The Hero of "The Mummy" (1999)

As I already pointed out in this post about Imhotep, the real hero of the 1999 version of “The Mummy” isn’t Rick O’Connell, but Evie Carnahan. I promised a post about her as well, to show how she was created as the perfect hero to oppose Imhotep, so here we go.

Once the movie has left the historical prelude, which sets up Imhotep’s fate for later, we get a glance at Rick, who is a Foreign Legionary and currently stationed in the City of the Dead. That is, essentially, all we need to know about him. It’s where he found the key which Jonathan later on steals from him and it’s why he’s useful to Evie - because only those who have been there before can find the city. Despite the first impression, Rick is not the hero of the tale.

That might seem strange to a lot of people at the first glance, because the movie never makes a secret of being what it is: a pulp-based adventure movie really, really enjoying itself. That is actually why it’s still fun to watch today, almost twenty years after it was originally released. An adventure story like this one usually has a male lead, a hero going up against the evil villain - with the female lead being the love interest and the damsel in distress at some point. It’s traditional and it’s what people expect. But it’s not what they get in “The Mummy.”

Sure, Rick O’Connell makes a great sidekick and comic relief and he surely is a great love interest for Evie as well (few men make such great gifts, stealing some archaeological tools for the woman they court). But he’s not the hero, he’s never set up as one by the movie.

The hero of any given tale is the one who really drives the story. The one who is set up to oppose the villain, the one who develops throughout the story, becoming stronger, better, something new in some way. In “The Mummy,” there’s two people with a clear ambition, as there should be: Imhotep, who is set on reviving his lover (bringing about the end of the world is just a side effect for him, obviously), and Evie, who is set on stopping him (and, if at all possible, not becoming the new body for his aforementioned lover). Since it’s easy enough to establish Imhotep as the villain, this makes Evie the hero, not matter how you twist and turn it. Their ambitions are on cross-purpose, none of them can achieve theirs without the other one losing, which is also as it should be. If both hero and villain can get what they want without the other one losing the chance to fulfil their own wish, you’ve been doing it wrong. “The Mummy” does it right.

From the first time we see Evie, putting away books in a library, the story focuses on her ambitions. She is a working woman, a 1920s career woman. She might be clumsy and she might be a little naive every now and then, but she knows what she wants and she does what she can to make it come true. So when she learns her application for the Bembridge Scholars has been rejected because she doesn’t have the necessary experience, she seeks for a way to gain that experience. Her brother’s little gift (they key to several things in the City of the Dead - honestly, you can make a city disappear at will, but everything is unlocked with the same piece of equipment? WTF?) provides a way. If she can find the City of the Dead and the Book of Life within it, she can basically force her way into that group, whether they like it or not. And after the map has been ‘accidentally’ burned, what does Evie do? Sit around and mope and give up? No, she finds and frees the only guy her brother can point her to who knows where that city lies - Rick O’Connell, who is literally hanging on to life by a piece of rope (until the piece strangles him). She makes a deal for his life, she organizes the trip, she is absolutely set on finding the city and the book.

Whatever opposes her on her way is averted. Evie is not physically strong enough to push things aside, but she is intelligent and determined. When the ship is attacked, she still holds on to the plan, seeking other means of reaching the city. When faced with the much stronger American party also searching in the city, she doesn’t try to fight them, she tries to literally undermine them by digging for the same spot from below, from the catacombs. She steals the Book of the Dead from the other party, just to read in it, because she knows she can. She is a proud librarian and she is a woman who knows and never doubts her worth.

And what happens after she accidentally has revived Imhotep? The others, Americans, Rick, and Jonathan alike, want to run for it. Evie is the only one ready to take responsibility for what she did - another mark of the hero. She refuses to be put somewhere safe (which doesn’t work with a guy who can turn to sand, anyway). She still actively seeks out the solution for the problem, figuring out that if the Book of the Dead was where the Book of Life should have been, then the Book of Life may be where others (Bembridge Scholars) have expected the Book of the Dead to be. When things seem hopeless, because the enemy has cornered them, she gives herself up, in order to save the others. In the desert, she successfully distracts Imhotep, so her friends can survive his sandstorm.

Yes, Rick is the one who basically gets knocked around by Imhotep until Evie has found the right words to make the old priest mortal again, but only Rick’s last attack (which, essentially, only works because Imhotep doesn’t realize he’s mortal at that point - something Rick also doesn’t know) can do real harm and end Imhotep’s current life. Evie is indeed the one who called the mummy forward and also banished it again. She’s the one who opposes Imhotep at every turn. She’s the hero.

