Let’s use some pop culture examples to talk about theme and how, when discussing a story’s thematic question and what the work supports ideologically, what the author chooses to show us fundamentally supersedes what they tell.
Now theme refers to many things and can be as general as a recurring topic like heroism, grief, or revenge. A thematic question is a bigger philosophical issue that the story confronts, like how Batman stories often ask, “Is unaliving the bad guy ever the answer?” or how Season 2 of Bridgerton asks, “Can people bound by societal expectations make a choice for their own happiness?”
Think of it as though the storyteller is running a science experiment. First they pose a problem, just like asking “Can you burn a wet log at -10 degrees?” And to answer this question, the story will start to pose hypotheses. This is the tell portion of “show versus tell.”
By early in the first act, through a quote or implication, we’ll be given our first hypothesis and how the main character feels about it. Maybe it’s something they say, something said to them, or best yet, we witness their beliefs in action. The stronger the main character feels about this first hypothesis the more compelling their arc will be, either by fighting for and proving their convictions or growing through a journey of change.
Other hypotheses will crop up quickly. If there’s a foil or an antagonist, their thematic hypothesis should challenge the protagonist–sometimes by holding an opposing position or by sharing the protagonist’s opinions, causing the lead to question their beliefs. And a protagonist without a firm opinion of their own will often work best if they’re being actively pulled back and forth by characters or directional choices with fully opposing positions.
At this early point in the story, a solid answer cannot be reached. This is why we usually hear yet another hypothesis by somewhere in the second act. Maybe something hopeful like the Days of Future Past quote from Charles Xavier, “Just because someone stumbles, loses their path, doesn’t mean they’re lost forever,” or something dismaying like the Joker’s Chaos speech to Harvey in The Dark Knight.
But all of these beliefs, all of these quotes, are nothing but sound & fury. Just because an idea is said out loud doesn’t mean that the story will support it.
Enter the final act, where we get our full picture of how events have played out, where themes have been tested and we get to see how each idea held up. Here we often see characters able to weigh the validity of the previous hypotheses and maybe even propose a new one–like Robert Pattinson’s Batman deciding he needs be something more.
It’s like a creative experiment where the storyteller tries to support a conclusion (or Thematic Thesis) with evidence collected throughout the story. We get our best look at the storyteller supports not by what they make characters say but by what they choose to illustrate throughout the course of their story.
A great example of this is Batman’s “No Kill Rule” in many of the comics. The hypothesis is that a hero shouldn’t kill or that killing is wrong or a bridge too far. The counter hypothesis is that killing is necessary, which is usually a hypothesis raised by the villain or by a foil like Red Hood. But a story doesn’t actually support or endorse Batman’s rule if the events and finales suggest that killing the villain would have been the best choice or if letting them live solves nothing and only leads to more problems.
Just because the story says something out loud, even something we personally like and believe, that doesn’t mean that the story as a whole supports it.
Disclaimer after the fact: obviously these aren’t hard and fast rules. Many stories pose a thematic question but leave their thesis intentionally ambiguous. Many stories have multiple thematic questions and theses. And because these aren’t necessarily the “point” of stories, many don’t have much of a thematic question or thesis at all. Don’t approach the above like rubric so much as a helpful map for considering analysis. Oh, also, I recorded this as a Tiktok.
© Nathan Cook, 2022
The Favoring Wind 