Porno Stories

There are two ways to look at the purpose of stories. One way is that a story is an experience in itself, unique to every audience member who receives it. In this sense, the purpose of the story is to experience it and take out of it whatever your mind discovers.

The other view is that stories are a means to an end. This can mean that a story exists to make people see or think a certain way. It can also mean that a story exists to justify an action. And in this final sense, we find the porno story.

The term obviously comes from professional pornography, which is notorious for having ridiculous, paper-thin plots to justify/explain the actors all having sex. To me, though, this problem exists in far more than just the world of professional sex videos.

I will outright say that I truly did not care for Avatar. Of course, it was a visual spectacular. There's probably never been a more seamless fusion of CG graphics and live-action, along with an excellent incorporation of current 3D technology. But the story sucked. It's like, why bother putting in that much time, effort, and money into this production which looked amazing, and then make the story one of the most pathetically formulaic ones possible?

The story of Avatar existed only to showcase its visual prowess. This is what I call a porno story.

I don't think that anybody cares why two people are having sex on camera. If you want to see it, there does not need to be a justification. If you really wanted to see a bunch of beautiful landscapes and blue furry cat-aliens, they should just show it and not insult our intelligence with this hackneyed excuse for what we're looking at.

When you write your own stories, consider why you're writing them. Do they have value on their own, or are they a justification? It may not be easy to judge your own work fairly, so maybe ask your trusted friends. But make sure that, if you want to make something awesome, you make every part of it awesome.