Stakes Hit The Heart

An image of a hammer and two nails.

Since Marvel’s Endgames, the concept of stakes has been as elusive as the steak on the dinner plate above. The heroes start off in one state of being and end up completely the same as they had before. Nothing changed. Nothing was at risk. Nothing filled your heart with meaning.

Power Slides

Image of a playground slide

No. Making stuff up isn’t hard. My kids do it every day with the most basic prompts at hand. What’s hard is keeping your ducks in a row and not run over them with the bulldozer of convenience. No one wants to see that mess.

Comic Book Logic

Image of a dialogue cloud with only the word "Umm..." in it suggesting the author doesn't know what to write in the cloud.

I’ll take the example of a human hero in a suit made of the latest unbreakable nanotech material. He’s fighting some titan from a distant galaxy. This titan has the strength to pulverize solid rock or to throw said rock miles away. Now, this titan delivers a solid punch to the armored superhero. We see this hero fly, smash into and through concrete pillars, skip across the ground until friction finally slows him down.

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