History Main / WritingByTheSeatOfYourPants

* ''Series/StarTrekTheNextGeneration'': The famous cliffhanger at the end of "[[Recap/StarTrekTheNextGenerationS3E26S4E1TheBestOfBothWorlds The Best of Both Worlds]] Part I" was due to the writers not knowing if Creator/PatrickStewart would return as Picard or not, forcing them to pause there and wait to write Part II by the seat of the pants once they found out about Stewart. Amusingly, Michael Piller, who wrote the finished script, had also decided to leave the show, and thought it was quite funny that he would be leaving the resolution to somebody else... and then he decided to stay on too, and suddenly had to come up with a resolution himself! Luckily, this turned out extremely well and the two-parter is still considered one of the entire ''Trek'' franchise's all-time greatest moments. [[FranchiseOriginalSin Not so luckily]], this encouraged the writers to [[FranchiseOriginalSin ''keep on doing it'' at the end of each season on every ''Trek'' show from then on, which naturally had increasingly diminishing returns]].

* ''Series/StarTrekTheNextGeneration'': The famous cliffhanger at the end of "[[Recap/StarTrekTheNextGenerationS3E26S4E1TheBestOfBothWorlds The Best of Both Worlds]] Part I" was due to the writers not knowing if Creator/PatrickStewart would return as Picard or not, forcing them to pause there and wait to write Part II by the seat of the pants once they found out about Stewart. Amusingly, Michael Piller, who wrote the finished script, had also decided to leave the show, and thought it was quite funny that he would be leaving the resolution to somebody else... and then he decided to stay on too, and suddenly had to come up with a resolution himself! Luckily, this turned out extremely well and the two-parter is still considered one of the entire ''Trek'' franchise's all-time greatest moments. [[FranchiseOriginalSin Not so luckily]], this encouraged the writers to ''keep on doing it'' at the end of each season on every ''Trek'' show from then on, which naturally had increasingly diminishing returns.

* ''Series/{{Supernatural}}'':
** Creator Creator/EricKripke had a plan for the ending of Season 3 which was derailed by a writers' strike which cut the season short. This led to the season ending with a massive cliffhanger, [[spoiler: Dean dying and going to Hell.]] Kripke had an arc planned that would have had Sam save his brother, but there was no time to set it up. So, Season 4 introduced [[spoiler: the concept of angels, and specifically, Castiel, the angel who pulled Dean from Hell. Prior to that, Kripke had been adamant that angels would not appear on the show even though there were demons. Season 4 gave us the angels and made them Old Testament-style "dicks' who didn't care much for humans.]]

** Creator Creator/EricKripke had a plan for the ending of Season 3 which was derailed by a writers' strike which cut the season short. This led to the season-ending with a massive cliffhanger, [[spoiler: Dean dying and going to Hell.]] Kripke had an arc planned that would have had Sam save his brother, but there was no time to set it up. So, Season 4 introduced [[spoiler: the concept of angels, and specifically, Castiel, the angel who pulled Dean from Hell. Prior to that, Kripke had been adamant that angels would not appear on the show even though there were demons. Season 4 introduced the angels and made them Old Testament-style "dicks' who didn't care much for humans.]]
** After revamping the mythology to include angels, the writers created a female love interest for Dean who was a FallenAngel, but audiences didn't warm to the character. So, they [[spoiler: scrapped that character and gave most of her arc to Castiel, who did not die as planned.]] This led to creating an entire backstory for Castiel's vessel as well as making him Dean's NotLoveInterest. Or maybe his [[https://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/HoYay/Supernatural Not Not Love Interest]].

** Amethyst being created on Earth. While her joining the Crystal Gems post-war had always part of the character's backstory, her specifically being made at the Earth Kindergarten was thought up during the writing sessions for Season 1B; Garnet's "We kept Amethyst" line from early in the show's run wasn't intended as foreshadowing at the time. Amethyst's short height being the gem equivalent of a birth defect was also something thought up later still. %%podcast Vol. 2/Ep. 2

* Dan Povenmire was asked to pitch ''WesternAnimation/PhineasAndFerbStarWars'' before he had actually finished the script. He explained the script anyway and actually managed to fix every plot-hole without anyone realizing he was improvising.

