Timeline for How to include deliberate inconsistencies without it seeming like lazy or bad writing?
Current License: CC BY-SA 4.0
26 events
| when toggle format | what | by | license | comment | |
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| May 7, 2022 at 11:43 | history | edited | aurorajack | CC BY-SA 4.0 |
edited title
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| May 6, 2022 at 21:23 | comment | added | ekl | The book "Finity" by John Barnes has a similar plot point of reality changing in unexpected ways which causes the characters to doubt their sanity. The book as a whole isn't necessarily a prime example of great writing, but I think the reality changes are done really well and could give you some ideas. | |
| May 6, 2022 at 17:09 | comment | added | Wrzlprmft | To what extent is the character you are following a point-of-view character? For example, could your story as well be first person (if it isn’t already)? | |
| May 6, 2022 at 8:53 | comment | added | Luaan | How do the characters notice the changes? That's the kind of thing that desperately needs consistency too. But in any case, this is going to be really hard. It's frustrating to no end how we've been trained to ignore things like continuity errors and illogical stuff, only for it to then come back as a clue (i.e. "This is completely ridiculous, but it's poorly produced sci-fi, so I'll suspend disbelief..."). It's especially annoying in work that changes that quality over time (e.g. compare the stupidities in the later Expanse show to how well-designed many things were in the first season). | |
| May 5, 2022 at 19:08 | history | edited | aurorajack | CC BY-SA 4.0 |
deleted 12 characters in body; edited title
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| S May 5, 2022 at 18:31 | history | suggested | Peter Mortensen | CC BY-SA 4.0 |
Copy edited (e.g. ref. <https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sentence_clause_structure#Run-on_sentences>). Clearer title.
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| May 5, 2022 at 18:15 | review | Suggested edits | |||
| S May 5, 2022 at 18:31 | |||||
| May 5, 2022 at 8:07 | comment | added | Stef | @obe I transitioned from "freaked out and wondering whether I'm losing my marbles" to "rationally scared and looking for a new place to live" | |
| May 5, 2022 at 3:00 | history | tweeted | twitter.com/StackWriting/status/1522048494680293376 | ||
| May 5, 2022 at 1:09 | comment | added | N. Virgo | Another example of something that plays with inconsistency is Westworld season 1. I don't want to say much for fear of spoiling it, but it's really nicely done. | |
| May 5, 2022 at 0:15 | answer | added | DWKraus | timeline score: 3 | |
| May 4, 2022 at 22:28 | comment | added | obe | @Stef and were you less freaked out after your discovery? personally i'd rather have aliens move my stuff around than my landlord... | |
| May 4, 2022 at 17:58 | comment | added | computercarguy | This completely explains why I'm apparently always misplacing tools I just put down. As well as the "safe place" I put things that can never be found again. And putting things back in their place, only for them to never be there when I'm looking for them. | |
| May 4, 2022 at 17:32 | answer | added | Roger Lucas | timeline score: 6 | |
| May 4, 2022 at 16:29 | comment | added | Murphy L. | Another example is the pre-redpill scenes in The Matrix. | |
| May 4, 2022 at 16:17 | comment | added | Stef | Another question I've often asked myself is this: "If the landscape of the moon (the craters that are visible when the moon is full) magically changed overnight, how many people would notice it?" | |
| May 4, 2022 at 16:11 | comment | added | Stef | Also, a large part of the plot of "The three-body problem", by Liu Cixin, is about how physicists are freaked out because "physics no longer makes any sense" (and the rest of the population don't notice anything wrong). | |
| May 4, 2022 at 16:10 | comment | added | Stef | What you describe also reminded my of several books by Stephan King. In many of his books, there are a few very small hints of supernatural elements, scattered throughout the first half of the book. Then in the second half, the big bad monster makes a less discrete appearance. | |
| May 4, 2022 at 16:08 | comment | added | Stef | "For example, a character could have sworn they put their cup on the table but it's on the windowsill, or they did the laundry last night but now they have no clean clothes." No need for fiction; I had this happen to me in real-life. Turned out my landlord was using their copy of my keys on a weekly basis and was moving stuff in my apartment. I was freaked out for weeks before I figured it out. | |
| May 4, 2022 at 14:59 | comment | added | Michael Richardson | As an example of this, the season of Buffy that Dawn was added had several "inconsistencies" that bugged the heck out of me for most of the season until the later episodes where "how" and "why" explained them. Then I enjoyed them. | |
| May 4, 2022 at 10:48 | answer | added | Satch421 | timeline score: 1 | |
| May 4, 2022 at 7:34 | vote | accept | aurorajack | ||
| May 4, 2022 at 6:41 | history | became hot network question | |||
| May 4, 2022 at 1:47 | answer | added | Kate Gregory | timeline score: 10 | |
| May 4, 2022 at 0:09 | answer | added | EDL | timeline score: 29 | |
| May 3, 2022 at 22:40 | history | asked | aurorajack | CC BY-SA 4.0 |