And, as already mentioned in the post linked above, she is the ideal hero for the tale. Imhotep is an un-dead creature of unbelievable power. Not only is he impossible to kill (on accounts of not being alive), he can regenerate himself by killing other people and absorbing their life force. He has power over insects, wind, sand, water, can dish out a disease which allows for him to control those who have it. He’s an ultimate power, even those created to guard him are unable to stop him, once he has risen and recovered. That means any hero who is physically strong and has regular weapons is helpless against Imhotep (as is show through Rick, especially in the last battle, where he gets knocked around a lot).

No, the right hero to face off a villain like Imhotep is one who has other means at her disposal: knowledge. Evie never even tries to physically attack him, because it’s so obvious that won’t work. The only time she physically approaches him is in the desert, where her kiss breaks his concentration and stops the deadly sandstorm just in time. Apart from that, she pits her mind against him. And from this point of view, it makes a lot of sense to have a female character pitted against this specific villain. There is no real option for physical violence for Evie, even against a human opponent. She’s a librarian, as she proudly claims. Her weapons aren’t guns or maces or swords, her weapon is knowledge. And as a woman, she’s not supposed to know how to use swords, maces, and guns, not in the 1920s. And this is Imhotep’s weakness. He can’t be attacked physically (well, not successfully), so he doesn’t fear the humans at all. But there are ways to take his powers from him and Evie finds those in the Book of Life, sending him to the afterlife (finally, one might say).

For a movie which never denies its roots, “The Mummy” does have a very surprising hero in Evie Carnahan. So the next time you watch the movie (and if you haven’t so far, you should give it a try), you might see it with different eyes, but it won’t be any less enjoyable.

Deus Ex Machina

Today’s topic is the Deus Ex Machina, the ‘God out of the Machine,’ which is a writer’s tool you should use sparsely, if at all. Because it’s actually outright cheating, you see. You’ve written yourself into a corner and instead of going over twelve chapters and changing the way the story went, you just bring up some kind of ‘out of jail free’ card and let the heroes get away with it.

One of the most definite versions of the Deus Ex Machina I even encountered is actually perpetrated by God himself in the Goethe version of the tale of Faust. Now, usually, Faust is your standard guy who made a deal with the devil and, in most versions, the deal goes something like this: the devil serves him for a certain number of years (usually ten or twenty), then the devil gets his soul. There’s lots of those stories in folklore, not just about Faust.

Goethe wanted to make a different point, a point about how humans should always strive for knowledge, and so he fiddled with the story. He gave it a prelude in heaven, where Mephisto and God made a bet to see whether or not Mephisto could tempt Faust, an avid scholar, to stop striving for knowledge and just live a nice life.

Mephisto set to work, using Faust’s frustration about not being able to understand certain things, and offered him a deal, which was similar to the regular one: He’d serve Faust in any way, give him access to whatever he wanted, but once Faust was content with his life, his soul would fall to Mephisto. Faust agreed to the deal and they started it off by making the old scholar young again (because what fun is living life to its fullest when you’re old and cranky?). Soon afterwards, Faust spotted Gretchen, a very pretty and rather opinionated young woman whom he wanted, so Mephisto had to organize everything. But, as is to be expected when you make a devil arrange your love life, things went awry, Gretchen’s brother came home at the wrong time, Faust had to kill him and to flee. Gretchen stayed behind, her mother died of the shock over her son’s death, and Gretchen was pregnant (which means Faust got what he wanted). Once Faust learned about Gretchen’s fate (she killed her newborn, because it seemed the only way out of her situation, and was to be executed as a child murderess), he had Mephisto take him to the prison and offered to free her, but Gretchen preferred to accept her fate and her soul was saved by God (who might already have been hatching his plan or just have been a little more forgiving than those who interpret his word on earth). This is where the first part of Goethe’s play ends.

There’s a second part, though, where the story is finished. Due to being a lot more complicated, the second part is rarely performed these days, but let’s talk about the absolute end. After a long trip through human history, Faust has his own realm, Helen of Troy for his companion, and, finally, utters the words Mephisto has been working hard for: he wants things to stay the way they are. Because, had Faust really stood by his principles and never wavered, they’d still be at it today and the play would never have ended. So, good news for Mephisto? Nope, because now God shows he’s not playing fair. As Mephisto is about to snatch Faust’s soul, which is now his by right, Gretchen appears and pulls Faust off to heaven. Mephisto has done all the work, but he doesn’t get his payment. Poor devil.

