June 28, 2026

DZ-128: What even is a Character Arc?

1 hour 30 minutes

Listen to separate the three layers of an arc -- does the character change? How do they feel about it? And how is the audience positioned to feel about it?

Stu, Chas and Mel finally begin their long-awaited journey into CHARACTER ARCS. In this "primer" episode, we try find some learnings and analytical lenses that we can then apply in future breakdowns.

In this episode, we explore differences between a character learning something and a character fundamentally changing, how to dramatise that, and how the show teaches the audience to perceive that transformation (whether positively or negatively).

Throughout the discussion, we skate over A NEW HOPE, BLUE MOON, BREAKING BAD, BETTER CALL SAUL, the French real-time thriller FULL TIME, A KNIGHT OF THE SEVEN KINGDOMS, THE GREEN KNIGHT, ALL OF US STRANGERS, PREDATOR BADLANDS, FIELD OF DREAMS, MEG 2, and Stu's receding hairline.

Ultimately, this discussion synthesises into a series of questions to ask of a story and the main point-of-view character living through that story:

Does the audience enter the story with an expectation that characters will change?

How does the story teach the audience to expect characters to change or not?

Do the characters change? Is it experiential change or internal value change? How is that dramatised?

Is the character aware that they changed? How do they feel about that change? Does that matter?

How does the story want the audience to feel about that change? If different to the character’s perception, how does the story pull that off?

How does the story world punish or reward the change?

What are the values explored by the arc? How does this relate to the theme?

How is contrast vs affinity/unity portrayed through the characters’ journey? Order vs disorder vs inertia

What is the emotional event created between the character and audience as a result of the journey? Does the character end up more intimate or distant from the audience?

In upcoming episodes, we intend to apply these lenses to stories with STEADFAST/RESILIENT arcs, POSITIVE arcs, NEGATIVE arcs and - potentially - a “WTF is this?!” arc.

Please check out our homework discussion on Patreon. And if you want to vote on the stories we're gonna breakdown, sign up!

As always: SPOILERS ABOUND and all copyright material used under fair use for educational purposes.

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Thanks to our Patrons, especially Khrob, Theis, Sandra, Jesse, Randy, Paulo, Thomas, Jennifer, Malay, Alexandre & Natalie and Lily.

→ Read the transcript for this episode.

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"Character arcs are really difficult to talk about because they're not just in isolation. Rarely is a film only about one character, right? So we're actually talking about how we harmonize other characters around them." — Stu Willis @ 00:12:16

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CHAPTERS

00:00:00 – Cold Open

00:00:17 – Character Arcs: A Primer on What We're Really Asking

00:03:13 – › Three layers of an arc: character, self-perception, audience

00:07:04 – › The four-quadrant map: change, no change, better, worse

00:10:15 – › Why calling it an arc is already a misnomer

00:13:35 – What We Each Want to Learn from This Series

00:19:56 – › Whether emotional authenticity is becoming more valuable than spectacle

00:23:37 – › Why stories let us safely inhabit experiences outside our own

00:30:04 – The Deep Question: Can Characters Actually Change?

00:35:49 – › Contrast and affinity as the design logic of transformation

00:41:40 – › The rock metaphor: external forces versus intrinsic change

00:46:43 – › Order, disorder, and inertia as the spectrum of arc types

00:50:29 – Three Layers of Judgment: Character, World, and Audience

00:56:45 – › How the filmmaker positions the audience relative to the character

01:00:01 – › Do audiences enter stories expecting change at all?

01:06:09 – › Mapping the inner journey against plot beats

01:09:28 – › Why low points exist to make the climax feel earned

01:12:09 – Key Learnings & Wrap Up

01:26:47 – Thanks to Our Patreons!

FILMS

STAR WARS (1977) — (w) George Lucas

SHOWS

A KNIGHT OF THE SEVEN KINGDOMS — (w) George Rr Martin, Ira Parker

BETTER CALL SAUL — (w) Vince Gilligan, Peter Gould