* ''WesternAnimation/GravityFalls''. Almost everything outside [[DrivingQuestion the identity of the Author]] and his backstory was made up as the writers went along, with them jokingly apologizing for the show not being [[TheProducerThinksOfEverything as perfectly planned out as fans believe]] after every instance of this in the show's DVD commentary tracks. Several important details and plot elements were usually the result of an idea being put in purely because it seemed cool or funny. Any intent or attempt to give them more meaning coming later on. These include:

** The wheel of symbols surrounding Bill in the opening credits had no meaning upon conception. It was just meant to be a cool visual using various pieces of imagery from the show.
** Before Old Man [=McGucket=] [[spoiler:was revealed to be The Author's old lab assistant]], he was originally just meant to be a one-off character.

** After revamping the mythology to include angels, the writers created a female love interest for Dean who was a FallenAngel, but audiences didn't warm to the character. So, they [[spoiler: scrapped that character and gave most of her arc to Castiel, who did not die as planned.]] This led to creating an entire backstory for Castiel's vessel as well as making him Dean's NotLoveInterest.
** Season 5 had been planned to be the end of the show, so Season 6 had to undue the finality of the previous season. Sam returned from Hell [[spoiler: soulless]] but that whole arc was scrapped mid-season and as a replacement, [[spoiler: Castiel became the BigBad.]]
** The whole Leviathan arc was a last-minute replacement in Season 7, apparently because the war between Heaven and Hell that was planned was either too expensive or wasn't working on the page.

** The sequel series produced by Creator/{{Disney}} ran into this issue as a result of their initial plans fell through. Originally each film was supposed to be directed by a different director (Episode 7 by Creator/JJAbrams, Episode 8 by Creator/RianJohnson, and Episode 9 by Colin Trevorrow) like they did with the ''Franchise/MarvelCinematicUniverse''. However, Disney left it to the directors to make the plot and characters, hoping that each one would build off of the previous film to create a unique story that had different directorial flairs to it. However, this lack of planning caused issues when Creator/RianJohnson stepped up for his film, because, judging by the result, he had little interest in simply "building off" the previous movie, as his film ''Film/TheLastJedi'' essentially wrapped up or rendered irrelevant all of Abrams' plotlines from the ''Film/TheForceAwakens'', leaving the final film with almost no plot points to work with. Colin Trevorrow would leave as well, forcing Abrams to return to direct the last movie and follow up on the little remaining plot points left from the previous film. Most notably, Rian said that [[spoiler:the next film could very well retcon his own idea of Rey's parents not being anyone special, although Daisy Ridley also said that the ''one'' answer Creator/JJAbrams had in mind [[http://collider.com/star-wars-reys-parents-answer/ was about Rey's parents, and it was the same as Johnson's.]]]] As it turned out in ''Film/TheRiseOfSkywalker'', [[spoiler:while Abrams was fine leaving Rey's parents "[[ExactWords nobodies]]", he still made her ''grandfather'' somebody, as in Emperor Palpatine, who himself wasn't even originally intended to return and become the overall BigBad in the first draft of the script]]. Basically, Disney was hoping the directors would be able to write each film in such a way that the next film could take the ending and expand it. However, this caused the films to have inconsistent tones and plotlines that seemed all over the place.

** The sequel series produced by Creator/{{Disney}} ran into this issue as a result of their initial plans fell through. Originally each film was supposed to be directed by a different director (Episode 7 by Creator/JJAbrams, Episode 8 by Creator/RianJohnson, and Episode 9 by Colin Trevorrow) like they did with the ''Franchise/MarvelCinematicUniverse''. However, Disney left it to the directors to make the plot and characters, hoping that each one would build off of the previous film to create a unique story that had different directorial flairs to it. However, this lack of planning caused issues when Creator/RianJohnson stepped up for his film, because judging by the result he had little interest in simply "building off" the previous movie, as his film ''Film/TheLastJedi'' essentially wrapped up or rendered irrelevant all of Abrams' plotlines from the ''Film/TheForceAwakens'', leaving the final film with almost no plot points to work with. Colin Trevorrow would leave as well, forcing Abrams to return to direct the last movie and follow up on the little remaining plot points left from the previous film. Most notably, Rian said that [[spoiler:the next film could very well retcon his own idea of Rey's parents not being anyone special, although Daisy Ridley also said that the ''one'' answer Creator/JJAbrams had in mind [[http://collider.com/star-wars-reys-parents-answer/ was about Rey's parents, and it was the same as Johnson's.]]]] As it turned out in ''Film/TheRiseOfSkywalker'', [[spoiler:while Abrams was fine leaving Rey's parents "[[ExactWords nobodies]]", he still made her ''grandfather'' somebody, as in Emperor Palpatine, who himself wasn't even originally intended to return and become the overall BigBad in the first draft of the script]]. Basically, Disney was hoping the directors would be able to write each film in such a way that the next film could take the ending and expand it. However, this caused the films to have inconsistent tones and plotlines that seemed all over the place.

