Good vs Bad FANTASY Dialogue (Writing Advice)

In this video, I analyse good and bad dialogue scenes from The Rings of Power, The Lord of the Rings, Eragon, and Narnia - all to help you write better dialogue in your fantasy novel.

⏲️ TIMESTAMPS:

00:00 - Introduction
00:23 - What defines BAD fantasy dialogue?
02:17 - What defines GOOD fantasy dialogue?
04:59 - Special guests
05:42 - The Rings of Power
07:35 - The Chronicles of Narnia
09:58 - Eragon
12:54 - The Lord of the Rings

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[heatherkline]

The reason Aragorn's speach works is yes, he uses repetition, but he uses it correctly so his words gain a poetic feeling and enhance the message he is trying to convey.

[MajorLeeAwesome]

Personally, the line "I see in your eyes the same fear that would take the heart of me, " is killer. He's instilling that his men are braver than he is, and he'd freeze of flee in their shoes.

[singingsanja]

It says a lot about the quality of Aragorns speech that it still gives me goosebumps after all these years. 🥰

[stryfer]

Given the snippet you used from Rings of Power, I'm surprised no one's pointing out another important factor - metaphors should make sense. "It's because the stone sees only downward" made me instantly aware of the kind of ridiculous writing I was about to be exposed to and it was only the first few minutes of the show!

[wouterl]

Theoden's speech before the ride of the Rohirrim. You can't get much more epic than that.

[justjustincase]

Something not talked enough about in Aragorn’s speech is the use of the horse and the camera movement. Most films would settle for the hero giving a speech standing still or on some kind of platform. But Peter Jackson consciously choose to have him constantly moving the horse. This does many things. Subconsciously, the viewer feels they need to keep their on focused on him, same way we try to focus on an object when it’s moving or when speaking to someone who’s walking around. It’s easier for the mind and focus to wander on a static object. It also give a sense of urgency to the situation. He seems antsy, ready to go at a moments notice. It also reinforces the sense of him speaking to EVERYONE, not simply stand in front of a portion of the front line and expecting everyone, including the audience to listen. Much how profesional speakers, singers, stage actors etc know how to use movement around the stage to keep everyone’s attention.

[scloftin]

The Narnia scene also has one of the power house actors of the age, which helps. You're not gonna write badly for Tilda Swinton.

[Leitis_Fella]

I will never get over the fact that Eragon (the film that doesn't exist) had a higher budget than The Fellowship of the Ring, had a longer run time, and was *still* a far worse adaptation of the source material.

[dougsinthailand]

“The very heart of me” is an archaic turn of phrase that grounds the reader/listener in the world, but is not so convoluted or weird that it’s hard to understand. This is sometimes a challenge for fantasy writers.

[xenomorph]

0:07 don't tell me you were trying to suggest "That's right Peter: I'm you, and you're me, and this is a gun." is BAD dialague. That is THE most iconic line in cinema history, maybe ever

[theRockRider]

The Narnia Scene works really well in my opinion because you can also tell through their way of speaking that Edmund and the White Witch are from two different worlds. She says things like how did you come into my dominion, Edmund is talking in a more modern sense in terms of vocabulary but also respect. You don’t talk to a Narnian royalty and just blurt out Why? without even addressing them. It also conveys the feeling the White Witch is using her words carefully and specifically which furthers her manipulative nature.

The Eragon scene feels like it would word in a novel if not the characters but the narrator said those things. I haven’t read the Eragon books so I don’t know much about them but it feels like this would’ve been a moment and gives the feeling of closing a book and putting it aside. In the movie however it had to be dialogue and that just feels wrong for the reasons you stated.

Aragorn‘s speech is just fantastic and a great way to climax his character development. Aragorn rejected the title of leader but in his nature that’s what he does. He lead the fellowship when Gandalf fell, he lead the men in Helm’s Deep and he lead the last stand against Mordor. There is sincerity in his voice. This is the speech of a leader but it doesn’t sound pretentious because he is the leader and he has finally embraced his role. It’s authentic. He doesn’t sugar coat. He expresses fear, the need for courage. Aragorn doesn’t have to act strong or fearless because he doesn’t have to pretend to lead. I love that

[stocktonjackson]

A good thing to remember is that not all of these rules are set in stone. For instance, the majority of the time you don’t want to be repetitive, but in the last example with Aragorn’s speech, he says “there may come a day” and “it is not this day” repeatedly. It works very well even though it’s repetitive. When it comes to figuring out if you should repeat something or breaking other common dialogue rules, you should ask if it’s appropriate for the character and the setting. Aragorn is an old and wise character, so it makes sense that he would say something poetic, but he’s also speaking to thousands of troops, so he wants a simple message to get across to all of them.

If he said something like that to Frodo while they were walking, it would be distracting. Even though it fits Aragorn’s character, it wouldn’t fit the setting.

TL;DR of what I’m trying to say, is that a good way to tell if your dialogue is jarring or unnatural is to evaluate if it fits the character AND the setting.

[absurdious]

Aragorn's speech works for one reason: you hear him, you will follow him in battle (and Viggo is a fantastic actor)

[arzabael]

In cinema, a true feat would be to give a speech that gives the audience the chills while there is no musical score behind it. I often wonder how aware audiences are of the musical score’s effect on the character dialogue. Like when a speech hits home, in reality isn’t the scene of the movie, those people don’t hear the orchestral music, so if the music is what signals to us it’s a good speech, that’s not an immediate win, it should be considered how impactful the words will be with no music, because we are writers

[denizucuran]

I think we often forget the culmination of the dialogue. That's one of the crucial parts in a story, as the words of a character establish who they are, and let us see the gradual change from who they were to who they'll be at the end. Aragon's speech is a prime example of that. The ranger who became the King, the road he'd taken to face the nightmares of Mordor and his inner fears, now speaks from his heart to the men who he holds dear, as equals perhaps. That's powerful.

Great video, thanks!

[adamheywood]

I always loved how it's Merry and Pippin who are first to charge after Aragorn

[ajalabandele]

Aragon's speech is modeled after the Saint Crispin's day speech from Henry V by Billy Shakes. Specifically the repetition of "But it is not this day" If you wanna learn from good dialogue, take a peak at Shakespeare. His dialogue has to also be the stage directions, there for it's laced with movement. Classic.

And I love you putting your clients in the video. Very cool!

[mateuspereira]

I do like Aragorn’s speech, but I’ll be honest that Theoden’s speech at the fields of Pelennor I think is better. Especially considering his lines upon his death. Just perfect

[jlogan]

Aragorn is just a prime role model for good characters. He is powrful but humble, he takes up responsibility but not for his own glory, and everything he does is in service and duty to those around him.

[wishuponamonkeyspaw]

I'd say one important aspect is to not get _too_ hung up on the entire 'said vs unsaid' part of dialogue, and that *context is key.* If you have two characters who know each other extremely well and support one another, there's no need to dance around what they want to say in private. Their explicit trust becomes the subtext. As for the Rings of Power example: the closest thing to a coherent message I can parse out of this parable is 'bad people focus on the negative, good people on the positive.' However, there's a bit of a caveat: he's talking to a child (a child that just got bullied no less). I get that elves have infinite lifespans and can waste decades pondering riddles and whatnot, but I feel like an amount of directness is more than called for in such a situation.