"The first episode is a very classic thriller. You’re discombulated, you’re with the characters, right? You’re going through this discombulating experience, you’re playing catch up. So there’s a lot of these plot questions about like what has happened, what is he accused of, you know, all these kinds of questions, which are kind of plot questions, kind of keep us hooked."
— Stu Willis | DZ-118: ADOLESCENCE -- How Questions Create Dramatic Tension
Plot Questions Drive Thriller Momentum
"The first episode is a very classic thriller. You're discombulated, you're with the characters, right? You're going through this discombulating experience, you're playing catch up. So there's a lot of these plot questions about like what has happened, what is he accused of, you know, all these kinds of questions, which are kind of plot questions, kind of keep us hooked."
— Stu Willis
(00:25:34)
· DZ-118: ADOLESCENCE -- How Questions Create Dramatic Tension
How do dramatic questions create tension?
AI✦Stu and Chas show how the writers control which questions the audience asks at any given moment--plot questions in episode one (did Jamie do it?), character questions in episode three (will the psychologist understand him?), and thematic questions by episode four--creating tension regardless of whether plot is actually progressing.✦
Listen when you need tension without external stakes--subtext, stillness, and thematic weight do the work.
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In this episode, Stu and Chas delve into the cultural phenomenon of ADOLESCENCE. We try to find the craft tools that have made the show so compelling and such a catalyst for conversation…
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How do audience questions shape scenes?
AI✦The episode’s central thesis examines how plot, character, and thematic questions work together to shape what an audience needs answered in any given moment on screen.✦
Listen if learn how to structure individual scenes through the questions you pose to your audience!
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Inspired by our earlier episodes on sequences, Chas and Stu narrow their focus to look at the atomic unit of screen storytelling: the scene. In particular, we breakdown how question and answers prompted in the audience structure individual scenes…
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What questions do you want your audience asking at any given time?
AI✦The episode’s central question asks what questions you want your audience asking at any given time, using narrative POV as the mechanism to generate and sustain those questions throughout your story.✦
Listen if you want to understand how narrative point of view can organise your entire story structure
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Waaaaaaaaaay back in DZ-5, Stu and Chas examined how shifting narrative point of view (i.e. what the audience knows in relation to the characters on screen) heightens emotions in any given scene. We’ve now taken that micro idea and applied it to the macro: how can deciding what the audience knows and when in relation to the characters organise your story? Are whole sequences or even acts driven by the audience following a character, feeling concerned about a character, empathising with a character or being absorbed in the irony of knowing more than all the characters interacting on screen…
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Can forcing your audience to ask questions - and then answering them - trigger an emotional response?
AI✦The episode’s central thesis is that forcing your audience to ask questions and then answering them triggers emotional response, making question generation the engine of the craft.✦
Listen to learn about the most powerful tool in screenwriting: narrative POV.
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Stu and Chas delve into audience point of view - not character point of view! Does your audience know more, less or the same as your characters? And does changing this within a scene trigger or heighten the desired emotional response…
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How does ending your story on the climax affect audience experience?
AI✦Mel notes that the script’s ending would have left her asking ‘oh it’s deliberately making me go tashi is excited about one of them winning the point,’ whereas the filmed version leaves her with an entirely different set of unresolved questions about the three characters’ future.✦
Listen to understand how withholding resolution can make your story great!
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While Stu is on show, Mel and Chas sit down to analyse the meaning behind the ending of 2024’s CHALLENGERS, especially when - upon reading the script - the most impactful moment of the ending on screen (for Chas in particular) is not written on the page…
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How does interweaving two timelines change how the audience feel?
AI✦Stu and Chas examine what questions the interweaving of timelines prompts in viewers, treating audience inquiry as a direct consequence of non-linear storytelling choices.✦
Listen when you're writting multiple timelines and struggling to anchor your reader to one timeline's perspective.
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Stu and Chas are joined by Mel Killingsworth to dissect interweaving timelines. Not anthology films. Not Cloud Atlas. But films where two plot lines featuring the same characters, but from different timelines, are woven together…
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What if there is no antagonist?
AI✦By making the film itself the antagonist, these works generate questions not about plot but about what the audience is being shown and why -- turning narrative uncertainty into the engine of engagement.✦
Listen to turn narrative uncertainty itself into the engine that keeps viewers compelled.
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It’s time. The Epic Deep Dive(TM) into Antagonists has reached its shuddering conclusion. And for this Part V - by choosing films that have no obvious singular antagonist (and in some cases no obvious narrative either) - Stu and Chas realised there was indeed a final category of antagonists: the films themselves. Where the film (and the filmmaker) are engaging directly with the audience. Where the films are... VERSUS AUDIENCE…
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