Recently at CSFG, we floated the idea of turning last year’s Everything I Know About Storytelling I Learned From Star Wars blog post, discussion and sequel into an irregular series in our meetings and on our blog. Inspired by that idea, Tim Napper, writing at www.nappertime.com, has posted his Blade Runner response:
It’s not true, of course. Authors such as Orwell, Ishiguro, and Camus were formative influences on me, as were many others.
However – and as you can probably tell from this website – if I were allowed to choose only one movie as the inspiration for my writing, I would pick Blade Runner. It is the finest neo-noir film of all time and my personal favourite movie of all time.
An added bonus is being able to include Phillip K Dick as providing me ‘everything I know,’ given the film is loosely based on his novel: Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep.
Here it goes.
1) Make your villains sympathetic
If there’s been a more sympathetic villain in science fiction than Roy Batty, I can’t think of one.
When we first meet Roy Batty he quotes William Blake (or to be precise – deliberately and brilliantly misquotes him):
“Fiery the angels fell; deep thunder rolled around their shores; burning with the fires of Orc.”