"The Art of Story-Telling" An Evaluation On What Makes A Great Story

 

  Part 1/6        

            I’ve been writing stories since I was six years old. Story-telling always had a special place in my heart. I’ve found that every interest that I’ve ever had has always been some form of story-telling. My earliest interest, and one I still have today, is art. Through my art I always communicated some kind of emotion which conveys to a story. Another interest that I’ve had was videography. I wanted to make movies and tell a story through that movie. I’ve also always loved music and communicating feelings and stories through music.

            Recently, I have started back to writing after almost of an entire year of no new ideas and worlds. I have really regained an interest in it and loved it far beyond what I used to.

            Since growing back into writing I’ve found myself being able to connect to other stories much more closely, but also as a downside really strongly disconnecting from poorly told stories.

            There have been four stories that have found a place in my heart and love with a strong passion. These three are all different mediums of story-telling. The first one is a book called The Dragonrider Chronicles. The second is a saga of movies titled Star Wars. The third is a video-game called Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic. And the fourth is a TV series called Avatar: The Last Airbender. My two favorites out of these are the Star Wars saga and Avatar: The Last Airbender. Though it is difficult to choose between these two, Star Wars finds itself a little higher. Star Wars I like for the depth of the world, all the different stories from it, and the characters. But, in terms of the story-telling, I believe that Avatar: The Last Airbender is superior to all four of these in terms of raw story-telling and character development. Not to mention the beautifully crafted relationships between the characters of the series that I have never seen more incredibly portrayed or designed than in this one series.

            Here, not only will you learn the art of writing, but story-telling. This can apply to any form of media that tells a story, a book, writings, movies, television, art, painting, and even music. Using Star Wars and Avatar: The Last Airbender as examples, let’s dive into the art of story-telling.

Part 2/6 

    There are three main elements of story-telling that both Star Wars and Avatar: The Last Airbender exceed in. If these three elements of story-telling are mastered, then this is what makes such a beloved story. This is why both these stories are so well loved and known, is because they have all these elements mastered.

            The elements of story-telling are:

            Style. How the story is written, how good the author is at conveying the emotion of the story.

            World. The world is where your reader or consumer are in, it has to feel real. It’s also where your characters live and it even defines how they might act in certain situations.

            Characters. In my opinion the most important element. Sometimes an author can get away without an amazing world if and only if they have really, really strong, good quality characters. Characters, despite being the most important, are also the hardest element to get down, that’s why when a character is written really well the story can lift off the page, becoming a world of its own.

Part 3/6 

    Now, delving deeper into these three elements we first start out with:

            Style. This element is probably the most personal and one that cannot really be taught. It depends completely on who you are as a person. It can be shaped and helped, but it cannot be taught. Style is one that you will have to learn on your own, by practice and taking in lots of other stories. As an example, my style of story-telling is a little peculiar, I like poetic-like writing, but at the same time flowery over the top poetry I is something I cannot handle. In my stories I like to sprinkle in some poetic-like writing usually to illustrate an emotion inside a character. Style is something that you must find out for yourself. Though the help I can give you is consuming other stories. You build your particular style from mixing and matching the styles of those you like. So next time your reading, watching, or even listening to a story and pay attention to the style and how the story-teller conveys certain things to the consumer.

Part 4/6 

    World. In this section I get to use some examples. In world-building you must have a past, a present, and a hoped future. What does this mean? Well, in setting up your story your characters are always in the present time. But a present time always has to have a past, a backstory, to explain how we got here. In Star Wars we don’t just have one world, but a whole galaxy of them! But this galaxy isn’t a happy one. No, this galaxy is under control of the Empire and it’s tyrannical Sith ruler: Emperor Palpatine or Darth Sidious. This is the present time, but how’d we get here? Well, in episodes 1-3, or as most call them: The Prequels, we get to see this.    It starts with the decline of the Galactic Republic, which has stood for nearly five-thousand years, then the decline and fall of the young Jedi, Anakin Skywalker, and his transformation to Darth Vader. This is the past and present of the Star Wars galaxy, now the hoped future is for the Empire to fall, but how? This is where the story-telling happens. The journey from present to future.

            Now that the world is built though, the next part of world-building is culture. Every planet in Star Wars has a unique culture every species has a backstory. This part of world-building can be tricky and sometimes doesn’t have to be fully explored.

