Decompressed storytelling is really inflated storytelling, and it's a scam

[WillieMorgan]

This story will soon surpass 2,000 hits, and it's gotten a lot of feedback from unbiased readers. I know what the consensus about it is. So how did I manage toi write it, and three others? A major reason was that I used the best tool that was available to help me write them. I recognized that I couldn't invent my own tool that was just as good. Or worse yet, use no tool at all.to

There's nothing to argue about where this tool is concerned. It works, and it has no competitor.

Well, one of those 2,000 hits was me but I'm afraid that I didn't actually get around to reading your obviously perfectly formulated fan-faction. So it's actually 1,999 hits....

I keep trying to get hold of that Bruce Springsteen bloke you know. His albums are all over the place. They should be structured to 12 songs, each one exactly 3 minutes and 20 seconds long. That's the perfect formula for albums. I should know because I've recorded a few demos. Thing is, the selfish tosser won't even respond. He just WON'T LISTEN. It's definitely his loss you know. He'll be sorry when I'm a massively successful singer-songwriter with my perfectly constructed albums. I'll tell you all now. I'm the future of rock'n'roll. Not just some delusional bloke on the internet.

[t hedge coke]

Well, one of those 2,000 hits was me but I'm afraid that I didn't actually get around to reading your obviously perfectly formulated fan-faction. So it's actually 1,999 hits....

I keep trying to get hold of that Bruce Springsteen bloke you know. His albums are all over the place. They should be structured to 12 songs, each one exactly 3 minutes and 20 seconds long. That's the perfect formula for albums. I should know because I've recorded a few demos. Thing is, the selfish tosser won't even respond. He just WON'T LISTEN. It's definitely his loss you know. He'll be sorry when I'm a massively successful singer-songwriter with my perfectly constructed albums. I'll tell you all now. I'm the future of rock'n'roll. Not just some delusional bloke on the internet.

Stupid Springsteen can't even cover a classic song without somehow extending it to twelve minutes and his band puts a sax solo in there and I can't even tell. Like they think they know what they're doing or something.

[borntohula]

You raise a point that, while I'm sure someone has brought up before, hasn't been directly asked. What about works that don't adhere to a typical act structure but instead a holistic structure? Take Ennis' Hitman or Robinson's Starman, for example. They each have variable arc length, but work best as a whole (75 issues the former, 50 the latter, roughly). The work, as a whole, has a three act structure with a beginning, a middle and an end. You could say the same thing about other mega runs, like Morrison's Batman as well.

100Bullets 100 issue run jumps back and forth quite alot with several overlapping story lines. Feels like reading jazz. Layers upon layers that leaves alot of questions that slowly forms possible answers.

[Lee Stone]

So all these "look at my example" comments were just an attempt to rack up hits, so you can use that as proof?

In that case, I offer up the Kirby Awards, the Eisner Awards, the Harvey Awards, the Ignatz Awards and the Diamond Sales Charts on Comichron.

And you may want to read the instructional books by Scott McCloud and Will Eisner.

[BatmanJones]

Well, one of those 2,000 hits was me but I'm afraid that I didn't actually get around to reading your obviously perfectly formulated fan-faction. So it's actually 1,999 hits....

I expect most of the hits were that. After months of this a lot of us have gone to click on his fan fiction out of curiosity only to close the window after reading a sentence or two. Adjust for that and I expect only a handful have actually managed to read anything he's written to the end.

[Conn Seanery]

I realize the OP has put himself out there as an example of the point he's trying to make, but that doesn't mean behavior rules go out the window as result. Keep things civil or don't post.

[Trey Strain]

The three-act structure -- it works, and you should accept no homemade substitute. That's my point.

[Carabas]

The three-act structure -- it works, and you should accept no homemade substitute. That's my point.

All structures are homemade. The very concept of story is homemade.

[JBatmanFan05]

While indeed editors conspire some to expand out stories that can be done better with fewer issues, you can't get too rigid about it.

The biggest problem is getting comic companies to relax their rigid desire for longer stories at the expense of many stories.

Limiting all stories to 4 issues isn't the answer. The industry needs to reconsider "writing for the TPB" idea that drives it all.

[Carabas]

While indeed editors conspire some to expand out stories that can be done better with fewer issues, you can't get too rigid about it.

The biggest problem is getting comic companies to relax their rigid desire for longer stories at the expense of many stories.

Limiting all stories to 4 issues isn't the answer. The industry needs to reconsider "writing for the TPB" idea to drives it all.

The industry would probably do better to reconsider if in this day and age the 20 page pamflet is still a viable thing, especially at that price.

[Prisoner 6655321]

I'd argue that stories with beginnings middles and ends are fairly artificial but sometimes useful literary devices and that the ongoing arc structure allows stories to be told that are more akin to how events really unfold.

[cranger]

I don't know if there are any rules that need to be put in place although I do think too many books have gotten of track and would be helped by following more conventional storytelling techniques.

The industry would probably do better to reconsider if in this day and age the 20 page pamflet is still a viable thing, especially at that price.

They have to pick one or the other. Monthlies get hurt because they have to take into account that people are going to be reading issues back to back in a collection and collected format gets hurt because every twenty pages ends up following the same formula to make it readable to the monthly reader.

[AdamFTF]

The industry would probably do better to reconsider if in this day and age the 20 page pamflet is still a viable thing, especially at that price.

Geez, doesn't anyone else call it a comic magazine anymore. Because it is a magazine, even if other magazines are bigger and longer.

[Mighty Roman]

OK, are stories being overlong a problem? Sometimes. Should we restrict stories to 4 issues? God, no. Like someone upthread mentioned, there are o many stories of varying lengths that are all great reads. For example Astro City: The Nearness of You (1 Issue), Spider-Island (9 if I remember correctly?), Batman: The Killing Joke (1), and Grim Hunt (4 issues).

As for a 6 panel structure, do you know what was one of the most critically acclaimed, award winning comics this year? Multiversity: Pax Americana. They have some very interesting Panel structures, which vastly benefit the storytelling, by switching around and playing with said structure:
https://nothingbutcomics.files.wordp...1/img_6413.png
https://p.dreamwidth.org/4f7ee59e827...axamevpj08.jpg
http://multiversitystatic.s3.amazona...CPAX-SMP-2.jpg

[Carabas]

Geez, doesn't anyone else call it a comic magazine anymore. Because it is a magazine, even if other magazines are bigger and longer.

Trades are also comic magazines. Those huge manga phone book-looking periodicals are comic magazines. Magazines are simply periodical publications.

A pamphlet is specifically an unbound booklet (that is, without a hard cover or binding). It may consist of a single sheet of paper that is printed on both sides and folded in half, in thirds, or in fourths, called a leaflet, or it may consist of a few pages that are folded in half and saddle stapled at the crease to make a simple book.