Put your dukes up, y'all, it's time to talk about fight scenes, as requested by the lovely @chaoticmutants! So sorry for getting to this you late.

As fan fiction writers of the marvel franchise, it is obviously important to know how to go about writing these kinds of scenes. Marvel characters are fighting literally all of the time. They need to learn some good ole communication skills. (I'm joking tf) So let's learn how to write a believable, gripping fight scene.

The first thing I should say is that I have nowhere near mastered the art of the fight scene. To date, I have only written one in my life and I'm pretty sure I biffed it. The reality is they are as difficult to write as people say. It's all about figuring out out how to paint a realistic, follow-able scene that's engaging and leaves the reader on the edge of their seat, just as much tension that that reader might experience when watching a real life fight. Problem is we have no frickin idea how to pull that off. It's quite tough.

According to my research, people recommend reading some good fight scenes that you know of beforehand. That way you can pick up on the kind of language they're using and the overall pace they're following. Of course, this tip is very vague and probably very obvious, but it's a good suggestion nonetheless. There are many samples of fight scenes you can find online, specific even to what kind of fight you're trying to orchestrate (gun fight, sword fight, hand to hand combat)

Another easy, preliminary kind thing is that you want to make sure the fight is essential to the story. The readers wants to have a clear understanding of why the fight is happening and the motive that character has for fighting that person, especially if this is personal fight for the character. You want your audience to have this sense of "Holy shit, this is happening!" when the fight breaks out. You want the reader to anticipate it and read the scene as this perfect piece fitting in to the puzzle of your story. That goes for a lot of writing, to be fair, but nevertheless important.

Now, as for the technicality of the scene, it is of most authors' recommendation to not be uber descriptive. Which is so trippy, I know, because as authors, we love to load on description whenever we can. You might think fight scenes is where you need to be most descriptive because you yourself don't know how the hell fight works and you want a point for point rundown just so you're in the know.

However, writers recommend the actions and movements to be clean and to the point in order to avoid everything being run down point for point completely and being boring. So don't worry, your reader will understand how a punch works. No need for "I curled my hand into a fist and sent my hand to his face where it landed on the upper part of right jaw." It's just about echoing the sense of chaos one might feel watching an actual fight in your writing.

That means avoiding adjectives and adverbs, too! So while you can't be overly descriptive, you can use sensory details! This will actually help paint physicality in the scene, which is what the scene should be all about! (ears ringing, tasting blood, injuries hurting, wind whistling past, seeing red) 

So, of course, this makes pacing, as I mentioned earlier, very important to developing this sense of chaos for your readers when your arsenal of description is limited. Controlled chaos, that is, because if your fight scene isn't at least somewhat controlled, I feel like it'll be just as ineffective as just a point for point fight. That's where pacing comes in.

In those tense moments before the fight, you might want to consider being more descriptive or detailed, just when it comes to expressing the emotions before that, especially if someone's being chased or whatever. When the fight is actually going on and it's that period of time where no winner is clearly being shown, I think, is where you can be less descriptive and more brief and precise. If you're getting to that point of the fight where a winner is being shown or death or some serious outcome is being measured is when you may want to be a little more heavy with the details of how the characters are feeling in the moment.

This is probably best accomplished through facial expressions or certain movements that indicate fear or rage or ruthlessness.  I would be careful using outward speech when to indicate any emotion in a fight scene, because it may interfere with the kind of pacing you're trying to achieve.

Which leads me into my next point, which is showing emotion in a fight scene. Remember, a fight by definition is a physical struggle that ensues when emotions are high. Just because the actual writing of the scene is supposed to be brief and precise does not mean you're not allowed to show how the protagonist/antagonist is feeling. It's key to show this and to make sure it's still a common thread in the fight, otherwise the purpose of the fight will become less obvious and make the fight stupid. Emotion has be to be underlying but present.