            Now it’s time to get into the third part of world-building: Magic Systems. This part is completely optional and isn’t used in every story. However, when it is it makes the story and events very compelling and adds an extra layer of depth and mystery into how the magic works. In Star Wars this “magic” is called the “Force” and only a select few individuals can even have command of the Force. Force sensitivity is determined by a Medichlorian count. Medichlorians are cells in a living being’s body. Most hardly have any Medichlorians but those who do have a lot more can feel the Force. The higher your Medichlorian count, the stronger in the Force you are.

Part 5/6 

    Characters. Characters are the most important aspect of your story and also my personal favorite aspect. Characters must have flaws, an arc, connections, and talents. The most important character to give all these to is your protagonist. Though, it is important that your main character has all these things, sometimes side characters can start to outshine even the protagonist.

            This is something I will talk about at the end when I get into Avatar: The Last Airbender. This is one of the big, big, big reasons the story-telling in this show is so phenomenal.

            Every character important to the story needs to have at least a small backstory and a flaw to give them personality. Side characters need to have an intriguing past, flaws and insecurities, connections to the protagonist and the other side characters, strengths, and a satisfying character arc. The protagonist needs to have all the same things the side characters do, just on a grander level. Now, the antagonist… this is a tricky one. Antagonists need to have a good motivation to do what they’re doing. Remember, they believe that what they are doing is the right thing. You actually need to make the reader or consumer feel bad for the villain.

            One of favorite examples of this being done in a beautiful outstanding way is through the Star Wars prequel trilogy, the novelizations of the movie to be more specific. Anakin Skywalker’s arc is something that is called a corruption arc. This is something I should bring up.          Your story doesn’t have to be about a good guy saving the world. It can be about a good guy who’s trying to save the world, but ends up breaking it instead, which is exactly what happens in Anakin’s story. This can also be done vise-versa in what is called a redemption arc. Redemption arcs are probably some of the hardest arcs to write. They require a lot of build-up and are very rarely done right. Not even Star Wars does it right in Episode Six. Remember, the antagonist is a really bad person. You need to have the just the right set up to perform a redemption arc. The only example of a truly great redemption arc I can think of is in Avatar: The Last Airbender. This is another huge reason why Avatar: The Last Airbender’s story is so great.

Part 6/6 

    Now, we’ve finished talking about the elements of story-telling using Star Wars as an example, but now why don’t I show you why I believe Avatar: The Last Airbender I believe is one of the best, if not the ultimate, example of great story-telling.

            I’ve saved this for last because, for one now that we have the knowledge of what makes a great story, we can look at this TV series and make a pretty good guess as to why it’s so popular.       Second, is for spoilers. If anyone reading this thinks they might have plans on watching the series… Spoiler Warning. Now, onto the discussion.

           

            First let me just tell you that Avatar: The Last Airbender is a Nickelodeon American-made anime cartoon that came out in 2005. And it’s a kid’s show! Now I am not a big fan of kid’s cartoons, mostly because of the really bad story-telling. The characters are usually very dry and only for comic relief. The antagonist has no real reason for being bad at all and the character arcs are little-to-nothing. So, I had no intentions of actually watching this show.

            Well, not too long ago a YouTuber that I watch started talking about this show and saying how great the story was. This YouTuber gives a lot of story-telling advice, and that’s what her whole channel is about, is writing. So, when she started referencing it in her videos, I started paying a little more attention when people started talking about Avatar: The Last Airbender. Then I remembered that a while back a close friend had recommended this show to me.

            A few months after that my parents invited two young couples over for lunch. They were students at the school of preaching at my church. I made a connection with them when they found out my love for Star Wars. After talking with them a while, Avatar: The Last Airbender made it into our conversation when one of them asked me if I’d seen the show. I responded by saying, “No, but I’ve heard it has a great story.” Then all of them started saying, “Oooh, yes, it does.” They started telling me that I should give it a try.

            After that my interest was piqued and I remembered my mom also telling me I should watch it, but then I brushed it off my list after learning it was a kid’s show. But I still wasn’t quite convinced enough. Soon though, I made friends with two other girls around my age who were huge fans of the series. And after them constantly persuading me to watch it, I finally gave in and turned it on one night.

            I was certainly all hyped up for this show, I had some major expectations from how much credit this show seemed to be getting. But, the first few episodes of “Book One: Water” (which is what they call season one) were kind of a let-down for me. The biggest problem I was having was the comedy. It seemed like every other kid’s show, when something meaningful or important happened there was always some dry joke or sarcasm that ruined the experience. I nearly gave up on watching it, that was until about halfway through “Book One: Water” when something started changing. The show began building and everything I’d just brushed off as a side tangent arc in this world just came together and then I realized how deep this show went.

