision. Dredd refuses back up, despite being out numbered, and he strictly adheres to the law even though a hostage's life is at stake. This is the character in five minutes, and it's got guns and face melting, everything a boy likes.

Inciting Incident 

Ma-Ma, evil drug kingpin, skins and tosses three dealers from 200 floors up to remind the Peach Trees residents who's in charge.

Analysis While the antagonist is often best hid, Garland wants you to see the amazing Lena Headly with her carved up face. She, in only about 15 minutes of screen time, makes the stakes very clear. She is control, this is her house, and when the Judges inevitably come, they are going to do so at her mercy. Since Dredd is so violent, and so absolute, having an antagonist that is worse is extremely important to keep the "moral" scales balanced.

Introduce Heroes 

Dredd, recalled from his bust, meets the Chief and sees the Rookie, Anderson, in an interrogation cell. She's a mutant, a psychic, and like most judges, an orphan. She didn't pass her qualifying exams, but the brass want to give her one more shot. Dredd is visibly and vocatively against this idea, but an order is an order.

Analysis Despite having a clear antagonist in Ma-Ma, Garland goes further, introducing a dual hero structure where the main dramatic tensions is between them and not with the outside force. This is brilliant. Again, we find out Dredd is an orphan and no children were made dirty and tearful in the filming of back story. We assume, rightly, that he passed his exams with top marks. And again, we see his adherence to absolute justice. "She failed," he says.

The conflict of the movie is not Judge vs. Ma-Ma, that's just background fodder. The conflict is Judge vs. Judge, absolute black and white vs. grey.

First Plot Point 

Dredd and Anderson, having located the likely culprits for the three dead bodies in Peach Trees, shoot up the drug den and capture one of Ma-Ma's lieutenants. Anderson reads his mind, realizes he's more than he seems, and the judges march him out for interrogation, only to discover that Ma-Ma has locked the entire mega-building down with ten foot thick blast doors.

Analysis While inciting incidents can overlap with first plot points, I like it when they don't. The inciting incident, pushed far enough forward can dramatically foreshadow the impending external conflict. Even while we're getting to know the Judges, we know what they don't, that they're walking into a lions' den. This turns what could be gratuitous slo-mo violence and death into dramatic tension as we wait to see how the inevitable collision will occur. And of course, the plot point happens nearly precisely at 25% of run time.

First Pinch Point 

Ma-Ma again uses her power to lock the judges into a small area on one floor and proceeds to use chain-guns to rip the place to shreds, killing many of her residents and nearly getting the Judges and their quarry in the process.

Analysis Perfect use of a pinch point to demonstrate overwhelming power both of the environment and over her people. Also, clearly, she doesn't care about anyone but herself. The simple plan of evade capture by the Judges is utterly destroyed, and the wanderers realize they can't wander like this much longer. Also, Dredd and Ma-Ma make eye contact, again by the book. Though we've seen her before, this is the first time hero and villain meet, and it's not an even match at all.

Midpoint Context Change 

Distracted by two teens, Anderson is taken hostage while Dredd stuns rather than kills the two boys pointing guns at him. Only moments before, the two Judges disagree on whether to take the fight directly to Ma-Ma or wait for backup.

Analysis Based on Dredd's rules, Anderson has now failed, again, because she looses her weapon to their hostage. This act of separation and failure of the two heroes is the catalyst that moves them from wanderers to warriors. Anderson has nothing to loose except her life, and Dredd is now compelled to take the fight to Ma-Ma without waiting for back up. Even though we've known this was coming, the changing context is beautifully achieved while showing that Dredd has the capacity for mercy.

Second Pinch Point 

Ma-Ma calls in dirty Judges who offer to kill Dredd for $1 million credits. The wolves are in the building.

Analysis Just as the context of the conflict changes, the context of the opposition moves from purely physical to mental, which will lead directly into the final confrontation. Ma-Ma not only control her mega-building, she can infect and control justice itself, for a price. Lena Headley does an amazing job with two lines of showing her power and her powerlessness in the system of corruption she is exploiting.

Second Plot Point 

There's a weak and a strong one. The weak one is when another Judge assumes the rookie is going to flinch when they face off, reversing an earlier occurrence where Anderson hesitates to carry out justice. For Dredd, it comes when he is shot and out of ammunition, and must delay the dirty Judge from killing him until Anderson can gun him down from behind.

Analysis First conflict separates the Anderson and Dredd, then physical separation occurs. So the resolution of their conflict is naturally the rejoining of them first physically, and second when Anderson takes charge. This is echoed moments later when she reads someone's mind and introduces 'evidence' Dredd cannot see to render judgment despite his objections. He makes a face that says, "I like this one," but she can't see him when he does. This is the final bit of new information, Anderson is strong now, Dredd declares "You look ready," calling back the same scene from an hour before where he said the reverse. But it is also a call back to Dredd refusing backup. He has been brought low, and must be rescued, something that is unnatural for him. They reach a new equilibrium between them so they can both make the decision to risk death in order to stop Ma-Ma.

Final Battle 

Ma-Ma has a dead mans's switch, threatening to level the entire building if Dredd guns her down. Dredd enacts ironic justice by giving her a puff of her slo-mo narcotic and betting that her transmitter won't reach through 200 floor of concrete, and throws her out her own penthouse window.

Analysis It's ironic reversal at its most obvious. The mighty falls, the same torture of time she used on her victims now becomes her own tomb. And the battle is fought with the mind and the will, not with the gun. Dredd passes Anderson, even though she thinks she failed. He enters the grey area, he makes that tiny little change in his character, while she goes from scared rookie to established veteran.

Every plot point on the money, at exactly the right point in time. It's a textbook case for Brooks methodology, and it appears to have worked.

What do you think? Is it a matter of hitting the right points at the right time?