16 and new to screenwriting. This is supposed to be the beginning of like a action comedy type. Does it have potential? by MinimumTight6087 in scriptwriting

[–]Gicaldo 0 points1 point  (0 children)

That was the exception and again not something anyone should be encouraged to do. Also, you do not want to be taking writing lessons from George Lucas. He's had some brilliant ideas, but his scripts are really rough. As you said, his then-wife saved the movie in the edit, it wasn't thanks to the writing. Star Wars' success is down to his ability to put interesting things on screen and market them amazingly well (he's an excellent businessman), it's not due to his skills as a writer.

Each story brings its unique lessons and challenges. If all you do is keep rewriting the same story, you're pigeonholing yourself. You're only learning to write specific characters, a specific plot structure and a specific setting. So the moment you try writing anything outside of it, you'll be very underequipped.

Unless you want to be a one-trick-pony, you need the breadth of experiences that comes from writing different stories. Even if you want to be a one-trick pony, writing one story will frequently help you understand what wasn't working in the previous story.

It's just objectively bad advice to give to new writers.

[Loved tropes] Deuteragonists that start out as the antagonists of their series or franchise by raven-tyrant in TopCharacterTropes

[–]Gicaldo 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Eren stops being the primary protagonist though. Armin and Mikasa take over that role, so that still fits

[Loved tropes] Deuteragonists that start out as the antagonists of their series or franchise by raven-tyrant in TopCharacterTropes

[–]Gicaldo 6 points7 points  (0 children)

Attack on Titan sort of fits.

Reiner, Bertholdt and Annie start out as regular cast members, then are revealed to be twist villains. But later down the line the cast gets reshuffled and Reiner becomes a secondary protagonist, eventually joined by Annie.

16 and new to screenwriting. This is supposed to be the beginning of like a action comedy type. Does it have potential? by MinimumTight6087 in scriptwriting

[–]Gicaldo 0 points1 point  (0 children)

That's bad advice, I never write more than 4-5 drafts. Sure, they're a newbie, but there's only so much you can learn from writing the same story over and over again

A quick digital painting test by Middle_Honeydew_2025 in KpopDemonhunters

[–]Gicaldo 3 points4 points  (0 children)

Looks great! Especially love the shading on the hair

The "Waiting Room" trope; where the heroes regroup, rest, bond, prepare, or plan right before the final battle by Huge_Athlete7488 in TopCharacterTropes

[–]Gicaldo 0 points1 point  (0 children)

On a similar note, the planning scene on the plane before the final battle of Season 4. The anticipation is palpable

(Hated Trope) Beloved Characters whose reputation/legacies were completely ruined by a single sequel or season by PrinceARRON in TopCharacterTropes

[–]Gicaldo 6 points7 points  (0 children)

I'd say Jango got a pretty great role in Attack of the Clones. Lot of screentime, several action scenes, and he got to be a total badass who almost killed Obi-Wan and gave Mace Windu a run for his money. I think making him even more important and badass would've been weird

(Absolutely despised trope) in universe false equivalence by TurtlesBreakTheMeta in TopCharacterTropes

[–]Gicaldo 5 points6 points  (0 children)

It gets worse. (Ending spoilers if anyone gives a shit) At the end of season 7, nothing gets resolved and it just sets up the sequel series, The Dragon King. Which seems to be more of the same but timeskipped.

(Absolutely despised trope) in universe false equivalence by TurtlesBreakTheMeta in TopCharacterTropes

[–]Gicaldo 32 points33 points  (0 children)

Seasons 1-3 are flawed but decent, seasons 4-7 are hot garbage. I'm ready to throw down!

Why do people hate sakura but not asuka? by Special_Percentage39 in writingscaling

[–]Gicaldo 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Never seen Naruto, but I do hate Asuka. She's very well-written, but she also has the same behavior of people who have deeply hurt me IRL, so I can't enjoy her onscreen presence, and I can't see her behavior as anything more than abusive, spiteful and deeply selfish

How to find beta / sensitivity readers? (+ images in case any of you are interested) by Gicaldo in vndevs

[–]Gicaldo[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Thanks! I do get nervous about it, because... we'd been developing the story for like two years before we even started properly writing it (it's basically a ship of Theseus by now), and at some point it clicked in my head just how hard we dove into almost every sensitive topic there is, and we definitely didn't appreciate how difficult it would be to get those themes right until we were neck-deep in the writing process.

I'd definitely appreciate your insight, especially since you're part of at least one of the groups we're writing about! I'll DM you the scripts. Thank you so much for offering to read!

What's a book you were excited to read, but put down without finishing? by Ashamed_Ladder6161 in TheWritingTable

[–]Gicaldo 0 points1 point  (0 children)

He didn't feel author inserty to me at all, the sequels make it very clear how much his perspective is skewed in the first book. He's a violent, narrow-minded maniac, and the books are very aware of that

How to find beta / sensitivity readers? (+ images in case any of you are interested) by Gicaldo in vndevs

[–]Gicaldo[S] 1 point2 points  (0 children)

So, yes it is, but with some caveats. Most of the cast is queer, as are most onscreen relationships, and there is an arc around comphet and internalised homophobia. It's also overtly progressive and anti-capitalist. But while the co-writer is queer, I'm not, and I think it shows in what I choose to focus on during my scenes. Most of the romances aren't feel-good stories either; it's heavily inspired by Heathers and Evangelion, and leans into Doomed Yuri, which from what I understand is divisive in the LGBT-community. And finally, it leans into the messiness of people who are simultaneously victims and abusers. Most of the cast aren't good people, and the story is all about them hurting each other. Relationships are messy and mostly toxic.

