Good morning, my lovelies!

Anyone ever play "Spot the Stan?"

Between 2008 and 2019, Stan Lee had a cameo role in each of the Marvel cinematic universe (MCU) films.  He also appeared in Marvel TV shows, video games, and in non-MCU Marvel films (X-Men franchise, the Fantastic 4 films, the Spider man films...)  While he passed away in 2018, he had filmed the 2019 films' scenes prior to his departure from our world and was posthumously included.

It all started in 2000 with the very first X-Men movie where he played a hot dog vendor.  

(Okay it really started in 1998 when he was supposed to play a cop in Blade but the scene was deleted.  But since he didn't have any hand in the creation of the character Blade, no one really cared.)

ANYway.  

If you're a Marvel fan, or at least a fan of super hero action movies involving a lot of hot guys named Chris, you'll have spotted Stan putting around in the background in a bit-part of less than 30 seconds.  Sometimes he talks.  Sometimes it's a silent part.  Either way, he's always there.  Somewhere.   Kind of like a real-life Where's Waldo.  And the fans love it.

You'll see similar things slipped into Pixar films.  

Stay with me, folks, I have a point here.  

In Pixar films, you will see at least one reference to another Pixar film hidden in the movie.  For instance, in Finding Nemo, Mr. Incredible is on the cover of a magazine in the waiting room of the dentist's office.  You'll also see A113 slipped somewhere into most of the films, a homage to an old room number at the arts college many of the Pixar founders attended.  There's the fact that John Ratzenberger voices a character in every.single.film.  Sometimes they're big parts, like Hamm from Toy Story.  Sometimes they're just bit parts, like playing Gordon the guard in Brave.

And then there's the infamous Pizza Planet Truck.  It appears it almost every single film (with the exception of The Incredibles).  While it's pretty obvious in the Toy Story movies, it's snuck into other films in much more sneaky ways.  For instance, in Monsters, Inc. you can see it parked outside the trailer-home Randall gets tossed into near the end of the film.

So, what's my point with all this? 

My point is that Easter Eggs and running gags are fun.  And viewers love spotting them.  It makes them feel rather involved and accomplished.  I'm guessing it triggers the release of some sort of endorphin in the brain that makes humans happy.  It's the same reason why we love search-and-find books so much.  "Ah-ha!  I found you!  Look how observant and awesome I am!"

My further point is that you can totally do this with your books.  And I encourage it because, let's face it, it's fun.  It doesn't matter how serious your story is, or how crack-y it is.  Get yourself a "thing" and run with it, full throttle.

It doesn't have to be anything huge.  It doesn't have to be flashy or special.  It just needs to be in some way memorable without being (at the time) obvious.

Littie's Ficus

For anyone unfamiliar with the ficus, this is a ficus:

This is also a ficus:

As is this:

And this:

Technically, Ficus is a genus of trees, bushes, and shrubs that comprises about 850 different species of fig.

The potted variety you often see sold under the name "Ficus" is called the Weeping Fig (Ficus Benjamina). 

(Also, in case anyone does not have English as their first language, or is not at all familiar with this plant, the "Fi" is pronounced like "eye" with an f-sound (f'eye) and then the cus is like the start of the word "custard.")

I'm so side-tracked today.  Moving on to the bloody point of this chapter.

Anyone who has read my fanfics on Watt will notice that, at some point, somewhere, there will be mention of a potted ficus.  I've even worked it into the tip book, now, in a rather meta way.  (It doesn't appear in the flash fiction stories as those are 1000 word shorts that have very specific requirements for the competition in which they were submitted, and there was no word-count room for a ficus.)

In Heaven, there is a potted ficus in the Northern Tower Suite.  It's even on the hand-drawn floor plan I posted at the end of the first chapter.

In Six, it is mentioned during Taehyung's first chapter when his POV is reflecting on the fact that slaves can eavesdrop like pros because no one treats them with any more regard than they would a potted ficus.

In Hitman, there is a potted ficus in the safe-house on the southern shore.

The only one it hasn't popped up in yet (as of the date of publication of this chapter) is Herding Cats.  But that story is only three chapters long and is on a sort of hiatus due to lack of reader interest.  

So, What Makes a Good Easter Egg?

Well, it depends on the medium you're using.  

In a visual medium, such as film or art, you'd take a different approach to how you'd slip in an Easter Egg or a running gag.  Maybe you draw a bunch of different manga, but in every one you end up including some sort of scene with a member of a waitstaff who's name-tag just says "Pickle," but no one in the manga ever mentions it or notices it.  The Pickle-name-tag would be harder to slip into a story because of the way text is perceived versus art.  (Not that it can't be done, it would just be more obvious to the reader.)