** Zigzagged with the original trilogy. After the success of ''Film/ANewHope'', an outline was created planning possibly nine films. However, while [[Film/TheEmpireStrikesBack the sequel]] was being written, [[AuthorExistenceFailure the hired writer died]], leading Creator/GeorgeLucas to a CreatorBreakdown that made him change things around (most importantly, Anakin Skywalker and Darth Vader became the same character, and the film would become [[AnachronicOrder Episode V]] of IX), and also push some elements to [[Film/ReturnOfTheJedi the sixth]] (namely the revelation of Luke's sister and the appearance of [[BigBad the Emperor]]) - which in turn would become the GrandFinale as Lucas decided to just end at 6 films, though the prequels [[SequelGap would take a while to appear]].

** This tradition was tragically enforced after the [[AuthorExistenceFailure unexpected death]] of Creator/CarrieFisher (Leia), who was supposed to have a huge planned role in ''Film/TheRiseOfSkywalker''. Her death (and Rian Johnson's decision to leave her final performance intact instead of altering the film to kill Leia) reportedly left the writers scrambling. They ultimately brought back some unused shots of her from ''The Force Awakens'' and added some FakeShemp moments to cobble together an ending for her arc.

* Creator/DavidLynch infamously wrote ''Film/InlandEmpire'' scene by scene during filming. What effect this had on the film's [[MindScrew (lack of) coherence]] is up to debate. Seeing as it's ''David Lynch,'' however, [[CrazyAwesome it really doesn't matter too much.]]

** The sequel series produced by Creator/{{Disney}} ran into this issue as a result of their initial plans fell through. Originally each film was supposed to be directed by a different directors (Episode 7 by Creator/JJAbrams, Episode 8 by Creator/RianJohnson, and Episode 9 by Colin Trevorrow) like they did with the ''Franchise/MarvelCinematicUniverse''. However, Disney left it to the directors to make the plot and characters, hoping that each one would build off of the previous film to create a unique story that had different directorial flairs to it. However, this lack of planning caused issues when Creator/RianJohnson stepped up for his film, because judging by the result he had little interest in simply "building off" the previous movie, as his film ''Film/TheLastJedi'' essentially wrapped up or rendered irrelevant all of Abrams' plotlines from the ''Film/TheForceAwakens'', leaving the final film with almost no plot points to work with. Colin Trevorrow would leave as well, forcing Abrams to return to direct the last movie and follow up on the little remaining plot points left from the previous film. Most notably, Rian said that [[spoiler:the next film could very well retcon his own idea of Rey's parents not being anyone special, although Daisy Ridley also said that the ''one'' answer Creator/JJAbrams had in mind [[http://collider.com/star-wars-reys-parents-answer/ was about Rey's parents, and it was the same as Johnson's.]]]] As it turned out in ''Film/TheRiseOfSkywalker'', [[spoiler:while Abrams was fine leaving Rey's parents "[[ExactWords nobodies]]", he still made her ''grandfather'' somebody, as in Emperor Palpatine, who himself wasn't even originally intended to return and become the overall BigBad in the first draft of the script]]. Basically, Disney was hoping the directors would be able to write each film in such a way that the next film could take the ending and expand it. However, this caused the films to have inconsistent tones and plotlines that seemed all over the place.

