Things I have learned from Joss Whedon pt 2

"Make it dark, make it grim, make it tough, but then, for the love of God, tell a joke."
-Joss Whedon

I really believe that this is a very fundamental idea when writing that which has a heavy tone, and something that is sometimes missed with various media. It is one of the reasons that I miss Battlestar Galactica so much. It was a show that was harsh, and at times really depressing. Things always got harder, always worse for the heroes, but the great thing about this is that when there was a moment of victory, the characters, the actors, even the audience really felt it. A lot of TV is missing that nowadays, by putting in too many feel good moments and it makes it all seem fake. It is a weird feeling when the writing makes shows like Bones, and Hawaii Five-O seem less real then Battlestar Galactica which is set in space and has people trying to find Earth.

That is how you make the writing real. You don't write some fantasy world with rainbows and unicorns, you make it like real life with all the nitty gritty. People scraping by, doing the best that they can. Make people selfish, with the heroes being less selfish. You make a world where every one makes mistakes and no one is without some sort of sin... and then you put in a unicorn. The lesson from Joss though is that if you make something heavy, you need some levity.

Some of my favorite Whedon scenes revolve around a character saying something offbeat at the right moment that is appropriate to that character. My favorite from this selection of Firefly involves Nathan Fillion with a sword, you'll see it. Or the one with Adam Baldwin and a chain...

http://youtu.be/3uMAKtXlXf4

There are many more of these moments from Buffy, Angel, Dr. Horrible. But the important thing to take away from it, especially when writing is that when you create a conversation, make the characters' personality drive what you want them to say. When mapping out dialogue plan out all the points you want to hit, but then make the personality of the characters dominant the banter. Of course you need enough different characters that have widely different personalities which make the banter all the better.

So when setting the tone as something dark and heavy, always give a moment of levity to keep the reader engaged (and not too depressed).