Writing by the Seat of Your Pants: Difference between revisions

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== Anime and Manga ==

* Writer Tsugumi Oba admitted that this was pretty much the way he wrote ''[[Death Note]]'': he'd write Light into a massive jam at the end of one chapter, and would then try and figure out how to get him out of it only when time came to write the next one.

* [[Tite Kubo]], the author of ''[[Bleach]]'', is infamous for using this trope ''and'' for his special use of [[Chandler's Law]]: "When in doubt, introduce a new awesome character". [[Loads and Loads of Characters|He was in doubt very often...]]

 

== Comic Books ==

* The original writers of ''[[The Flash|Impulse]]'' admitted they were writing by the seat of their pants in the first trade. Given the character, this is quite appropriate.

* Prolific comic book writer Robert Kanigher did this all the time. The results run the full gamut from enduring classics to ludicrous dross (but it was ludicrous dross that was handed in on time, and that was the important thing).

 

== Film ==

* ''[[Casablanca]]'' was being written as it was filmed.

* In ''[[Iron Man (film)|Iron Man]]'', the actors came up with so many good things on-set that halfway through they just threw away the script (having previously rewritten it every night) and instead wrote outlines of each scene instead. [[Jeff Bridges]] said that it felt weird doing it this way, then realized that he had to treat it "like a 200 million dollar student film".

 

== Literature ==

* An excellent summation of this trope from [[EL Doctorow|E.L. Doctorow]]: "It's like driving a car at night. You never see further than your headlights, but you can make the whole journey that way." (also quoted by [[Anne Lamott]]).

* [[Ray Bradbury]] fleshed out his short story ''The Fireman'' into the novel ''Fahrenheit 451'' at a pay typewriter in 9 days.

* Horace Kelton once replied to a friend that he didn't know "what [his] next book would be about. [[I Just Write the Thing|The characters [hadn't] told [him]]]." But he still planned some once he got the basic idea.

* [[Charles de Lint]] writes that way and refers to it an "organic" style of writing.

* [[Haruki Murakami]] swears to this type of writing, never knowing the ending when he begins a story. [[What Do You Mean It Wasn't Made on Drugs?|It shows]]

* [[Stanislaw Lem]] wrote ''[[Solaris]]'' that way. It is considered to be his best book which is saying something, because his other works are nothing short of brilliance.

* Much of [[Charles Dickens]]' novel-length work was created one chapter at a time for sale to newspapers, with no long-term planning. However, he wrote these chapters so densely-packed with detail that he could almost always find something in them to turn into a retroactive [[Chekhov's Gun]] at need.

 

* In the original KTMA season of [[Mystery Science Theater 3000]], the riffs were improvised rather than written. The films being mocked hadn't even been seen in their entirety in advance. In the [[Comedy Central]] era, however, each film was carefully screened and written for before its respective episode was recorded. The show became [[Growing the Beard|better for it]].

* The ''[[Battlestar Galactica (2004 TV series)|Battlestar Galactica]]'' revival. The writers' commentary on the DVD makes it clear that ''a lot'' of stuff was made up episode-by-episode.

 

== Music ==

* [[Elvis Costello]] recorded the album ''Momofuku'' in six days. He joked that "the record was made so quickly that I didn't even tell myself about it for a couple weeks."

* [[David Bowie]]'s preferred methodology of song writing. Tony Visconti, his long time producer, has confirmed that Bowie will often come to the studio with just a few chord changes and write the lyrics and vocal melodies on the hoof.

 

== Radio ==

* This is how [[Douglas Adams]] wrote the original radio scripts for ''[[The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy (radio series)|The Hitchhikers Guide to The Galaxy]]''. Apparently, he'd often still be rewriting the ends of episodes as the cast were recording the beginning. According to a making-of feature, the actor who was supposed to play the Ruler of the Universe (who appears in the final minutes of the last episode of season two) actually ''went home'' because it took Adams so long to finish the script. The role was cast by handing the pages to the one actor still in the studio who didn't have another part in that scene. In fact, the second series' deadlines for the scripts were so tight that his producers essentially locked him in a hotel room to force him to hit them.

** Adams would often lock himself in a small office next to the toilets to finish scripts. This, combined with the fact that the scripts were handed to the actors on little pieces of crinkly paper, [[Unfortunate Implications|led to the not unreasonable supposition among the cast that the scripts were written on toilet paper]].

 

== Web Comics ==

* ''[[Penny Arcade]]'' is written without a [[Strip Buffer]], so the creators can stay up-to-date on gaming news. Different reason for the trope, same idea. It helps that it's a gag-a-day strip, rather than needing any sort of continuity.

* ''[[Bob and George]]'', especially at the beginning, when it was just filler.

 

== Web Original ==

* The ''[[Bionicle]]'' serials are apparently written like this, although the main plot is carefully planned out years in advance. The serials tend to cover the lesser-known characters and don't affect the main story much, so they are able to have this sort of freedom.

** Now, as there is no main plot to be told, the serials took over. This means the entire story has become an example.

 

== Western Animation ==

* According to the [[DVD Bonus Content]], ''[[Freakazoid!]]'' was written with very little planning because of time constraints.

* ''[[Ren and Stimpy]]'' episodes never had real scripts. The creators went straight to storyboards and improvised each subsequent image.

* Most episodes of ''[[South Park]]'' are pitched, storyboarded, written, animated, voice-recorded, and put on the air in the stretch of about one single week. To contrast, most animated series take multiple months per episode.

* The writers of ''[[Beast Wars]]'' admitted in [[DVD Bonus Content]] that they were winging it as they were going along.

 

{{reflist}}

[[Category:Trivia Trope]]

[[Category:Script Speak]]