And this last step is actually the Deus Ex Machina. Goethe had written himself in a corner over the many years it took him to compose the full story (almost sixty from first idea to finished second play). He’d already had a full play out, so he couldn’t just rewrite half of it. So he cheated and made Gretchen - who, if we’re honest, had no reason whatsoever to save Faust - pull his price from right under Mephisto’s nose. He didn’t want to see Faust punished, as he should have been. By rights (and traditions), Faust’s story shouldn’t have had a happy ending. Deals with the devil don’t have a happy ending normally. Even if people get away from hell, they usually get some kind of curse put on them.

The Deus Ex Machina can also take the shape of a character suddenly coming to the hero’s help without good reason, an enemy suddenly being weakened (again without good reason), or information turning up out of nowhere to help the hero win. The old Greeks already knew about that trick and they, unlike us modern people, had a lot of gods, so in their stories, it’s less unlikely for one of them might take an interest and help a mortal for some reason. Sometimes just in spite of another god or because they were bored. Greek gods were larger-than-life humans, after all. Modern religion doesn’t afford us that much logic with this trope, so it has become a problematic one. It simply isn’t logical, even within the logic of the story.

If you really, really, really have no way out of a corner you’ve written yourself into, you might consider using a Deus Ex Machina, but I recommend always trying to find another way out first. Rewrite, if necessary. Leave the God in the Machine.

Working With A Formula

I’m currently reading quite a bit of Jules de Grandin, which means pulp at its finest. With the other pieces of pulp I read recently (see reviews for Secret Agent X, Jim Anthony, and The Black Bat … oops, spoiler, sweetie), I’ve also started to see the patterns in those stories and especially Seabury Quinn’s Jules de Grandin stories work after the same pattern, with some variations, every time. Is it bad to work with a formula of some kind?

First and foremost, every story follows a certain formula. You have an introduction (might be missing in a short story), you have a change, you build up tension through twists and turns, you have a black moment (when everything seems hopeless), then you have the big confrontation, and afterwards you tidy up (might also be missing in a short story). This is how storytelling works. This is the sequence we expect when we pick up a book, turn on the TV, or sit down in a movie theatre. So every writer who writes fictional works tends to work of a formula, anyway.

If, however, you want to produce work quickly (as Seabury Quinn did), you will keep much closer to a formula. Edgar Wallace did the same. The art is not to stray from a formula working for you, but to make sure to have enough variations and use the formula well. Essentially, every genre can be summarized in a formula of sorts and the closer you keep to that, the more the story will look like the genre in question. Yet, people who read a lot of stories from on genre will also quickly recognize such a formula, if it’s in use. If you keep very closely to it, they will realize it and know what to expect. You can fool with that, of course, by playing with the tropes in your story, by playing with the characters, by adding a few more unusual twists and turns.

It sounds boring to keep to a formula and you might produce something much more recognizable without, but if you need to produce something over and over again (as the pulp writers of old and the new ones), having a formula to apply to your work is very helpful. It helps you minimize the time you need to plot a story and the time you need to write it. You can easily produce a full novella of 20,000 to 30,000 words in a month that way (even faster, if it flows well). Over time, if you’re using a formula often, you will grow so accustomed to it and know it so well you can use it without having to think about it much.

Personally, as an unorganized writer, I can’t rely on formulas too much, since my stories are not finished when I start the writing process, but even I find them helpful to a certain degree, because they give me an idea where to go next while I’m writing. I just can’t use it to produce a story without having to wait for my own ideas to catch up with me.

What you should be weary of is coupling a formula with too many stereotypes. You might not find the time to flesh out every character for a new story, if you’re producing them quickly, but you should at least make sure the main characters are characters and not just the cardboard cut-outs known as stereotypes. A story relies on the characters as much as on what happens. In fact, usually the characters are really driving the story, because their strengths and weaknesses, their past, present, and future, their acquaintances make something happen. Therefore, stereotypes won’t get you as far as ‘real’ characters who have all of the above.

Tropes are also an interesting topic, especially if you’re trying to put a story together quickly. Tropes are, however, not only known to you as a writer, readers and other audiences who are familiar with the genre will also recognizes tropes which are used often. The art is not to eschew them or write them, but to write them well, to spin them in a different direction, to vary them enough so the reader can’t be too sure what to expect. Or to make them think they know where things are going and then to surprise them - but it needs to be done well. You can’t go too far when twisting and changing tropes.

But back to the formulas as a such. Looking down on writers who use them, especially when producing a lot of material, is looking not far enough. Yes, they will probably never write something unique and their stories might not stand the test of time, but the same goes for a lot of stories not written with a formula in mind. Few books have a staying power and few stories age well. Sometimes, it’s not the writing which makes them powerful (“Dracula” was written in a diary/file style which was dead already when Stoker started work on his book). Sometimes, it’s only very popular for a short time, only to disappear completely afterwards. Sometimes, it takes a while before people start to get interested.