** The sequel series produced by Creator/{{Disney}} ran into this issue as a result of their initial plans fell through. Originally each film was supposed to be directed by a different directors (Episode 7 by Creator/JJAbrams, Episode 8 by Creator/RianJohnson, and Episode 9 by Colin Trevorrow) like they did with the ''Franchise/MarvelCinematicUniverse''. However, Disney left it to the directors to make the plot and characters, hoping that each one would build off of the previous film to create a unique story that had different directorial flairs to it. However, this lack of planning caused issues when Creator/RianJohnson stepped up for his film, because judging by the result he had little interest in simply "building off" the previous movie, as his film ''Film/TheLastJedi'' essentially wrapped up or rendered irrelevant all of Abrams' plotlines from the ''Film/TheForceAwakens'', leaving the final film with almost no plot points to work with. Colin Trevorrow would leave as well, forcing Abrams to return to direct the last movie and follow up on the little remaining plot points left from the previous film. Most notably, Rian said that [[spoiler:the next film could very well retcon his own idea of Rey's parents not being anyone special, although Daisy Ridley also said that the ''one'' answer Creator/JJAbrams had in mind [[http://collider.com/star-wars-reys-parents-answer/ was about Rey's parents, and it was the same as Johnson's.]]]] As it turned out in ''Film/TheRiseOfSkywalker'', [[spoiler:while Abrams was fine leaving Rey's parents "[[ExactWords nobodies]]", he still made her ''grandfather'' somebody, as in Emperor Palpatine, who himself wasn't even originally intended to return and become the overall BigBad in the first draft of the script]]. Basically, Disney was hoping the directors would be able to write each film in such a way that the next film could take the ending and expand it. However this caused the films to have inconsistent tones and plotlines that seemed all over the place.

** The sequel series produced by Creator/{{Disney}} ran into this issue as a result of their initial plans fell through. Originally each film was supposed to be directed by a different directors (Episode 7 by Creator/JJAbrams, Episode 8 by Creator/RianJohnson, and Episode 9 by Colin Trevorrow) like they did with the ''Franchise/MarvelCinematicUniverse''. However, Disney left it to the directors to make the plot and characters, hoping that each one would build off of the previous film to create a unique story that had different directorial flairs to it. However, this lack of planning caused issues when Creator/RianJohnson stepped up for his film because without a concrete idea of an arc to take the story, and judging by the result had little interest in "building off" the previous film, with essentially all of Abrams' plotlines from the ''Film/TheForceAwakens'' being either wrapped up or rendered irrelevant, leaving the final film with almost no plot points to work with. Colin Trevorrow would leave as well, forcing Abrams to return to direct the last movie and follow up on the little remaining plot points left from the previous film. Most notably, Rian said that [[spoiler:the next film could very well retcon his own idea of Rey's parents not being anyone special, although Daisy Ridley also said that the ''one'' answer Creator/JJAbrams had in mind [[http://collider.com/star-wars-reys-parents-answer/ was about Rey's parents, and it was the same as Johnson's.]]]] As it turned out in ''Film/TheRiseOfSkywalker'', [[spoiler:while Abrams was fine leaving Rey's parents "[[ExactWords nobodies]]", he still made her ''grandfather'' somebody, as in Emperor Palpatine, who himself wasn't even originally intended to return and become the overall BigBad in the first draft of the script]]. Basically, Disney was hoping the directors would be able to write each film in such a way that the next film could take the ending and expand it. However this caused the films to have inconsistent tones and plotlines that seemed all over the place.

** The sequel series produced by Creator/{{Disney}} ran into this issue as a result of their initial plans fell through. Originally each film was supposed to be directed by a different directors (Episode 7 by Creator/JJAbrams, Episode 8 by Creator/RianJohnson, and Episode 9 by Colin Trevorrow) like they did with the ''Franchise/MarvelCinematicUniverse''. However, Disney left it to the directors to make the plot and characters, hoping that each one would build off of the previous film to create a unique story that had different directorial flairs to it. However, this lack of planning caused issues when Creator/RianJohnson stepped up for his film because without a concrete idea of an arc to take the story, he was allowed to essentially resolve almost all the plots from the ''Film/TheForceAwakens'', leaving the final film with almost no plot points to work with. Colin Trevorrow would leave as well, forcing Abrams to return to direct the last movie and follow up on the little remaining plot points left from the previous film. Most notably, Rian said that [[spoiler:the next film could very well retcon his own idea of Rey's parents not being anyone special, although Daisy Ridley also said that the ''one'' answer Creator/JJAbrams had in mind [[http://collider.com/star-wars-reys-parents-answer/ was about Rey's parents, and it was the same as Johnson's.]]]] As it turned out in ''Film/TheRiseOfSkywalker'', [[spoiler:while Abrams was fine leaving Rey's parents "[[ExactWords nobodies]]", he still made her ''grandfather'' somebody, as in Emperor Palpatine, who himself wasn't even originally intended to return and become the overall BigBad in the first draft of the script]]. Basically, Disney was hoping the directors would be able to write each film in such a way that the next film could take the ending and expand it, causing the films to have inconsistent tones and plotlines that seemed all over the place.

