<story><title>Lessons from Dungeons and Dragons about storytelling (2013)</title><url>https://litreactor.com/columns/7-things-dungeons-dragons-taught-me-about-storytelling</url></story><parent_chain><item><author>SunlightEdge</author><text>&amp;quot;The best heroic journey is not the story of an incredible person doing incredible things. It is the story of a flawed, ordinary person who—when called upon—rises to an incredible challenge and finds within themselves something truly extraordinary.&amp;quot;&lt;p&gt;This is the main reason I don&amp;#x27;t like superhero films. There is no sense of danger or vulnerability. It&amp;#x27;s just people in fancy jumpsuits doing acrobats around explosions till they win the day. 
I prefer main characters dying &amp;#x2F; at severe risk of dying. Give me tragedy. Show me vulnerable people who grow and become stronger.</text></item></parent_chain><comment><author>setr</author><text>I don’t think we need tragedy, or really most personal drama arcs. They’re usually so basic as to just be filler. I want more Jackie Chan — always on the back foot, always struggling against unfair odds (and usually a bit confused), usually the reluctant&amp;#x2F;accidental hero — and somehow succeeding anyways, usually through a combination of grit, talent and ingenuity.&lt;p&gt;And that struggle and growth is often best encapsulated in the fight sequences themselves.&lt;p&gt;Honestly I’m beginning to despise character drama. Superhero movies have tons of drama — the whole storyline typically lives solely to create character growth and personal shifts, and otherwise is largely irrelevant (if the characters don’t learn some lesson, they’ll never succeed).  I want it to favor the other way; the story&amp;#x2F;fights exist, and the characters happen to grow through that experience.</text></comment>
<story><title>Lessons from Dungeons and Dragons about storytelling (2013)</title><url>https://litreactor.com/columns/7-things-dungeons-dragons-taught-me-about-storytelling</url></story><parent_chain><item><author>SunlightEdge</author><text>&amp;quot;The best heroic journey is not the story of an incredible person doing incredible things. It is the story of a flawed, ordinary person who—when called upon—rises to an incredible challenge and finds within themselves something truly extraordinary.&amp;quot;&lt;p&gt;This is the main reason I don&amp;#x27;t like superhero films. There is no sense of danger or vulnerability. It&amp;#x27;s just people in fancy jumpsuits doing acrobats around explosions till they win the day. 
I prefer main characters dying &amp;#x2F; at severe risk of dying. Give me tragedy. Show me vulnerable people who grow and become stronger.</text></item></parent_chain><comment><author>BrandoElFollito</author><text>This is exactly the reason why I like superhero movies. I go to the cinema to relax, switch off the rationale part of my brain and have fun.&lt;p&gt;I liked very much the Marvel movies that were fun (&lt;i&gt;Guardians of the Galaxy&lt;/i&gt; for instance) and did not rewatch the sad and heavy ones.&lt;p&gt;It is of course a matter of personal taste. My wife terrorized me a few times into going with her to movies where I either had to take notes to follow the narrative, wonder about the mental sanity of the script writer and the director, wonder whether the movie froze when people were looking at each other for 5 minutes without saying anything, or simply trying to find a comfortable position to sleep.&lt;p&gt;Some of these movies left a trace, though, but maybe not a very good one (usually Almodóvar movies)</text></comment>