Writing, whether in literature or film, often involves common mistakes that negatively affect the plot of the story that the writer is trying to portray. Some writers are too proud of their work to see their flaws, while others do not notice their writing’s weaknesses. In this article, I will review the common mistakes writers make. These mistakes can often make a story feel generic, turning a would-be-interesting character into a bland cliche.
The first sin of writing is a poor use of dialogue:
Some writers write a character’s dialogue, with the character sounding unnatural when they talk. When a character speaks, it should sound natural and coherent. A writer should not use a character’s dialogue as a tool for exposition; instead, dialogue should be used to flesh out the character better. Dialogue is an exciting tool in writing, for it allows the characters in a story to interact with one another in a natural setting. Having characters interact with each other through dialogue can let the characters in a story convey their personalities and even desires through simple conversation. Having a character perform simple acts of compassion or cruelty through dialogue can flesh out a character’s personality far better than what could be achieved through simple action. The most important thing a writer can do when conveying a character’s personality through dialogue is to make the dialogue sound natural and not forced. Dialogue should always sound like a natural conversation, not just some simple script lines.
The second sin of writing is creating uninspired characters:
When writing characters, writers often try to make their characters likable and realistic, but sometimes, a writer will also want their character to be heroic. Unfortunately, writers frequently mistake a flawless character for a heroic one. More often than not, when writers pursue the goal of making the perfect heroic character of a story, they tend to focus on all the great traits that make a desirable hero but forget about all the integral flaws that make that character more realistic and interesting. A heroic character is not flawless; often, the struggle of a hero to overcome their flaws makes them brave in the first place. In short, a character must not be a flawless embodiment of perfection to be a hero or likable. A character can have flaws, and flaws can make a character more likable by having the character strive to better themselves and overcome their weaknesses, which can create an interesting and endearing character.
The third sin of writing is creating uninspired themes:
The third sin of writing is creating a boring and generic theme. A well-developed theme challenges our current viewpoint and makes us think about the primary meaning of the story. The theme should serve as the grounded point of the story, for it should be the lesson that the story’s characters and plot are centered around. However, writers, especially those working in modern film, have forgotten how to create an interesting theme or central concept for a story. I’ve recently seen the most bland and uninspired theme portrayed in recent movies. These themes often need to be more varied and include concepts like good triumphing over evil, unity’s importance, and trust’s value. These themes could make for an interesting concept in a story, but often, writers create interesting premises for stories and fail miserably in the execution of said stories. Usually, in modern cinema, themes will derail due to a lack of focus on a specific conflict and juggling too many concepts simultaneously. Having multiple complex themes as an integral part of a story can be significant. The problem is that when writers try to convey too many themes throughout the story, it often makes the story more cohesive and makes the point of the story lose focus and become jarring. Sticking to one theme at a time and building off that theme to make a unique and exciting story is a good idea. When crafting a story, writers sometimes must make their themes inherently complex to create a well-crafted story. Some of the greatest stories ever known had straightforward themes.
How to write a good theme:
The foremost thing writers need to understand when crafting well-thought-out themes for stories is to keep the theme simple enough to develop a plot around and to ground the characters and story itself into that theme. In short, if a writer wants to write a story about the horrors of past sins and the struggle for repentance and redemption, the story should be about redemption, not just some cheap run-of-the-mill tough guy action film. But with the state of modern writing and stories, I would give you straightforward advice on how to write what you know. If writers need help understanding the fundamentals of a concept they want to write about, they should do themselves and the audience a favor and not write about it. Instead, writers should take an idea they are familiar with, pick up some inspiration surrounding that concept, and write a decent story. Writing a story based on what the writer already knows can allow a writer to better structure a theme and story. When writers already have prior knowledge of the theme they are trying to develop, they often better understand what they are writing about, which can lead to them creating an exciting story.
The fourth sin of writing is creating boring plots:
When writers try to develop an interesting plot, they often have an interesting premise for the story but fail in the execution of that premise by not fully fleshing out conflicts and characters. Modern writers need to understand that when writing a well-written story, it is often best to keep your main plot straightforward but add complexity by developing the conflict and characters of the story. The story’s conflict does not have to be complex to be impactful, for the conflict of a story can be as simple as two individuals having a dispute. Of course, the individual dispute must be well-fleshed out and interesting. Fleshing out the characters could be accomplished by giving the characters an intertwined past. Modern writers should find inspiration for their stories by looking back at the simple yet well-written stories that became classics. When you look at your favorite stories, more often than not, you can summarize them in a few sentences. But nowadays, the plot of a story usually has to be needlessly complicated and complex enough to the point where a novel could be written about it. Complexity is not inherently wrong, but it can lead to a jarring and underwhelming story if the story is not retrained. The best-written plots consist of characters continuously being realistically developed over a story and the conflict being the centerpiece of these characters’ development and growth. Once writers learn how to keep a plot simple yet develop it throughout the story, there will be an exceptional increase in the quality of storytelling in modern cinema and literature.
