Bad Dialogue vs Good Dialogue (Writing Advice)

The best way to learn about

dialogue

is by studying the

good

and the bad and that's what we're going to do today, so stick around guys, my name is Brandon Mcnulty, I'm a writer, I'm the author. of bad parts and welcome to my

writing

channel, one of my subscribers requested a video about

good

dialogue

versus bad dialogue and I thought it was a great idea for a topic because obviously there are a lot of things you can learn from good dialogue, but sometimes of a good dialogue. It can be intimidating on its own, especially when it comes to some of the best things out there right now;

On the other hand, when we learn from bad dialogue, we not only see other people making mistakes but we can have a lot of fun in the process and For today's video I am going to explain what makes a good dialogue good and what makes a bad one. dialogue is bad and I will have examples of both. I want to start by explaining what makes good dialogue good and I think there are three things that help define good dialogue the first thing that makes good dialogue sound natural and this is going to vary from character to character obviously what marty mcfly says about back to the future in his movies would not work in lord of the rings and what frodo says lord of the rings would not work in the world of back to the future so you have to be aware of who is talking and what world he is talking in, but regardless of who your characters are and where the dialogue is in your story world. it has to sound natural the second thing good dialogue does is attack or defend and that's because good dialogue involves conflict involves characters trying to learn something that another character doesn't want to tell them involves characters trying to impose a worldview on another character who defends against it, your character should always want something in their scenes and should try to gain information through dialogue exchanges and the third thing that good dialogue does is express an unspoken meaning or subtext and this means that there is some kind of meaning below. the surface and I think the best way to think about this is that when you have the spoken word going back and forth between two characters, you have to remember that there must be some emotions hidden underneath it, for example, if you have ever seen a married couple arguing because of something stupid you know that what you are really arguing about is much bigger than that stupidity you are not arguing about whether or not you are going to have chicken for dinner tonight you are arguing about some kind of conflict that is happening within your marriage so keep in mind that there should be something else going on beneath the spoken words in their dialogue.

Now we're going to talk about bad dialogue and for this video I came up with five specific types of bad dialogue that I'm going to do, I'm going to go over each type, explain what it is, then I'll give you an example of bad dialogue and then I'll also give you a good example. that they can use. Instead now, the first type of bad dialogue is direct dialogue, this is when you state the obvious, this is when you simply express thoughts and emotions without any subtlety, without any subtext, there is nothing beneath the surface, you are simply saying exactly what you want. are you thinking or exactly what you are feeling an example of this type of bad dialogue comes from attack of the clones it shouldn't surprise anyone that today I'm going to talk about attack of the clones but in attack of the clones If you remember the only scene in the one where Anakin and Padmé are talking by the fire and Anakin just pours out his unfiltered emotions to her is completely on the nose, I'll play it for you now that I'm with you again.

I'm in agony the closer I get to you the worse it gets I'm haunted by the kiss you should never have given me you're in my soul tormenting me believe me I wish I could just wish my feelings away and this is of course in the nasal dialogue he says exactly what he feels, it's unnatural and it feels totally cliché, it feels like something straight out of an afternoon soap opera and that's why we know we don't believe it. it doesn't feel real and it's just boring because there's no deeper meaning here he's just saying exactly what he feels there's nothing to read now if you want a conversation between two lovers that's a lot more fun take a look back at the future the opening scene between marty and his girlfriend jennifer they are discussing their next romantic trip to the lake i will play it for you now does your mom know about tomorrow night?

Oh, get out of town, my mom thinks I'm going camping. with the boys, well Jennifer, my mom would freak out if she knew I'd go with you when she gets the standard lecture about how she never did that kind of thing when she was a kid, I mean, look, I think the woman was born and none, she just he's trying to keep you respectable, he's not doing a very good job, terrible, okay, so notice how neither of these two characters openly express how they feel about each other, it's obvious that their boyfriend and girlfriend have this.