As a writer, you should aim for the thing which all stories are meant to do: entertain the reader. Because that is the first and foremost thing any piece of fiction is meant for. Yes, you can experiment. Yes, you can try to leave the regular paths and see where it leads you. Yes, you can cross two or even more genres and work out something new. Yes, you can add a social comment. But first and foremost, your story should entertain the reader.

And that is where the formulas do their work well. They are creating an interesting story to write, a story which will have twists and turns, which will satisfy the reader with its end. And that is what a story should do, so do not look down on formulas. You don’t have to use them, but at the same time, you shouldn’t think them worthless or cheap. They have their uses.

What To Avoid In Dialogue

Dialogue is an important part of any story. You will rarely find one where the main character isn’t at some point speaking to someone else (themselves, if nobody else is around). There are, however, some things which you might want to avoid in writing dialogues. Here’s a little list.

1. Accents or dialects

If you read older books, you might often find the author using a reproduction of what a specific dialect or accent would look like when written down (Doyle did that now and then, same goes for Stoker or Seabury Quinn). I think it was fashionable for a while, quite some pulp stories (originals or reproductions from today) do it as well.

The problem with that?

It makes the text hard to read for everyone who is not acquainted with the dialect or accent in question. In addition, it serves no real purpose in most cases. You might, of course, produce a crime story in which the victim whispers a word in an obscure dialect spoken far away, leaving the detective struggling hard to interpret that last word. But that is usually not how those passages of dialogue are used. So, instead of writing the dialogue in that accent, simply state a character is speaking it. That will convey the information (where a character is from or, for instance, how high up they are in society, as some accents or dialects will be associate with low-ranking or high-ranking people), but not trouble people who are not familiar with the accent in question.

2. Using foreign languages

Of course your character can meet with people from all over the world (or several others, especially in sci-fi or fantasy settings), but that’s no reason to use several different languages in the text.

The problem with that?

First of all, most people are not able to understand several languages. They will miss whatever information you have in a dialogue line in French, Mandarin, or Russian (or whatever other language you choose). There are, however, also people who will understand several different languages or happen to be natives in that language. To them, a sentence which is anything but logical in the language will be jarring (I personally have that problem with the German fiends in pulp novels speaking German, since it’s my native language), a problem which happens often when you use Google translate. You can use a few words to pepper the dialogue and convey the nationality of a character, but make it words easy to understand (papa, monsieur, etc.) or expressions which clearly aren’t meant to convey any direct information (such as exclamations). If in doubt, just tell the reader that a character is speaking a specific language, but the hero can’t understand it. That will give the reader the necessary information (character X is Russian, for example), but at the same time not waste time and space in the dialogue.

3. Writing speech impediments

Sooner or later, you might be writing a character who is lisping or stuttering or showing other unmistakeable sights in their speech. Perhaps they can’t pronounce a specific letter correctly or say a specific word wrong all the time. Still, don’t try to reproduce any of that in the text, either, unless you’re writing a comic.

The problem with that?

You … could … write a … sentence … like … this … for a character who makes unusual pauses when they speak. O-o-o-or y-y-y-you c-c-c-c-could u-u-use s-s-s-s-something l-l-like t-t-this for a stuttering character. Apart from virtually presenting the problem, however, you will achieve little that way. That is what the descriptions around the actual lines are for. Say your character stuttered two minutes, before he managed to get out “I didn’t see anyone.” Much easier to read and you want your dialogue to flow, so always make it easy to read.

4. Using descriptive texts

You will have to indicate sooner or later who is speaking a specific line of dialogue. If you only have two characters, it’s usually easy. If you mention every now and then who is speaking and you make sure to start a new line whenever someone else starts to speak, that should work. But if more people are part of a conversation, you need to keep the reader updated on who spoke.

How to do that?

Well, the easiest would be ‘X says’ and ‘Y said,’ depending on the tense you’re writing in. That pretty quickly conveys who is speaking, but it also gets old and boring quickly. One way to change that is to use words like ‘shouted,’ ‘whispered,’ ‘growled,’ or ‘hissed.’ All of them also convey more than just ‘said.’ Another way is to add little sentences with what is happening. Usually, people aren’t just standing around stiffly, they move, they perform actions. They show emotion through body language and facial expressions. That also allows you to add information on who is speaking, by describing to the reader what they’re also doing, such as ‘folding their arms in front of their chest’ or ‘glowering at X.’

With those few hints, you can make dialogue much better and easier to read, which your readers will be very grateful for.