Go Into The Story Resource: Character Introductions

Everything you need to know about the subject… and probably more.

On May 16, 2023, Go Into The Story turned 15 years old — you can read the very first blog post here. I led with this paragraph:

Welcome to Go Into The Story! Right now, it’s nothing but a humble, threadbare blog, but I hope it will evolve into an active resource for aspiring screenwriters, as well as a community for anyone interested in storytelling and the creative life.

And evolve it did! To the point where it was recently named “Best of the Best” Scriptwriting Website in the 20th Annual Writer’s Digest Best Websites for Writers list.

To celebrate 15 years of blogging about screenwriting, writing, Hollywood, movies, TV, and the creative life, each day in May, I’m going to feature a piece of Go Into The Story trivia, plus a writing resource you can find in the site’s archives. This is not an exercise in self-congratulations so much as I figured readers could use some tips about how to best use the site. With — to date — over 100 archive topics, there is a LOT of content here. Hopefully, these posts this month will clue in more recent followers and remind long-time readers about resources you can use to facilitate deepening your understanding of the writing craft.

Today’s trivia: When I launched the blog, I figured I’d give it a month and see how that felt. Then I reached 100 days. Then 1 year. That became 2 years.

I set my sights on 1,000 days. Being a baseball fan, I targeted Lou Gehrig’s old consecutive games played streak of 2,130. Hitting that, I decided to go after the all-time baseball record set by Cal Ripken, Jr.: 2,632.

When I passed that consecutive day streak and no more baseball records to be broken, I had a short and long term goal: 3,000 and 10 years.

I made it to 4,428 straight days before shoulder surgery felled me. What next? As you can tell, I’m a goal-oriented person. That said, I work 80+ hours per week. My book The Protagonist’s Journey: An Introduction to Character-Driven Screenwriting and Storytelling is out and is Amazon’s #1-Rated Top Seller in Film and Television. I’m currently midway through a comedy feature film spec script. And I’ve got a novel I’ve been developing.

How to balance the blogging with all that?

Hey, I’ve been super busy for 15 years and somehow managed to keep the site going. Day… after day… after day…

Today’s Go Into The Story resource: Character Introductions.

Think there’s nothing to introducing characters in a script? Think again!

Here is a twelve part series representing a deep dive into the subject. Why such a comprehensive take on a seemingly mundane concern?

For an explanation, check out Part 1.

Part 2 here.

Part 3 here.

Part 4 here.

Part 5 here.

Part 6 here.

Part 7 here.

Part 8 here.

Part 9 here.

Part 10 here.

Part 11 here.

Part 12 here.

Each day this month, I want to take the opportunity to thank you for supporting Go Into The Story. I’d love to hear from you in RESPONSES. When did you start following the blog? What are your favorite features? And as always, if you have any suggestions, feel free to suggest away.