Like I said, that can be accomplished through physical things (groans, guttural yells, brows swearing, spitting, face muscles twitching, any twitching or jerking of a particular body part out of compulsion, gritting teeth, the particular manner in which they're moving) the more quirky or uncommon these kind of fidgets the better. It makes the characters more memorable and less stale. Using phrases like "surged with fury" "lunged with precision" "heart trembling with fear" can be good too.

Inner dialogue can aid showing emotion as well, especially if the character in question is facing an adversary she/he knows damn well might overpower them. It's okay to write in the person's fear or doubt, and that can be quite helpful in making your hero/heroine relatable, or even your villain. So have your character internally measure the situation in their head. Have your character encourage/berate themselves as they plow through enemy lines ("come, on, Joy, keep moving" or "get the scepter") can be really cool to sprinkle in, so long as you maintain pace.

Speaking of maintaining pace, I also want to make sure you guys know that you don't have to write off outward dialogue entirely. As long as it's used when the pacing of your scene allows it, dialogue can be great, especially if it's a very personal fight, not just some SHIELD agent carrying out a mission.

Aftermath is also important to consider. If it is that personal, emotional, revenge fueled kind of fight, aftermath is essential to factor in. It's crucial that the characters process the outcome, and even more that the outcome has a particular important result. Like death. If it's just a cut and dry, SHIELD mission or some other authorized assignment where the fighter has no personal connection to her/his victims, then by all means, don't include so much aftermath.

It can be used for both, but you can consider having your character suffer an injury, minor or major, or even maybe collect some kind of item if the fight ends in someone dying. This would be helpful to the SHIELD mission kind of fight because though your character may not care about their recent victims, a physical reminder of the conflict can maybe sway their indifference or bring them to think about the fight. That can help advance your plot if anything. Even if the fight isn't supposed to be some huge thing, it still should have some attention after it's done, just to reinforce it's importance in the first place.

When it comes the actual words of the actual action, you want to use really hard, brutal words, that is if this fight is really serious. Use, pound, jab, slam, ram, shove, crush, hurdle, whatever you got. Here's a list of of those kinds of words.

But caution! Another thing is that you also want to do your research about fighting techniques such as these, but to an extent.

What I mean by this is know the kind of movements one may do in a fight and how they work but limit yourself when using words like parry, for example. To parry means to block, which is a good movement in itself to include in a fight scene but not when the word is something the common reader doesn't know. Make sure you're looking up all the cool and creative ways to maneuver, but also that you translate them into real word context.

Showing the character in pain is also crucial to a fight scene. You can't skip it. It's a fight, there's going to be some physical strain no matter who you are. Let them feel the pain ripping, searing, coursing through them. It makes readers more interested.

Now I understand I've neglected to mention how to write a fight scene when powers or other supernatural elements are involved. And honestly, I think that's okay. Powers can get ridiculously astronomical very quickly so I think writing your character fighting in the same way you would write a normal character fighting is the way to go.

Of course, they've got some supernatural shit on their side and it's okay to show that, but also showing the strain and struggle during a fight is the only way to keep them interesting. No one's gonna read a character who can just zap every enemy into dust. Powers aren't cool unless they've got weakness and weaknesses is essentially what you're trying to reveal/show in a fight. This person might be even more vulnerable if they have to be able to figure out how to channel their powers combatively. What if their powers hurt them or drain them? All important to consider when writing a fight.

You should also make sure your character is matched appropriately, that is if you want this fight to actually be epic or meaningful. This is a general rule, even when it comes to normal people. With superpowered people, it's even more important. Give your character an opponent who can challenge their own powers, whether this be through powers of their own or just their own skill.

Finally, if you're having trouble keeping your description at a controlled minimum, try overwriting the whole scene and then cutting down what you know the scene could do without. This way, there's not so much pressure going into the thing and then, you can still try to improve it. Side note, this also happens to be a very good way to aid writer's block.

So that wraps up my little (2000 words of me fishing) thing on fight scenes. I understand it's very messy, but I was really just compiling a bunch of tips I researched in a time crunch. Hopefully, it helped a little. Thank you for reading!

( mara! )