Tension is a writing element that goes incredibly well with conflict. The right amount of tension can cause a scene to go from boring to interesting, or interesting to amazing! The key to good tension is for the conflicts to be believable and the characters to be likeable. If you aren’t interested in the characters and you don’t like the conflicts, then the tension will be weak. Good tension can lead to very strong emotions, whether they be positive or negative. Relief if a character in a dangerous situation manages to escape with their life, or if a dangerous mission goes off successfully. At the same time, they could experience dread as a very intense situation slowly goes bad and characters get hurt or are threated. It is important to understand which scenes deserve lots of tension and which ones don’t. If you give every scene an insane level of tension, then it would be the same as if they had no tension at all. Nothing will feel more important than anything else and it will be difficult to understand what is really going on, and what is really important. Examples on what to give tension are as follows.
- Rivalries
- Fights
- Tests of ideals (the hero and villain having a debate about whether what they are doing is right)
- A trial scene
- Characters having a debate/disagreement
There are more situations of course but these are just some of the options. Tension is yet another element of story telling that can make or break a story. Doing it poorly can lead to the story being completely thrown off the rails. However, on the opposite end doing it well can lead to the story being enhanced to completely new heights. That’s all for this week I hope you found this informative as always.
Jarod's Writing Advice 