Fighting scenes.

When Ragnarok asked me to write a column about "fighting scenes" I wasn't sure if I could come up with anything useful.  I don't have a particular strategy how write scenes with fighting in them.  I pretty much wing it.

My subconscious seems to come up with (I hope) believable moves -- the hero does this, that villain does that.  I mean, when you get right down to it, fighting is just a sequence of reciprocal blows.  The hard part is making it different and interesting.

The more intriguing question to me is how long the fight scenes should go.  You can make them short and to the brutal point, or you can extend them...and extend them.  It's a matter of feeling it, I suppose.  Too much fighting is as boring as too little.

Unfortunately, sometimes fighting is a replacement for storytelling.  That is, it works as 'filler.'  You see that a lot in action movies, in comics, and in books.  To me, it's off putting when the action serves as filler, no matter how cleverly it's done.

I think one of the worst examples of this I've seen is the movie, Armageddon.  (I've boycotted Michael Bay movies ever since.)

I've probably lost half of you with that statement. Sigh.

But to me much of the movie seems to consist of fighting for fighting's sake. The smarmy emotions, the lousy dialogue, but most especially the bullshit action scenes.  It's exhausting and not very illuminating. I happened to look at my watch at one point, bored to tears by the meaningless explosions, and I realized that the explosions came every 15 minutes or so -- or about the average time between commercials on TV and presumably the average concentration span of the American viewer.

On the other hand, I do like action movies above all others.  Given a choice between a drama, a comedy or an action movie, and I'll pick action every time.  I saw Kingsman last weekend, for instance.  Loved it.

What I'm saying is, the action has to be often enough to be interesting, but not so often as to replace real storytelling.  (I have the same problem with meaningless drama -- lots of TV shows are guilty of this -- sudden bullshit drama, meaningless fights.  Armageddon happened to have both meaningless drama and stupid action.)

Fighting scenes that come from the consequences of the characters actions -- that's what I'm looking for.  Aliens, Terminator, Die Hard.

I personally think the big budget action flicks are spending way too much time and money on fighting scenes, explosions, car chases and such.  These movies would be better if they cut about 1/3rd the action, and added about 1/3rd more character development.

But then, I'm obviously out of touch. 

Like I said, I do fighting scenes by feel.  I sort of wing it -- letting my subconscious choreograph the moves.  I admit, I probably spend a fair amount of conscious effort wondering how often and how long the fighting scenes should take place. I try to have something every chapter, if possible.  I try to build to bigger action scenes as the book progresses.

Fighting is fun, if done right.

It just has to fit the story.