I don't disagree with you, Ryan however I'm choosing to look at the positives here. Roger took his love of serials and Indy (based on serials) and meshed them together. He spent time and effort working around or through the storytelling problems as best he could. He (re)created something so people in the internet age can appreciate the work. He paid homage.
Is it perfect? No. But perfection is boring, and would give us very little to talk about.
The fact is Roger didn't sit back. He did something...and I'm happy to present them here on Pulp 2.0 every Friday.
So, all this begs the question: How would you have done it given the same resources? What would you have changed? What would you have rearranged? These are storytelling tools we should all be sharpening as the internet is very kind to shorter works and not so much to longer narratives.
Given the same resources, I doubt I could do any better.
Serials are infamous for their cliffhangers, and for good reason. Raiders of the Lost Ark was made to be viewed in one block, so the cliffhangers don't occur naturally.
For the end of the previous chapter, Roger effectively turned an action scene into a cliffhanger, which also meant this one started strongly. But the pacing of the scene this ended with didn't lend itself as well to this treatment. If this was being shot to be a serial, or even if Roger had access to unedited footage, something could be done to punch it up, but you have to do what you can with that material.
8 comments:
totally off topic but i thought you'd like to see this:
Pulp stuff
Bookmarked! (and thanks!)
And a couple of answers in the interview have sparked some ideas for posts.
Beware....
The pacing is completely different for a feature-length movie and a serial. Cutting one up to turn it into the other isn't always going to work.
I don't disagree with you, Ryan however I'm choosing to look at the positives here. Roger took his love of serials and Indy (based on serials) and meshed them together. He spent time and effort working around or through the storytelling problems as best he could. He (re)created something so people in the internet age can appreciate the work. He paid homage.
Is it perfect? No. But perfection is boring, and would give us very little to talk about.
The fact is Roger didn't sit back. He did something...and I'm happy to present them here on Pulp 2.0 every Friday.
So, all this begs the question: How would you have done it given the same resources? What would you have changed? What would you have rearranged? These are storytelling tools we should all be sharpening as the internet is very kind to shorter works and not so much to longer narratives.
Given the same resources, I doubt I could do any better.
Serials are infamous for their cliffhangers, and for good reason. Raiders of the Lost Ark was made to be viewed in one block, so the cliffhangers don't occur naturally.
For the end of the previous chapter, Roger effectively turned an action scene into a cliffhanger, which also meant this one started strongly. But the pacing of the scene this ended with didn't lend itself as well to this treatment. If this was being shot to be a serial, or even if Roger had access to unedited footage, something could be done to punch it up, but you have to do what you can with that material.
In the interest of constructive criticism:
There are several ways to "manufacture" tension with the format of the serial -
1) Use stills and graphics to ask the question "What is the Ark?"
(Which leads us to the sequence we pick up in Chapter 3)
2) Cut together a sequence and ask the question," What mysterious Lady holds the key to defeating the Nazis quest for the ark?"
(The mysterious lady being our intro to Marion Ravenwood)
3) Then continue with the "Call to Action" that you have inviting us to see Chapter 3.
Rinse and repeat.
Edit to add:
" "manufacture" tension with the format of the serial -"
Meaning to manufacture tension and interest to get people to come back next week. To solidify the idea of the cliffhanger.
You're right. I was being too defeatist. That totally works.
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