When her father is assassinated, a sheltered princess searches the land to learn magical arts from her exiled mother to take revenge and save her people
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When her father is assassinated, a sheltered princess searches the land to learn magical arts from her exiled mother to take revenge and save her people
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I am going to attempt to cut some unnecessary words but keep the basic logline:
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“After he father’s assassinated, a sheltered princes must learn the forbidden arts from her exiled mother to extract revenge.”
“After her father?s assassinated, a sheltered princess must learn the forbidden arts from her exiled mother to extract revenge.”
What exactly are the ‘forbidden arts’? I’m pretty sure it’s magic, but what kind of magic? Why is forbidden? Is is necromancy? Scrying? Divination? Summoning otherworldly creatures? Rather than just say forbidden, in the logline state what it is. Fire magic? I have no clue, and neither would a producer, or whomever you pitch this to.
All she wants is revenge?
Here’s an example:?After her father is assassinated, a sheltered princess must learn dangerous blood magic from her exiled mother to extract revenge. (20)
I’ve commented on this premise before. Is the antagonist, the one who killed the king, a sorcerer or just a normal man(or woman)?
This version of the logline lacks the presence of a threatening antagonist. Who is the person who killed her father? A dangerous warrior tired of what he/she sees as tyranny? A magic user in search of some power that the king has? A survivor of a battle the king fought and won?
What I do with all of my stories is create a logline for more than just the protagonist(s). I create one for each of the major supporting characters, and especially the antagonist. I want to have a clear sense of who each of these characters are, what is driving them, and what they want. What is that drives this antagonist?
For example:?After his village is massacred by the royal army, a skilled swordsman must kill the king and end the tyranny his reign has brought.(24)
Even though we enter his(or her) story after the inciting incident, the antagonist has a clear goal, a driving force that should be felt even though there is distance from them.
I hope this helps.
Agree with Dkpough1. ?Particularly ?on the lack of a characterized antagonist. ?Because the antagonist supplies the why — why she must resort to ?sorcery? ?Why doesn’t she just learn to play a shrewd political game, ?forge alliances with the usurpers opponents, rally supporters, etc. ?What makes the usurper so potent, so sinister she must resort to such extreme measures as sorcery?
Also while revenge is an acceptable goal, isn’t her overall objective goal to regain the throne? ?Or is that all she wants, revenge, ?life for life?
“What makes the usurper so potent, so sinister she must resort to such extreme measures as sorcery?”
This is a great point that I hadn’t thought?about. What exactly makes her the one who needs to be the protagonist? If this assassin is so bad, why wouldn’t there be an uprising to take back their kingdom? The protagonist’s little journey to go learn magic and then come back, would be useless if the people have already turned against the new ruler. Sure, if it’s a powerful sorcerer(something we’ve seen all too often…just saying) then he/she won’t have a problem keeping the power through fear.
Personally I think it would be much more interesting for this antagonist to be truly not evil at all. He/she genuinely wants to better the kingdom, free them from what they see as a bad reign. You could introduce the question as the princess is on her quest: Is she wrong? Is the assassin truly making the place better? As she travels she sees people completely happy,
I think that could be a much more interesting angle. I mean, sure, girl’s father dies, she learns magic and something about herself and then she overthrows the bad guy and blah blah blah. We’ve seen it a dozen times before. At least with a male protagonist, but anyway, what is she truly fighting for? Because if it’s for herself, for revenge, and she’s wrong, that could end up a great character arc and an interesting antagonist who isn’t just evil for being evil. That’s not to say that the assassin is completely great, maybe the protagonist is actually right, and manages to prove it, or something.
That’s just my opinion as someone who watches/reads a lot of fantasy and I’ve seen quite a lot of the same plot over and over again.
I hope this helps.
This concept has been posted many times and I believe it’s already received these same comments. The goal of revenge is a negative one – even the Count of Monte Carlo realized at the end that revenge alone is not worth pursuing…
What positive goal can you give her? As previously suggested, a good one would be for her to free her people from an evil/bad ruler.
Also as previously mentioned, including the antagonist, in this instance, is necessary and will provide an elegant way to specify the genre. If the antagonist is a sorcerer, she needs to learn magic and the story is supernatural, however,? if he’s a brute and she needs to learn to be an assassin then it’s an action thriller and so on.
The blind?daughter of a sorceress queen must search far and wide for her banished mother to learn from her?the magical arts- her only? chance for revenge?against the mighty?Evil One who brutally assassinated her father – The King.