We're hoping to hook up at the lake, but the feelings here are all in the subtext, the dialogue itself is a lot of fun and just revolves around the theme of romance, sex, everything else that's going on here, but it's so much better than the Star Wars example because none of these characters openly say oh I'm so crazy about you, I love you, something like that, it's a lot funnier when they just hide their feelings a little bit even though we know what's going on here. The second type of bad dialogue is melodrama and I have talked about melodrama on the channel before and what it is, it is a very exaggerated emotion, it is an emotion that is not earned.

Sometimes you'll see stories where two characters are just yelling. and towards each other, but they don't really care about the conversation, they don't feel the anger, they don't feel the passion or anything like that because it's not earned, that's what melodrama is now, as an example of melodrama. I want to take it from one of my favorite video games, Castlevania Symphony of the Night. I love this game, but it starts with a prologue that has absolutely horrendous dialogue. Now for context the only thing you really need to know is that the boy in blue here on your screen his name is richer he is a vampire slayer and he goes after dracula and once he meets dracula this happens time monster you don't belong to this world it was not by my hand that I was once again given flesh I was called here by humans who wish to pay me tribute tribute you steal the souls of men and make them your slaves perhaps the same could be said of all religions your words are so Empty like your soul, humanity needs a savior like you, what is it? one man, a lot of miserable secrets, but enough talking, what about you?

Okay, obviously the voice acting here is bad, but one of the clues that it's melodrama is the fact that everything Richter says ends with an exclamation point, it's just a lot of screaming. Back and forth and this dialogue exists solely to create a sense of conflict that doesn't really exist and that's why it's ridiculous because it's so over the top that you don't want this kind of melodrama in your stories. Instead, try something like what the Netflix series Castlevania does in the example below and it's a very similar scenario. We have Alucard, who is Dracula's son, who confronts Dracula and they are going to have a conversation here.

Pay attention to how different they are. It's because of the first example I gave you father son your war is over because you say so it ends in the name of my mother it lasts in the name of your mother okay so notice how the dialogue in this confrontation is toned down and measured you can feel the emotion boiling beneath the surface of his words and that's much better than what we got in the first example where everyone is shouting back and forth. In this second example, the two characters are practically holding back from attacking and we get the sense of subtext the underlying emotion and we also get the verbal battle the back and forth sounds natural everything about this dialogue in the TV show is considerably better than what we saw in the video game now the third type of bad dialogue is an exposition specifically an exposition that involves characters discussing things that they already know and this is often called a bob exchange basically what it means is that if you have two characters and one one of them is called bob, you might have a scenario where one says like You know, Bob, the house down the street has been haunted for decades or, you know, Bob, my wife works at the supermarket so she can help your friends. children to get a job or, as you know, Bob, we're just saying this so the audience can understand. where the plot is going, that kind of thing, as you know, Bob Exchange is not what you want in your stories because it's just a cheap attempt to tell the audience something.

An example of this comes from the first Lord of the Rings movie, if you remember. the party at the beginning where bilbo celebrates his birthday and bilbo and frodo have this exchange here pay attention to the moment bob, as you know, I'm very selfish, you know, yes, I'm very selfish, I don't know why I took you in after your mother and father They died, but it wasn't a charity, okay, so in this example, Bilbo and Frodo are discussing something that they both already know, neither of them are really gaining anything from this conversation, it's there purely so that the audience can be drawn in. . aware of what happened to frodo's parents and frankly it's lazy to write now, on the other hand, if you want to explain something through a dialogue exchange, do what they do in John Wick now, if you remember at the beginning of the story here, vigo, who is it.

