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How do you fill plot holes?

H

harmonica44

For my current script I came up with the third act first. That way I have the perfect one, and can build into it. Then I started coming up with the first two, and thought of a surprise twist I want to happen before the third. However, I find myself having plot holes in between. For my previous scripts I had the same problem and it took years to rewrite it over and over and finally fill them in. Plus it requires having to come with a scenario or character's decision that is illogical and forced, just so the twist or outcome you want, can occur.

So how do you more experienced writers, know that you have not forced the envelope of unreasonableness too far, or how do you fill in plot holes better? Whatever twist you come up with two get out of the plot hole, it cancels out another twist, and creates another one. Any writing tricks to it? Thanks.
 
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Many times there are easy answers to plotholes. But then everything is relative to your problem. I have found myself thinking of large and elaborate solutions to plotholes which could have been solved by some accidental event or something out of the characters control which the audience often can buy into!
But hard to be specific on these terms but think small, that's what i do at least!
 
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Take out the experienced part and I'll offer my advice.

Don't use the twist that causes the plot hole.

There, fixed.

Forcing situations in movies is ALWAYS a bad idea. Audiences aren't stupid (well, they are, but they're still perceptive) and will pick up on these things. Why force a bunch of illogical things just to get some plot twist into it? If your script isn't interesting enough without the twist, then it should probably be reworked from the ground up anyway.
 
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Two ideas:

1. Don't write the third act first. It's fine to come up with some idea of where you want the story to go, but a vague idea will allow you to change things if necessary.

2. Write backwards completely. Just work backwards scene-by-scene. Think about what happens immediately before the earliest scene you have. Keep doing that until you reach the beginning.

Also, forcing characters to make illogical or forced decisions to make a plot twist work is going to come across poorly almost regardless of how you do it. I've yet to see a storyline that can pull it off. All you're likely to do in those cases is piss off your audience. Change the plot twist or change the characters, but don't try to force either to do something it's not meant to do. This is where the phrase "kill your darlings" really comes into play.
 
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Same answer as CF: Don't craft a hole to begin with.

I'm a stickler for sh!t making sense, even in comedies.

Personal fave: If the giant eagles could fly in and save Frodo and Sam from the lava oozing from Mount Doom how come they couldn't have flown the two in and dropped them off and save the big journey?

I think one of the more challenging creative processes is writing a story NOT about what I would do or a "normal" person would do.
No.
Tell the story about what THIS IDIOT did - but it still has to make sense.
Most stories would end PDQ if everyone acted sane and sincere.
Gotta find the character that makes "unique" decisions, yet they're not preposterous.

And no deux ex machina cheats.
"... and there just happened to be a reflective shard of glass conveiniently located right there on the cliff. Of all places!"
Puh-leeeze.
 
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cameronchapman said:
Two ideas:

1. Don't write the third act first. It's fine to come up with some idea of where you want the story to go, but a vague idea will allow you to change things if necessary.

2. Write backwards completely. Just work backwards scene-by-scene. Think about what happens immediately before the earliest scene you have. Keep doing that until you reach the beginning.

Also, forcing characters to make illogical or forced decisions to make a plot twist work is going to come across poorly almost regardless of how you do it. I've yet to see a storyline that can pull it off. All you're likely to do in those cases is piss off your audience. Change the plot twist or change the characters, but don't try to force either to do something it's not meant to do. This is where the phrase "kill your darlings" really comes into play.
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Well the climax is not set in stone. I would still like to keep the third act but could always change parts of it of course. The movie Oldboy had a lot of illogical things happen for the twist to be pulled off, but the villain was so crazy in that one, the unreasonableness came off convincing therefore. I could make my villain really crazy for it, but it would tough to convince an audience that his men would go along with it, regardless of him being the boss or not.

I was considering changing the twist but my friends who read it, said it's a great twist and I must keep it, even if it means changing other parts.
 