* Production of ''Film/TheHobbit'' trilogy was rushed and the script was constantly being rewritten, meaning that when Creator/PeterJackson rather quickly was called in to cover the directing, he often had to come up with lines and sequences as he was shooting. He'd have the cast and crew break for long lunches so he could have the time to develop ideas and everyone would have something to do in the afternoon. Many scenes had to be cobbled together from randomly scened takes, that were done with no reason (such as the Dwarves vs Smaug, and the climax of the second film).

* The storyline [[GratuitousJapanese "manga"]] on ''Website/GaiaOnline'' tells an unbelievably convoluted story. It's so twisty and [[ShockingSwerve swerve-y]], in fact, that the writers and artists responsible for pushing out storyline updates have joked that even they stopped paying attention to what happens at some point or other.

** The sequel series produced by Creator/{{Disney}} ran into this issue as a result of their initial plans fell through. Originally each film was supposed to be directed by a different direction (Episode 7 by Creator/JJAbrams, Episode 8 by Creator/RianJohnson, and Episode 9 by Colin Trevorrow) like they did with the ''Franchise/MarvelCinematicUniverse''. However, Disney left it to the directors to make the plot and characters, hoping that each one would build off of the previous film to create a unique story that had different directorial flairs to it. However, this lack of planning caused issues when Creator/RianJohnson stepped up for his film because without a concrete idea of an arc to take the story, he was allowed to essentially resolve almost all the plots from the ''Film/TheForceAwakens'', leaving the final film with almost no plot points to work with. Colin Trevorrow would leave as well, forcing Abrams to return to direct the last movie and follow up on the little remaining plot points left from the previous film. Most notably, Rian said that [[spoiler:the next film could very well retcon his own idea of Rey's parents not being anyone special, although Daisy Ridley also said that the ''one'' answer Creator/JJAbrams had in mind [[http://collider.com/star-wars-reys-parents-answer/ was about Rey's parents, and it was the same as Johnson's.]]]] As it turned out in ''Film/TheRiseOfSkywalker'', [[spoiler:while Abrams was fine leaving Rey's parents "[[ExactWords nobodies]]", he still made her ''grandfather'' somebody, as in Emperor Palpatine, who himself wasn't even originally intended to return and become the overall BigBad in the first draft of the script]]. Basically, Disney was hoping the directors would be able to write each film in such a way that the next film could take the ending and expand it, causing the films to have inconsistent tones and plotlines that seemed all over the place.

** This tradition was tragically enforced after the [[AuthorExistenceFailure unexpected death]] of Creator/CarrieFisher (Leia), who was supposed to have a huge planned role in ''Film/TheRiseOfSkywalker''. Her death (and Rian Johnson's decision to leave her final performance intact instead of altering the film to kill Leia) reportedly left the writers scrambling. They ultimately brought back some unused shots of her from ''The Force Awakens'' to cobble together an ending for her arc.

This does not always happen voluntary, mind you. In some cases, the writer did indeed have a carefully planned storyline in mind until it was suddenly struck down by either ExecutiveMeddling, an ExecutiveVeto, or some other case of RealLifeWritesThePlot, and the writer had to scramble against the deadline to come with a replacement story.

[[Administrivia/TropesAreTools Like most things, this can be done well, or badly]]. There's more than a few examples where the final product ends up so well put together than you would have never guessed it was an example of this writing approach. AbortedArc, TheChrisCarterEffect, and KudzuPlot are what happens when Writing by the Seat of Your Pants leaves too many loose plot threads.

** A more recent example is ''Anime/DragonBallSuper'''s Universe Survival Saga. Toriyama and his collaborator Toyotaro decided that they wanted an 80-person battle royale tournament, but only designed four characters for it[[note]]Excluding the Universe 6 characters already introduced in their own story arc[[/note]]: Ribrianne and the three main [[{{Sentai}} Pride Troopers]] Jiren, Toppo, and Dyspo. All of the other characters' designs were created by various Toei staffers, who also helped flesh them out: Toriyama only designed Ribrianne as fat, while Toei staff suggested making her a parody MagicalGirl based off of their work on ''Franchise/PrettyCure''. However, in other ways the trope is averted: Toriyama's original draft for the story included a full beginning-to-end write-up that covered the main plot points, what happened to every member of Team Universe 7, and even [[spoiler:Frieza being called in to replace Majin Buu when the latter falls asleep.]]