The main villain tells his son who John Wick is and he does it in a very cool and very creative way. I'll show you right now and the key thing to know here is that Viggo's son doesn't know John. Wick's story ain't what you did, son, it makes me mad, so it's who you did it too, ooh, that nobody, that nobody, John Wick, he was once an associate of ours, we call him Baba Yega, the bogeyman Well, John wasn't exactly the bogeyman, he was the one. one can kill the bogeyman okay so this is much stronger than the bilbo frodo exchange because viggo is telling his son something he doesn't know and it's also something the audience doesn't know we finally get to know who It's John Wick. that's why he's such a big threat why people are afraid of him and one thing i really like about this dialogue here is that viggo never calls john wick a hitman or a murderer that kind of thing if he said any of those things be on the nose oh john wick was a great hitman john wick was a great killer that's a bit boring instead he gives this vivid description about baba yaga the bogeyman he's the one he sent to kill the boogeyman, those are some cool details, the fourth guy. bad dialogue is forced poetry sometimes you have characters that normally talk like regular people and then some kind of event comes up in the story maybe it's a romantic relationship or maybe it's like a big moment in the story and suddenly they start talking in flowery language and purple prose and whatever it is and it just doesn't sound like them, it sounds totally unnatural.

I think one of the most notable examples of this is Anakin Skywalker. I hate sand speech. I'll play it for you right now. I don't like sand, it's rough, rough and irritating and it gets everywhere, not like here, everything here is soft and smooth, okay, so anakin shouldn't talk like that, it's too floral and it just seems unnatural. Now, this is not. Saying that characters who talk like regular people can't have a poetic moment every once in a while because you can have characters who are gruff and unpleasant and end up with a line of dialogue that sounds pretty poetic, but the point is you.

They have to keep that dialogue based on their character. Here's an example from Game of Thrones. It comes from episode nine of the second season. It's about the dog who is the head of the royal guard and in this scene he decides that he is done with the king's guard. he is abandoning his army and in the scene he has a poetic moment but it is still something that sounds natural coming out of his mouth your king's god clegane we must defeat them if they are going to take this city your royal city the king's city protect the city, the king, okay, so swap the king's guard, the city, the king, that's poetic within the context of the dogs' dialogue, that's something that you know stays with you when you watch the show, it's something that doesn't you forget because of the way it's presented, the way the dialogue is organized, but at the same time it's not flowery, it sounds natural coming from this character and then the fifth type of dialogue is a wooden dialogue, this is a dialogue that is too formal, it's too forced.

It sounds completely unnatural and one of the best and funniest examples of wooden dialogue comes from the original Resident Evil on the PS1 and everything you need to know to understand the context here Resident Evil takes place during a zombie apocalypse. It takes place inside a haunted house and the main character, her name is Jill, is trapped in one of those rooms where the ceiling is falling on her. She's basically like a member of the swat team and she's asking for help and one of her friends manages to save her and then that she saves her just listen to this dialogue oh barry that was too close, you were almost a jill sandwich, you're right barry, thanks for saving my life, but barry, didn't you see that you're going back to the dining room todo some research why the hell are you here?

I just had something I wanted. To check it out now, let's go back to find the missing captain and Chris, we'll thank you, Barry, yeah, yeah, okay, so that dialogue is so bad it's good and then it's bad again, obviously, if you're

writing

a story that doesn't You want to write. so you don't want to repeat barry's name four times you don't want jill to say things like why the hell are you here like she's 10 times her real age you want to avoid these things and what i actually did here i rewrote the dialogue so that it works and has makes sense and fits the characters, so here's the rewrite, it's very simple and to the point, okay, yeah, thanks, I thought you were heading to the dining room, I got sidetracked so nothing, listen, we should keep looking for others.

So with this rewrite it's very simple but at the same time it's natural that you think these SWAT team members would say things like this, you're not going to make them say things like why the hell are you here, so it's totally natural and there's also that attack. and he defends, he's still here, jill attacks with that line, I thought you were heading to the dining room, barry, he defends, well, I got sidetracked and then jill attacks again with which barry defends again, he doesn't say anything and that, of course, puts questions in the reader's head.

I'm aware that there is some kind of subtext, something is happening underneath here. Barry isn't being honest with her and it makes us wonder, well, what else is going to happen in this story? So I hope this helps the question of the day. your favorite line of bad dialogue from a movie let us know in the comments section below thanks everyone for watching if you want to support the channel get a copy of the bad bits if you haven't already be sure to check out my other videos press the like and subscribe buttons share this video with a friend and as always remember to keep writing