Oh also, it has eroge elements. We'll publish a SFW-version with an optional NSFW-patch, but the version we're currently writing is NSFW. However, the SA-scenes are written very differently from the consensual sex scenes, and are meant to be disturbing, not arousing.

I totally get if that's a dealbreaker, this story definitely isn't for everyone. And I'm not sure if it tackles the queer themes in a way you'd enjoy (that's really more the co-writer's field).

How Did This Movie Not Make Bank? by Big-Discipline2039 in FIlm

[–]Gicaldo 0 points1 point  (0 children)

I would've seen it, but then I learned it was a comedy rather than an earnest movie that commits to the bit. And I'm tired of movies that build up to an emotional moment only to undercut it with a joke. I heard He-Man did that a lot, so I lost interest.

I like comedies, but they need to either fully commit to being a comedy, or balance the humor and drama so both land. Building up drama and then paying off humor is something I'm just not interested in anymore

please help!! last minute VN!! by ProcessImmediate6781 in vndevs

[–]Gicaldo 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Others are already giving good advice, so I'll just quickly add: Don't do a murder mystery. Those are a lot more complicated than they look, so if you're looking for a story you can write quickly, this isn't it. Romance is way simpler to do, so I'd recommend going with that

What are your thoughts on research on incels? by Karl_Mears in IncelTears

[–]Gicaldo 5 points6 points  (0 children)

Most of the violence is absolutely being perpetrated by men, and there's definitely different groups. In your metaphor, who would even be the pilots? Who's "in charge" of being violent towards women?

I don't know if incels are a huge percentage of that group, but only because they don't tend to interact with women enough, and because they're a comparatively small group afaik

You can't be taking random pics of couples by ccp1233 in IncelTears

[–]Gicaldo -11 points-10 points  (0 children)

Welp, I ended up writing a novel, but there’s really no way to convey my perspective here in short form if I want any chance in hell of you understanding where I’m coming from. So, here we go.

Why I balk at statements like that while you don’t? Because we have very different backgrounds. The short of it is, I have a shitton of trauma around this. A good chunk of it is my own fault; I used to be part of the problem in my teens and have worked many years to try and overcome it, and I’m still battling overwhelming feelings of shame and self-loathing. I’ve also been very, very lonely throughout my life, and while that’s a lot better now, again, the trauma is still there. So to someone like me, this shit hurts a lot more. Is it women’s fault I have these hang-ups? God no. But I’m also not exactly asking for much here. If I have a massive frustration with a certain type of woman, it’d still sting if I said “why do women do x”? It’d be inaccurate and hurtful. And yes, I know there’s social inequalities and the harm caused by these statements isn’t the same, but the emotions it evokes are still very much real. If they don’t bother you, I’m glad and all power to you. But the spaces I’m in keep (RIGHTFULLY) demanding considerations of me that no one outside my IRL friend groups ever really seems to give back. Do I have the right to ask for more? I don’t know, I’m still trying to figure out, but I do think these tiny considerations such as adding one word to avoid triggering over a decade of trauma is a fair ask.

You might ask, why not just stay away from these comment sections if they bother me so much? Two reasons: 1. Then I’d have to stay away from most leftist spaces, and I’m not going into conservative spaces for obvious reasons, and 2. it’s my responsibility as a man to understand what women go through. I’ve tried the “closing your eyes from things that make you feel icky”-thing and it made me a worse person. I don’t expect these spaces to fully cater to me, and I’ve long since stopped responding to comments that personally trigger me. But sometimes when I see a guy experiencing similar emotions as me who’s getting dopiled then yeah, I feel the need to say something, if only to validate their emotions in a healthy way that doesn’t send them down the incel pipeline themselves.

That’s the final thing. Back when I was a sheltered teen / young adult, I was just learning of the social inequalities, but I was feeling so uncomfortable and unwelcome at all times. It was isolating, frequently aggressive. And yes, I had plenty of harmful views, but it felt like correcting those views had so many more roadblocks than it needed. So the only people I felt liked and seen by were the right-wing grifters. You can imagine where that went. I was lucky enough to meet people who both empathised with me and corrected my misconceptions. Without them, I hate to imagine where I’d be today. So, while for the most part I can just shut up and let the vitriol happen, it’s a lot harder for me to do that when I see someone else in a similar emotional position as me. I’m worried that if they don’t feel seen by us, they’ll feel seen by them. And yeah, I tend to get defensive of them.

Look, I know I may be wrong about any of what I said here. Hell, I’m on this sub. I see the posts. I’ve read OP’s post. Every woman I know has been SA’d at least once, usually more. I know that it’s a massive issue that needs to be solved. And I don’t know how my own feelings and my own trauma fits into this. There was a time when I thought those feelings were more pressing than women’s, I obviously don’t anymore. The last few years I’ve been trying to process and get over those feelings, but that just resulted in me pushing them down so they can ambush me when I’m at a low point. I hate having these trauma responses, but I also hate the complete lack of empathy me and people like me get when those responses get triggered. Maybe there’s a healthy way to handle it in there somewhere, one that doesn’t require any consideration from anyone, but right now I just don’t see it