Since this is, essentially, a tip book for writing (as well as for life lessons.  Seriously, there is always time for lube, people.  I promise it will not ruin the moment to slick that puppy up before going to town.  Anyone who says otherwise is a douchenozzle.  Same for condoms, kids.  If he says he doesn't want to ruin the mood by stopping to put on a condom, he's a piece of shit and you should let him know that he will be fucking himself instead of you.  But that's for another chapter)-

Damn, I got way off track.  Let's start that part over.

Since this is, essentially, a tip book for writing (as well as for life lessons) let's focus on what would make a good running gag for a written story.  Keep in mind, these are my opinions.  You do you, boo.

1. Pick a Thing

I suggest using either an object or a place.  It's best if it is something that can be used across genre in case you want to include it in both a modern day and ye olden tymes story.  A tacky, plastic flower vase would be rather out of place in 1850, for instance.  But a painting of a lily could pop up anywhere in just about any time line.

Though perhaps a little harder to do with a location, if you only write within a certain era, your thing could be a cafe or a restaurant or a corner market.

In my case, I chose a potted plant.  They're easy to work into just about any genre in almost any era.

2.  Make it Uniquely Ordinary

I know this one sounds like an oxymoron, a contradiction of classifications.  But the point I'm trying to get across is to pick a normal, everyday sort of item but make it something that might be less likely to be used in most stories.

I picked a potted plant.  They're very common to have in houses.  It isn't out of the ordinary to have a potted plant mentioned in a story in the description of a room.  But then I made it more unique by making it a very specific type of plant: a ficus.  Now it is both mundane and potentially unique.  If I only had one story up, no one would really even notice my ficus.  But as more stories get added, those who have read the previous stories will see a potted ficus in the unrelated books and start to get that vague feeling of "Wait... wasn't there a ficus in that other one...?"

3.  Don't Focus on It

The point of an Easter Egg is to not draw attention to it.  You want to slip it in casually, like bribe money hidden in a handshake.  Mention it but don't make it a whole plot point.

In Hitman, the ficus comes up only when Seokjin goes to water it because it looked dry.  I don't dwell on his thoughts on the dry ficus.  He doesn't even mention it directly.  The scene is from Namjoon's POV and it's merely stated that everyone in the room was so tense that Jin's act of watering the ficus nearly caused a fight.

4.  Don't Get Too Specific

This goes hand-in-hand with #3.  Not only do you not want to make the scene revolve around this object, you don't want to get too specific about it.  Adding great detail about an item makes the reader pay attention to it.  Remember, the goal is to not make it obvious while still triggering a "this is familiar... wait a second..." feeling.

5.  Be Consistent

If you're going to have a running gag or an Easter Egg, you've gotta stick with it.  While the item doesn't have to show up in every book early on, it should still be mentioned at least once.  In Heaven it's mentioned in a couple different chapters.  In Six, just the one time, but it is still there.  You could wait the entire book and include it in the last scene, or it could be in the very first chapter and never appear again.  But if you're going to include one, commit to it.

6.  Be Patient

If no one notices your Easter Egg, don't get your panties in a twist.  It took months before one of my readers made a comment about the ficus.

7.  Don't Ruin It

Of course, I've just smashed this whole rule with this chapter, but I'm sacrificing the identity of my ficus to help other writers learn to be as weird as I am.

The point of the Easter Egg is to just let it exist. Don't lead readers to find it with hints or clues. Don't come right out and say "Hey, there will be an Easter Egg in my book!"  

When called on it, I will then admit that, yes, my ficus is intentional and it is meant to be a running gag and that I put it in every story for the sole purpose of someone catching onto it. But I don't mention in the story itself that it is an Easter Egg.

The closest I ever get to pointing it out is in how I write my author's notes in certain stories.  Specifically, how I write notes in Hitman.  It is not unusual for me to write, at the beginning of a chapter, a quick note that either asks readers to read, vote, comment, and [insert unrelated, potentially wacky task here].  I may also include warnings if I deem it appropriate given the contents of the chapter.  And in chapter 7 of Hitman, the author's note reads:

"Warnings for mild PTSD, sexual tension, bad dad jokes, and one overly enthusiastic potted ficus.

As always, read, vote, comment, and build sand castles with whipped cream."

Slipping my ficus into the author's note was just one more way to include the Easter Egg in the story without actually calling it out directly.  Yes, there is a ficus later in the chapter, but there is also PTSD, sexual tension, and bad dad jokes.  And the way I've presented it matches with the quirky way in which I had written my notes for the previous six chapters.  So unless you were specifically looking for the ficus, you probably would not have thought twice about its inclusion in the warnings.

8. Be Honest

If someone sees it and comments on it, be honest about it.  Admit it and congratulate them on finding it.  Then keep including it in future stories and look forward to them commenting "Oh, there's the ficus!"  They'll enjoy knowing they found a hidden gem, and enjoy finding it in subsequent stories, and you'll enjoy what could potentially be a shared inside-joke between you and your readership.  

That's all I have for today.  Now get out there and water your ficus!