Slice of Life is such a funky genre for decentralized plot but I can still give a conflict for DKG: Man vs (His Own) Autism

I think one of the reasons I've really hit my stride writing more comedy heavy work is just that anytime I come to a decision point, I go with whichever option I think is funnier - which is just kind of how I operate when I play games with choices, too. I just greatly enjoy shenanigans lol

Which is all just to highlight that understanding the medium you're working in is a *huge* part of effective storytelling, often in small ways you might not identify specifically at first, but still distracts you.

Bollywood films often have big shots of huge crowds dancing - which is also why they tend to have a lot of wide panning and shots and holds, so you can actually *see* the dancing and set up. So while the shots aren't the most dynamic, they still feel energetic because of what's happening on screen.

It made the sets feel big and empty - and not in a purposeful way of highlighting isolation, just in a way that makes you ask "why is the scene of all the townsfolk singing Bonjour so spread out and empty compared to the animated version?" It feels cold, but not like a purposeful tonal shift.

It happened with the live-action Cowboy Bebop as well - by doing a frame for frame remake of the animation, they weren't really taking advantage of being a live action film. The 2017 Beauty and the Beast sets were set up like a stage play - but we weren't viewing the film from a single angle.

That was why when DC started all their newest rounds of films, a lot of them looked stilted and stiff - because they hadn't adjusted the comic style developed for still images into something dynamic enough for moving images. It wasn't the worst, but it was a thing.

Literally. So many adaptations of one medium into another fail because the story isn't adapted for that medium. It's adapted too literally from the source, so doesn't follow the principles of the medium it's being adapted into.

As a writer of almost solely ensemble casts, I both agree with this wholeheartedly and immediately saw a challenge. 😅

I've done art of a lot of the plants, too! And these of Petal ha ha - crushferns are based on the Rose of Jericho, but if it was big and deadly and moved like Theo Jansen's beach sculptures lol

Well, that's all I have really. Not sure how many other authors have had this experience, but I'm sure there are at least some afraid to write an original story a specific way because of people who will equate it to fanfic. I hope this helps you be weird and write the thing anyway.

If a work you enjoyed reminds you of fanfic, but it doesn't lessen your enjoyment of the work, you have no other issues with the work, and you cannot pin point a specific aspect that makes the work feel low quality other than it reminding you of fanfiction... why is it bad?

Fanfic isn't the only target of this. Plenty of original fiction tropes and conventions are called inherently bad writing - first person POV is one that comes to mind. This isn't new, and it certainly isn't going to die out completely.

Anyway.

And no, this does not include AI. Fuck AI. AI doesn't know how tropes work, or what makes them work. It doesn't know why a convention is a convention or how to make purposeful choices to subvert or fulfill expectations around conventions and tropes. And when you use it, you aren't learning either.