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rayw said:
Personal fave: If the giant eagles could fly in and save Frodo and Sam from the lava oozing from Mount Doom how come they couldn't have flown the two in and dropped them off and save the big journey?
Click to expand...


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1yqVD0swvWU
 
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Well my third act is my best idea for a third act, at least I've never seen it done quite like it before. I did make it vague, but even the vague idea of it is tricky to work a story into. I would like to keep it, and will try to limit the illogical character decisions along the way. I have no guarantees I can get rid of them all though. I will have to change part of the third act I think, which will make it weaker, but that's okay, if that's what's required. But even movies like Die Hard have a couple of illogical actions here and there for example. So I wanna take the advice I'm given but at the same time, make it suspenseful and compelling enough that it feels like a well crafted movie. Cause true stories, although logical, are almost never have a strong climax, and in order to have one, some unreasonableness has to be forced, even a little sometimes it seems. Sure there are some movies that don't, and I can do it too, but I feel my climax is not so interesting now. I wrote a new one on my treatment to fit more, but... it really doesn't have the compelling turns of my first as a result if filling in plot holes.
 
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One of my scripts came together, because I had a last scene in my head, but I still had to go back and write up to that point. I can get ideas that start in the middle, the end, but I always have to start from the beginning and work my way to that original idea.

And Cracker Funk stole my metaphor. Bastard.
 
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Okay, I won't use it.

Now even though I feel I can make the plot make sense, even though it could be less twisty as a result, I still have to make the action scenes make sense. For my last script the proofreader said that I had to throw logic out the window just so the action scenes could happen, in situations where they wouldn't normally happen like that. A car chase for example, when the bad guys probably could have thought of a better way to kill their target, other than a car chase at the that time. So do I need to have the action scenes be logical too, cause chase scenes in the movies, do not happen like chases in real life, and I'm yet to come up with a plot to logically support such an elaborate chase, when the characters may be motivated to do something else. This goes for my current script as well.
 
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SnS93.jpg
 
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rayw said:
I'm a stickler for sh!t making sense, even in comedies.

Personal fave: If the giant eagles could fly in and save Frodo and Sam from the lava oozing from Mount Doom how come they couldn't have flown the two in and dropped them off and save the big journey?
Click to expand...

An absolute ton of reasons.

I understand your principle, but the example you used is a bad one.
 
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GuerrillaAngel said:
Yup, that's a common writer's trick. There's no better way to get all the loose ends tied up than to begin with them tied up.
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Okay. Well as a result I will have to throw away my original climax and go for a climax that is more standard. But at least it's more convincing I guess. If I manage to come up with a climax just as different, as my original that fits, I'll use it. But if I cannot, what will audiences prefer, a unique original climax, that feels a bit forced or one that is natural and logical, but not near as interesting and twisty as a result? I will see what I can come up with but if I cannot come up with one as good, I hope the movie is still good since all the most compelling turns happened in the third act in my opinion.

I guess I'm being a little cynical but I normally don't like thrillers that don't go all over the place, and prefer the ones that do. Now I feel I have to write one that doesn't.
 
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harmonica44 said:
Okay. Well as a result I will have to throw away my original climax and go for a climax that is more standard. But at least it's more convincing I guess. If I manage to come up with a climax just as different, as my original that fits, I'll use it. But if I cannot, what will audiences prefer, a unique original climax, that feels a bit forced or one that is natural and logical, but not near as interesting and twisty as a result? I will see what I can come up with but if I cannot come up with one as good, I hope the movie is still good since all the most compelling turns happened in the third act in my opinion.

I guess I'm being a little cynical but I normally don't like thrillers that don't go all over the place, and prefer the ones that do. Now I feel I have to write one that doesn't.
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If you didn't feel they were a problem you wouldn't have been trying to fill them in the first place. If the third part works and the plot holes only exist due to the first two parts then why not keep the third part and write backwards from there? If the holes exist in the third scene then ask yourself, why do you need the holes to have it work. It's hard to really say without knowing the details, sorry.
 
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