The Comics How To: BUILDING THE WORLD

Lance Lucero

6 years ago

All right, we have a theme — a through-line/main plot — for the main character. He has abilities and a profession. He has a supporting cast that will learn, help and grow with him. He has an antagonist(s) that will push him into action.

By adding a supporting cast member, I touched on an important element of character development, which is a place to go to in order to find answers — a specialty bookstore that his cousin owns. This is a very important element to touch upon (a place) because it offers opportunities to expand on the main character’s identity. There are now enough story elements needed to progress with building his world and establishing a setting.

I“m sure most writers are aware that the main character’s environment can be an important part of their identity. Not only can the setting help create a character; it can also be just as identifiable to them as the nose on their face. There are too many examples to list that have the character and their settings firmly mixed together, so we will not go there.

I kept the development of the main character“s world very basic; I just based it on the place where I live: Denver, Colorado. Denver is a thriving city that, unfortunately, continues to grow. It“s big enough, but not too big. The seasons are wonderful. It’s located in a great section of the United States, which presents plenty of scenic and cultural story opportunities.

Although I base the setting in Denver, Colorado, I don’t give a name to the city or state. I wanted the setting to have that four-corner/southwestern feel, yet I didn’t want to pigeonhole myself into a specific location. In order to keep story elements broad, I want to make sure my “no-name” city has as many environments as possible. Denver, Colorado has many scenic offerings, but I will need more in order to expand the story possibilities. Not only do I want to have a big city, I also want suburbs, mountains, deserts, lakes, swamps, an ocean, and seasonal changes. The more options the better.

Now that I have my no-name city that can be located anywhere and has everything available, I have to think about the home or the main base of the character. This came easy because I have already established that my main character’s profession is a hairstylist, and if he owns and operates his own business, it would most likely be a barbershop of some kind. Where else would he be spending most of his time? This story element naturally presented itself; there was no over-analyzing this. I simplified it more by having the main character live in the apartment above the shop.

Now, we all see the main character in many stories making things happen in their home base, but I didn’t want my home base to be a trite location where characters just meet. The home base needs to be more than just cool set design. Because my main character owns and operates his business, I wanted his setting to be an extension of his personality. I wanted to show the main character sweeping floors, cleaning counters, and decorating the barbershop to his liking. I wanted him to take pride in his setting. I believe he would have to because he’s in the customer service industry, so he has to make a positive impression. I believe the main character would want to create a comfortable environment where clients and strangers would want to frequent. This will offer many story opportunities because the stories can come to the main character rather than having him seek them out or fall into a circumstance. For example, by expanding on the idea of the main character feeling as though his psychic abilities are a curse creates great conflict because if he were a psychic who could see people’s auras, their futures and what not, that would make an awkward circumstance while he’s styling their hair. He would have to be able to separate the psychic world form the hairstyling world in order to concentrate. That’s great conflict!

The barbershop is his sanctuary. It’s a place where he feels safe. It’s a place that he would want to protect. There’s more at stake when you personalize the main character’s home base/setting.

We are soooo close to writing a story, but not there yet!

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