* Buronson, writer of ''Manga/FistOfTheNorthStar'', has admitted in interviews to never plan things out and write on the fly. For istance, the initial reason Kenshiro has the seven scars on his chest is simply because it would be cool, and Buronson came up later with the idea they were inflicted by his RivalTurnedEvil. Buronson considers this method of writing very effective since the readers can't predict what will happen if the writer doesn't know either.

** This was a major part of the franchise in the 1990s, and is often cited as a reason for the franchise developing a major case of TheChrisCarterEffect. Essentially, many books were written with the collector's market in mind, who bought books that seemed like they'd be worth something in a few years (such as the introduction of a new character, or the first big hintings of a major story arc), and so they would merrily introduce new characters without having any idea what their deal was, or drop major foreshadowing without having a clear plan what they were actually foreshadowing. Famous examples of both were Cable, whose backstory wasn't worked out until years later, and the Third Summers Brother, which took ''decades'' to be resolved properly by a character who didn't even exist at the time.

* ''ComicBook/{{Catwoman}}'' has an InUniverse example: in a 1990's story, she was hired to steal the script of a movie that was being filmed on an island. She found out, however, that the filmmaker ''didn't'' have a script or a screenplay: he was improvising the whole thing without telling anyone about it. The guy was also AxCrazy and tried to kill the crew. Thanks to Catwoman, who saved the crew, [[HoistByHisOwnPetard the only one to die was himself]]. In order to not lose the contract's payment, Catwoman wrote a script herself and signed as the dead filmmaker. The movie made with her script became a blockbuster.

* ''ComicStrip/CalvinAndHobbes'' creator Bill Watterson notes in commentary that he when writing out a multi-part story, he doesn't think of an ending in conception because he prefers the story to flow organically. Sometimes it would create a storyline and resolution which would pleasantly surprise himself (such as the arc where Calvin decides to duplicate himself), [[Administrivia/TropesAreTools but other times he would write himself into a corner]].

** Although this story generally has a good deal of planning by fanfic standards, the author will sometimes run with spur-of-the-moment ideas, especially in ancillary scenes. Bridgette’s dream sequence [[note]][[AscendedFanon based on a reviewer’s comment]][[/note]], the makeover scene before the camping challenge and the dancing at the boot camp party are acknowledged examples of elaborate scenes with little or no planning.

* The 90's movie of ''Film/TheFugitive'' was largely made this way, on the fly--although one would never suspect by watching it, as it ''looks'' very carefully planned.

* Production of ''Film/TheHobbit'' trilogy was rushed and the script was constantly being rewritten, meaning that when Creator/PeterJackson rather quickly was called in to cover the directing, he often had to come up with lines and sequences as he was shooting. He'd have the cast and crew break for long lunches so he could have the time to develop ideas and everyone would have something to do in the afternoon. Many scenes had to be cobbeled together from randomly scened takes, that were done with no reason (such as the Dwarves vs Smaug, and the climax of the second film).

** The sequel series produced by Creator/{{Disney}} ran into this issue as a result of their initial plans fell through. Originally each film was supposed to be directed by a different direction (Episode 7 by Creator/JJAbrams, Episode 8 by Creator/RianJohnson, and Episode 9 by Colin Trevorrow) like they did with the ''Franchise/MarvelCinematicUniverse''. However, Disney left it to the directors to make the plot and characters, hoping that each one would build off of the previous film to create a unique story that had different directorial flairs to it. However, this lack of planning caused issues when Creator/RianJohnson stepped up for his film, because without a concrete idea of an arc to take the story, he was allowed to essentially resolve almost all the plots from the ''Film/TheForceAwakens'', leaving the final film with almost no plot points to work with. Colin Trevorrow would leave as well, forcing Abrams to return to direct the last movie, and follow up on the little remaining plotpoints left from the previous film. Most notably, Rian said that [[spoiler:the next film could very well retcon his own idea of Rey's parents not being anyone special, although Daisy Ridley also said that the ''one'' answer Creator/JJAbrams had in mind [[http://collider.com/star-wars-reys-parents-answer/ was about Rey's parents, and it was the same as Johnson's.]]]] As it turned out in ''Film/TheRiseOfSkywalker'', [[spoiler:while Abrams was fine leaving Rey's parents "[[ExactWords nobodies]]", he still made her ''grandfather'' somebody, as in Emperor Palpatine, who himself wasn't even originally intended to return and become the overall BigBad in the first draft of the script]]. Basically, Disney was hoping the directors would be able to write each film in such a way that the next film could take the ending and expand it, causing the films to have inconsistent tones and plotlines that seemed all over the place.

