Yuffie's Writing How-To's

How to ADD PLOT TWISTS

11. That One [Butt] Is Really Some Other [Butt]

Darth Vader is really Luke's father! Verbal Kint is really the serial killer in Se7en! The kid from The Sixth Sense is actually Casper the Friendly Ghost! The Gilmore Girls are actually The Fabulous Baker Boys! All along we expect that Character A is, as told, Character A. But then he rips his face off (probably metaphorically) and reveals the true face beneath: he's really Character Z. And also, a woman. And a werewolf. And the Prime Minister of Canada.

12. Variation: That Poor [Butt] Had No Idea Who He Was

This variant assumes the same as before (one character is actually another character), except in this case that information is kept from the actual character in question — imagine, if you will, Darth Vader not realizing he's Luke's father or that he ever had kids at all ("That stupid] princess ran off and had a litter of Jedi piglets on some dirt planet. I tell you, Tarkin, it's a cold, cold Galaxy out there."). Here you have the power of dramatic irony at your command: the audience may end up knowing something well before the characters themselves realize it.

13. That Poor [Butt] Also Had No Idea What He Had

Picture it: King Arthur thinks he needs the magical sword given to him by Lady of the Lake in order to fight off a... I dunno, a phalanx of randy leprechauns or a buncha grizzly bears or some [stuff] (what am I, an Arthurian scholar?) And then at the end the sword is destroyed in battle (oh, [shoot]!) but then the Lady of the Lake appears like a Force ghost and is all, "Excalibur was within you all along, Artie-boy," then light shines out of his mouth and butt and King Arthur becomes Excalibur. (Somebody throw some money at my face so I can write this up, proper.) Point is, a character goes through the tale not realizing he had what he needed all along: the secret weapon, the launch codes, the love of his life, a delicious Snickers bar, whatever.

14. [Darned] Peripeteia, Bro

Peripeteia is a fancy Greek word for "Is it worth it, let me work it, I put my thing down, flip it and reverse it," as made famous by Missy "Artemisdemeanor" Elliot. Or, put differently, it suggests a reversal of circumstances. The Shakespearean tragedy known as Trading Places (starring Dame Daniel Akroyd and Knave Edwardth Murray) is a good example of this. Someone rich becomes poor. Someone with no power gains all the power. Man becomes God, God becomes man, dogs and cats switch places, you know the drill.

15. That Subplot Is A Real [Douche]

Subplots help interrupt the standard narrative storyline — the main story is about a cosmic battle between good and evil while there's this subplot about an emperor's daughter and how she's trying to find her lost moon-horse. Thing is, a subplot has to eventually collide with a main plot, and sometimes when that happens, it causes a kind of pivot. The subplot may become the main plot (imagine that the emperor's daughter and her moon-horse, Mister Buckets, suddenly become the catalyst for the conflict at hand), or it may simply flip the main plot and change the circumstances by introducing new conflicts, characters, or settings.

16. Besieged By [Hated People] On All Sides

John McClane's got it bad in Die Hard. Not only is he dealing with international bank thieves, he's also gotta contend with an incompetent police force, a psychopathically aggressive pair of FBI agents, and whoever it was that decided Nakatomi Plaza needed so much [darned] glass. In your story, just as your protagonist (and the protag's proxy, the audience) thinks she's seen the face of her enemies, give her new enemies to fight on top of her existing enemies.