            And from there the emotional aspect of this just blew up. The depth of the show surprised me.

            I’m not one to cry at all during shows, or movies, or books, and even it makes me feel sad I usually can hold tears in. This show however made me full-out cry nearly three times! I was so glad I was watching in my room and no one ever walked in because I admit it was kind of embarrassing how much this show got to me.

            The group of characters in this show are so believable and so incredibly flawed, but yet I love them all to death, like I know them personally! But the thing that is so great and impressive about this show isn’t even the main character, it’s the villain. This is where the spoilers come in.         The first antagonist we meet is a young man named Zuko (Zoo-ko). At first you think he’s just your average bad guy out to destroy the world, but soon you learn that Zuko is much, much more than that. He has the largest, deepest, and most emotional character arc in the series and it gets very deep and emotional really fast.

            All the characters in this show are incredibly written, but not just that, the world as well is so real and deeply flawed. It’s not a black and white world where good and evil is clearly defined, but the lines between good and evil are very blurred. The world is also amazing the way cultures and areas are defined. The magic system within the world seems very simple on the outside but has so much depth to it. In that you can bend the set rules inside of the magic system itself which is very satisfying. When you think a character might do this, then they turn around and do something brand new and exciting.

            But again, the biggest thing with this series is the outstanding character work and the connections and sacrificial friendships all the characters have with each other. Every character has an arc and flaws and even personalities that make them butt-heads with each other. By the end of the series I was completely blown away by the fact that this was a Nickelodeon cartoon!   And the characters, their arcs, Zuko’s redemption arc, and the world, aren’t good for a kid’s show. No, they are good as in for any story! Just flat out amazing story-telling in general. And it amazes me how deep the creators were willing to go, even though it was a show for younger audiences.

            Now, why is it that this show is so good it makes me go off on a full-blown rant (which by the way I apologize for) about it above? Take the aspects of the elements of story-telling and apply them here.

           Style. The way this show communicated it’s meaning was a subtle act of genius. As I said before, this is a kid’s show so having real world problems that are truly scary to young audiences just isn’t possible. But, does this show go into some deep things? Yes, it does. It crafts the story in a way that it nods subtly to certain aspects that young viewers may not understand, but an older audience can pick up on and get a deeper meaning to the show.

            World. The world of Avatar is one of the most beautifully crafted I’ve ever seen. In this show you have the four nations; the Water Tribes, the Firenation (the bad guys), the Earth Kingdom, and the Air Nomads, who have literally been wiped out to the point of extinction. But even though the Firenation are shown to be the bad guys and the Earth Kingdom and Water Tribes the good, it is shown to us later that this really isn’t true. The actions or morals of every single person isn’t defined by the majority of the people who live in that area. In the Earth Kingdom and Water Tribes there are some bad people, in what is supposed to be the good guy’s territories. In the Firenation there are genuinely good people despite the Firenation being the “bad guys” so to speak. And aside from that the culture in each nation varies and, in the end, you have a beautifully crafted world.

            Character. The central and best aspect of the show. In thinking about this show each character has a completely different personality and outlook on the world. Each have their own past and future. And one of the best things is their relationships with each other. Every member of our main cast has a completely different relationship with the others in “Team Avatar.” The way each character interacts with each other is arguably one of the defining aspects of what makes the series great.

            “Team Avatar,” Aang, Katara, Sokka, Toph, and Zuko, throughout the series always have this close familial bond. Katara, my favorite character, is the mother of the group and Aang’s Waterbending master. Aang, my second favorite (it’s always a tie for 1^st between Katara and Aang), is of course the Avatar and he, Sokka, and Toph, are usually the comedic aspects. Sokka, is the comic-relief, but is also the protector. Toph, is the funny, wild-child and Aang’s Earthbending teacher. She also butts heads with Katara a lot because of their pretty much opposing personalities. And Zuko, the Firenation prince is Aang’s Firebending master and also is key to defeating the Firelord and ending the “Hundred Year War.”

            The characters in this show have some of the greatest character development in story-telling.

 

            I think this show is a great example of genuinely great story-telling. By watching movies and shows, reading books, and even sometimes playing video-games you can see great story-telling. If you teach yourself to look at these things through the eyes of a story-teller, you’ll end up connecting to worlds much more closely and loving stories that you otherwise wouldn’t like. Also, by looking at things through the eyes of a story-teller you will learn how to take things from your favorite stories, mold them, and shape them into your own story.

            This is the art of story-telling.