Connecting 2 unconnected plot paths in an unlazy way.

ChewyLewey

Hi all,

How do you feel when 2 seemingly seperate plot paths come together in a story by seemingly chance and coincidence? I feel like it's really lazy writing and it can put me off the story and its credibility because of this, because its quite hard to accept such a coincidence as plausible.

To give you an example:

I'm a big big fan of Breaking Bad, but there's a scene at the end of the 2nd series that quite bugged me. Anyone who has seen the show will know the scene I'm talking about: Walter White and Jane Margolis' father, Donald, meet and get talking to each other randomly in a bar. Neither knows each other. They are strangers. Neither knows that their fates are intertwined and they (by chance) meet and have this deep moving chat about the emotional turmoil of raising kids. Taken in isolation it was a great scene in terms of acting and dialogue and really apt as both of them were in a similar situation in which Donald's daughter and the man Walter sees almost as his son on many occasions, head towards disaster.

My gripe isn't with the scene, but just how convenient it was that the scene took place. It seemed implausible and reminded me I was watching a fictional, constructed story which in some ways cut short my complete engrossment in the episode

[It's funny because in the next series Walter overtly references what an absurd coincidence it was that he met Donald and talked about the astronomical odds of it happening!]


I don't know, am I being overly critical? We are of course meant to be suspending our disbelief to some extent when we read/watch stories.

But if I wrote that scene or read the script, my reaction probably would have been 'nah, too easy.' Just one scene that is not believable could potentially shatter the illusion that has sucked you in and made you care about the characters and their fate.

Does anyone else get a bit put off when something like this happens in books/films?

I guess the question I'm trying to ask is how lazy can you get away with, and what are some of the ways to solve this problem, to join up the 2 plot points convincingly? (For anyone who's seen Breaking Bad, how could they have included this scene but made the 2 men meeting seem more plausible? Or should they have just scrapped it?)

I'm having a problem at the moment with a plot I'm working on which relates to this... I need a storyline about a rural paedophile priest on the run to link up with another about a young middle-class guy who's got involved in small-time crime in Dublin. I'm trying to think of non 'coincidental' ways (such as example above) of bringing the 2 plot points together.

In other words I want it to seem like an organic progression of the overall story that the reader will accept, rather than something obviously forced by the writer for convenience sake. One of the challenges of writing I suppose!

Antilles

I've had the same problem in the past, though usually I only spot it when I'm editing. Often I find the only reason two sublots intertwine in a scene is because I thought it would be cool if they did. I think the only way to fix it is to work both subplots so that their momentum is building towards the same point from different directions. That way when the critical scene happens it's as though the overarching plot required it and the reader doesn't feel cheated.

pickarooney

Please add spoilers for BB!

If you drop little clues throughout each arc that seem irrelevant at the time but build towards the two stories linking up it should seem less convenient and more like a natural conclusion.

El Guapo!

You could have the criminal go to confession and that's how they meet.

............Although you did say the priest was on the run so that may not work.

Antilles

Dean09 wrote: »

You could have the criminal go to confession and that's how they meet.

............Although you did say the priest was on the run so that may not work.

No reason a priest on the run couldn't give confession.

El Guapo!

Antilles wrote: »

No reason a priest on the run couldn't give confession.

True.
I just thought if he was on the run he might not be still working as a priest. But I suppose he could be hiding out in another parish and it could still work!

pickarooney

You could have a few mentions of the middle class guy's upbringing in Offaly if you want them to have some back history together.

Otherwise if it's just a case of having them meet (and then what? what's the tie-in that you need to make plausible) there are any number of situations where they could run into one another. I'd have said at a golf club but it probably wouldn't be ideal for someone on the run. What do you mean 'on the run', by the way? Is he trying to leave the country before the cops nab him or just avoid being beaten to death by an angry relative?

I realised I had one of these myself earlier. There's a huge coincidence which has no logical explanation and ties up three stories and I'm buggered if I can think of a way for these people to meet naturally.

ChewyLewey

Ha apologies Pickarooney for not using spoilers on BB, hope I didn't give too much away!

Anyway cheers for the advice and suggestions. As I said, maybe I'm being too critical on the Breaking Bad scene. Maybe, approaching it from a writers perspective, you analyse it a bit too much and the average viewer/reader is perfectly happy to accept the coincidence.

In terms of my problem with my story it's probably impossible for you guys to give advice without more detail, and at the moment my idea is just a plot outline so I barely even have those details myself.

Anyway without the specific details I think Antilles advice is a pretty sound general guideline:

'Work both subplots so that their momentum is building towards the same point from different directions. That way when the critical scene happens it's as though the overarching plot required it and the reader doesn't feel cheated.'