Screenwriting, Lyrics, Art, and Investigation
Breakdown of television episodes using the Storytelling Enneagram formula.
I return to the Abbey to check in on Quina. She’s working with flowers and feels she has a talent as a healer. Can I take this flower to a priest for his opinion and recommendation?
They’ll send her to the Grand Cathedral to study! Her only objective is to learn more about the dragon, and this seems to be the best way to go.
ONE
The gang flies on Appa, as they often do at the One. Travelling onward.
TWO
Aang worries. How is he supposed to master the elements before the comet arrives next summer? This is an ongoing Trouble. Possibly, when we look at the Enneagram for this entire season, or even the three seasons of the entire show, this worry will be the larger Two. It’s an essential question.
Also, though, this episode has another, more specific Trouble. Katara offers to teach Aang the waterbending she knows.
THREE
With the two benders busy, Sokka is at loose ends. He uses a long fuzzy frond to clean Appa in the river, particularly between his toes. Sokka does regular human things at the Three. I really like how the story writers deploy him at key beats.
Continue reading “The Waterbending Scroll”A little group gossips in the town square as we come down from our castle visit. (These people and this quest are easy to miss.) The Duke is sending troops to question the Witch. We already know that Selene is alone in the Witchwood and that she doesn’t understand Wyrmspeak.
Off we dash.
Outside of her treehouse a mob clambors at her door. “Hang the witch!”
As we rush forward, a rock formation activates and rises up. It’s a golem monster that had been sleeping peacefully as a boulder. That sends the mob scurrying, and we’re left alone to do battle with it.
The trick to a Golem is to hit its glowing discs, and this can only be done with brute force. Magic is useless, and I’ve just idiotically changed my pawn into a sorcerer. I have arrows and daggers, though, so up I climb.
When it’s defeated, we see that it guarded a gated passage. At the end of it, in a graveyard, we find Selene safe with a glowing, ghost-like woman. With no lead up, these two drop some plot bombs:
Continue reading “Saving Selene”ONE
Fry Cook Spongebob flips patties. One patty twirls into the air and changes into a jellyfish, which swims about the Krusty Krab kitchen and escapes out the porthole.
Spongebob likes this. He turns back to the stove and watches all the patties morph into jellyfish. Spongebob himself floats into the air and flies after them out the window. He transforms into a large, square yellow jellyfish. With big round eyes! They cavort in Jellyfish Fields until a voice calling his name awakens him from this wish-fantasy One.
TWO
The stove smokes and Mr. Krabs is yelling. Reality is the Trouble.
Continue reading “NATURE PANTS”We’ve finished the Wyrm Hunt quests and are now invited to enter the castle and meet the Duke. Well, I’m invited. Pawns aren’t allowed.
At the door to the entrance chamber a little jester man in the full bell cap outfit stops me. He’s deeply unpleasant, over-animated and suspicious. (Another unfortunate trope deployed, this time of a dwarf or Little Person who plays the backstabbing Fool.) He puts something on my head.
When I enter, everyone in audience turns and scowls. Reverse angle and I can now see I wear a clown hat with pom-pom topper. The Duke frowns at first, then responds.
I’m welcomed to continue to assist the Duke. More missions to come! As I leave the castle, a cut scene takes over. Someone is in the garden.
Gender is immaterial. Whatever toon I play, they swoon at this Aelinore meeting. She’s blonde, she’s tender, and she’s innocent. She’s also new to the castle and in over her head. More plot to come for our prototypical Damsel in Distress.
Two more points dropped randomly about the mysterious Duke:
“His Grace is unwell,” Aldous the Chamberlain says to me. He looks hale, but I guess I’m supposed to notice that the Duke is failing in some way.
“He must be a wizened old man by now. He’s of an age with me, if not older,” Iola the hometown shopkeep says. Well, I have a photo and he doesn’t look anywhere near as ancient as Iola does.
ONE
We have a fairly substantial One this time. A large anchor is Mr. Krabs’ house. Inside, he sings robustly that “Pearl’s me daughter.” And there she is! Our first time seeing and hearing Pearl! (It is, isn’t it?) It’s her birthday, she’s excited, and daddy is cheap. Instead of the Flipper Slippers everyone’s wearing, he gets her wellies as a present.
Not only is the story introduced, but the Krabs locale and family are established for the series.
TWO
The fishing boots are the Trouble. They were, of course, a bargain. Krabs’ penny pinching and its results drive this episode.
THREE
Cut to the exterior where the anchor house shakes as Pearl scream-cries.
Continue reading “SQUEAKY BOOTS”Swarming with goblin and cyclops monsters, the Fort is a bastion the military wants to retake. We’re here to help!
Of the four Wyrm Hunt missions, I saved this for last as it can be tricky. Ballista fireballs rain down and vermin come from a tunnel system under the fort. At the end we face a Goblin VIP who taunts us, saying “Humans want destruction, too!”
I swear I’ve managed to kill him before, but he escapes underground this time. Good game. We didn’t lose the troop commander, which is actually hard to do. He’s a bit of a dolt who insists on standing in the fire.
Remember, this is the name of the two-part episode that includes The Spirit World and Avatar Roku. I assume that, although each separate episode has a Story Enneagram, that the overarching story will also follow one. Let’s see.
ONE
Spirit’s One is also this section of the One. The gang travels north until something interrupts them.
TWO
As I guessed in my Spirit review, the overarching Two is Aang’s sadness and need to talk to Avatar Roku. We already know from the Roku review that the Eight is indeed that meeting. Finding Roku — how do you talk to a spirit? — is the Trouble of the story resolved at the climax.
You’ll remember, though, that this moment in Spirit felt extremely awkward and forced. You’ll also notice, looking back, that the beginning of that story has a lot of padding that isn’t part of the overarching plot. The Two section is sloppy in both overviews.
Continue reading “Winter Solstice”Finding a chimera in the world is always fun when travelling with pawns who know what to do.
Cleave the poison-spewing snake tail, silence the magic-casting goat head, and kill the lion. It’s fast, satisfying work with plenty of climbing, clinging, and hacking.
When we popped by the Abbey to check on Quina, she said she’s still seeking information about our wound.
(Winter Solstice, Part 2)
ONE
As we’re in Part Two, this episode immediately picks up where Part One left off, in the village with the threat of the comet deadline hanging over. Aang has decided to go into the Fire Nation alone.
TWO
Katara and Sokka say nope. They’re coming, too. Appa approves and gives Sokka a big, wet lick.
THREE
Zuko, at the village our gang just left, insists on knowing where they went.
In Part One we had parallel Enneagram structure. Part Two is only Aang’s story. This allows Zuko to influence the plot as its Three/Six.
Continue reading “Avatar Roku”