Writing Tips: Avoiding Bad Worldbuilding
One of the first mistakes that a writer of speculative fiction (science fiction, fantasy, or supernatural horror) makes is front-loading every little bit of information of their world that they painstakingly made. One of the last mistakes that a writer of speculative fiction makes is giving stupid details of their world, unknowingly retconing things, and explaining things that don't need explaining because this usually ends their career or irreparably damages a franchise. Today's lesson is about "bad worldbuilding" because the hardest part of actually creating a fictional world is giving too much detail.
This one is going to be different for different types of media. For example, most television shows have a build-as-you-go kind of feel (think Fairly Odd Parents), while a series of novels is usually planned out from the beginning. As an aside, if you're planning out an entire series of novels, make sure that at least the very first one can stand completely on its own to the point where no one would "need" a sequel. Trust me, it'll save you a lot of trouble, and it'll be much easier to pitch to an actual publisher. But that's a lesson for another day. One lesson at a time, or two in this case.
Obviously leaving things too vague is a bad thing in a story. You don't need to have a master's thesis in writing to know that. However, giving bad details is significantly worse than giving no details. We'll decide what "bad details" are later, right now I have to explain why this is. Honestly to cut a long story short, the answer is the Star Wars prequels. When the Force was a vague... force, it made sense. What mattered was that the characters believed that the Force worked (and that both moralities had it, but once again, another day). Then George Lucas tried to explain why the Force worked. And explaining it added more questions that were never answered.
Today's rule of thumb: any worldbuilding should remove more questions than it adds. Yes there are exceptions, but that's not the point. You're not an Adventure Time writer. I don't care if you're saving the answers until later. Remember, you want your audience to be around until later, and more importantly, you want them to care. Bad worldbuilding actively kills the suspension of disbelief. People aren't stupid, and giving too many details is often the result of not having faith in your audience. You often don't even have to tell your audience anything about your world up front. If they can gravitate towards the characters or the story, then you can let the world unfold in front of them.
That brings us to "show, don't tell." Honestly, if a detail needs to be told to the audience and can't be shown, it might not be all that important. "For the longest time our people have been ruled over by an evil dictator" changes to seeing landscapes filled with wartorn battles, statues to this dictators, people cowering in fear from soldiers. By telling when you should be showing you risk giving stupid details because your explaination for how magic works might be convoluted beyond all belief. I have literally stopped reading books because the writers were spending too long and being too convoluted on how magic in their world works. I don't care! I don't need to know that you're pulling fireballs from another dimension! And all too often it ends up being a more complex way of wording: "I wave my magic wand and something happens." Even if your character is learning how to be better at magic, it doesn't matter how the hell it happens. I can write a novel without knowing how the English language came to be, or in even worse cases, how language itself came into being.
You want to give your audience the bare minimum they need to not be confused, at least at the beginning. As you get better at writing you'll learn more and more where that point is. This is an art, not a science. That's why so many rules can be broken, by the way; they're more like guidelines. What does your audience need to know up front? Your main character, several details about him, his main goal, and his location in the world. That's it really. Think of how your character relates to the world around him and show him doing those things to get across the points of your world. If it isn't plot-necessary, cut it. You might be really, really excited about this little detail, but try to supress it. In most cases, all of your characters will contain this specific piece of knowledge and two characters should NEVER talk to each other with exposition that they both know.
That should get you well on your way to avoiding too much worldbuilding (or rather, too much front-loading). It's time to avoid bad worldbuilding—giving your audience details that will piss them off. Refer to my previous points about over-explaining. If the audience doesn't need to know how x-thing works, don't tell them how x-thing works. Your audience may care, but they'll care a hell of a lot more if you explain this badly. You can explain things badly with poorly chosen words, logical errors, technical errors, and not considering literally everything from the beginning of your series. If you say this thing happens in this specific way, it must have been that way from the beginning. This could work if you were planning it out from the very beginning, but otherwise...
Let's talk about retconning. Retconning has a bad reputation. It's a term that means changing up or removing an established plot point. Retconning is different than misdirection. Misdirection is when you tell your audience purposely wrong information for a twist later, and yes, you can turn something in hindsight into misdirection instead of hindsight. It just takes a little extra thought. So, your character learned about this ancient monster in a history book? Well guess what, that book was made by a tribe that didn't have the tools to examine it closely. Oh, you thought the red guys won that war? Well, guess what, it was just government propaganda. Don't do this too much though, or it turns into a joke. Or do it a lot, and turn it into a joke on purpose. It works great for cartoons, hint hint. Something about coconuts...
So... when do you give more details about your world? When it's relevant to the plot. Or a joke if you're doing comedy. Fantasy comedy is a thing (good luck with that. Horror-comedy is easier to write). A lot of writing is "less is more." When should the beginning of your story be? At the latest possible point. How much world-exposition should you give to your audience? Just enough for them not to be confused. Can you give them bread crumbs of world-building? Sure, as long as it doesn't get in the way of the plot or anything. If you're doing a visual medium use things like the backgrounds to get the job done. In any medium, you can learn a lot about what people talk about and the way they talk about it.
Giving exposition about worldbuilding is a touchy subject to begin with. Like I said prior, two characters shouldn't tell each other what they both already know. Usually these two characters live on the same planet. And the narrator of the story is supposed to assume that you do too (no cheating). If worldbuilding doesn't remove any questions (net) from your series, then it's unnecessary at best. Yes, worldbuilding is a nice spice but if you use too much or the wrong kind you will give people diarrhea. That is not a desirable option.
However, if you absolutely CANNOT avoid the temptation of everyone knowing every little detail of your book/show/movie/whatever, make a pseudo-nonfiction book. Write the text books you might find in that world and publish them. A lot of authors do that, it's generally part of an expanded universe.
Writing Tips: Avoiding Bad Worldbuildingby MrEnter
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MrEnter
Yes, I'll get to the requested topics soon enough. I just thought the importance of these last two outweighed the ones I put in the poll. This stuff trips up people before they even get the point of needing to keep characters likable. Today's lesson... don't be Geor-- just kidding. Today's lesson is not to world-build too much (or at the very least world-expose too much). It's a lesson that I even have trouble dealing with sometimes.