** Another issue this caused was that [[spoiler:Tyrol was made one of the Final Five despite having a son, due to the writers forgetting that Cylons couldn't have children. When they realized this halfway through the final season, it was quickly retconned that his son with Cally was actually the result of Cally having a one night stand with Hot Dog the night before they began dating. And then the episode wasn't quite as clear as it could have been that this was what happened, leaving many fans with the impression that Cally (now long dead and unable to defend herself) had cheated on Tyrol. Also, keep in mind that Cally had ''never'' shared a scene with or even spoken to Hot Dog before. Ever. In the DVD commentary, Ron Moore admits that he came up with this retcon simply because they'd built up Hera as the special Hybrid child so much that it wouldn't make sense to have two Hybrids - which was the ''entire criticism'' about making Tyrol a Cylon in the first place.]]

* The late 1940's TV show ''Kukla, Fran and Ollie'' thrived on this. The show was completely unscripted and the actors ad-libbed everything on set.

* In the original KTMA season of ''Series/MysteryScienceTheater3000'', the riffs were improvised rather than written. The films being mocked hadn't even been seen in their entirety in advance. In the Creator/ComedyCentral era, however, each film was carefully screened and written for before its respective episode was recorded. The show became [[GrowingTheBeard better for it]].

** Writer Doug Naylor repeatedly dithered over what the ending to Series VIII should be, having had to scrap his originally planned finale as the budget had run out. The ending they went with was so rushed the director had to step in to play a part using a costume nicked from another series; this replaced another ending which the cast was purportedly in costume, ready to film when it was scrapped.

* Music/TalkingHeads relied quite a bit on this for ''Music/RemainInLight'', ''Music/SpeakingInTongues'', and ''Music/{{Naked}}'', starting the songwriting process by jamming out for extended periods of time in the studio before piecing everything together from the results. This extends to the lyrics as well: frontman Music/DavidByrne would improvise the melodies and rhythms for the vocal parts by scatting along with the instrumentals, then stringing together thematically-connected phrases based on what fit the resultant rhythms. This led to the songs on these albums leaning more heavily in the WordSaladLyrics direction, most notably with the [[SomethingSomethingLeonardBernstein famously obtuse and tricky-to-learn]] lyrics to ''Speaking in Tongues'' opener "Burning Down the House".

* The majority of Music/IronMaiden's album ''The Book of Souls'' was written, rehearsed once or twice and then recorded right on the spot- mostly so the band could keep a feeling of freshness and spontaneity in the music. Only two songs were pre-planned- the two Dickinson compositions, "If Eternity Should Fail" (which was originally meant to be a solo album track) and the closing [[EpicRocking 18-minute]] "Empire of the Clouds" (which took at least a month or two to write and was composed on a piano).

* Music/GeorgeGershwin wrote ''Rhapsody in Blue'' in five weeks. Around New Year's 1924, bandleader Paul Whiteman had asked him to write an extended {{Jazz}}-influenced symphonic piece for a concert to be held on February 12. Gershwin said no, because that wouldn't leave him much time to polish it up. Whiteman went ahead and told the press that Gershwin was working on it anyway, forcing him to throw it all together quickly. The famous clarinet glissando that opens ''Rhapsody'' was a ThrowItIn moment, after Gershwin heard Whiteman's clarinet player goofing around with the bit in rehearsal.

** Wrestling/VinceRusso inparticular became an even more notorious example during his stint as writer for Wrestling/{{WCW}} toward the end of the Monday Night War. Characters turned and won and lost titles so often that fans lost track, [[AbortedArc numerous angles were abandoned midstream]] (most famously Wrestling/StacyKeibler's "pregnancy"), wrestlers would retire "forever" only to show up next episode (quick even by wrestling standards). There is a reason bad and nonsensical booking leads to {{c|rowdchant}}hants of "[[XPacHeat Fire Russo!]]" even in promotions he's never worked for.

-->'''Karin''': See, this is the kind of plot hole inducing mind set we were talking about before.

* Though the main beats of ''{{Toys/BIONICLE}}'''s story were planned out years or at least months in advance, many smaller segments were written like this, chiefly the unfinished 2007-2011 online serials. The writer admitted he hated planning ahead because he always tried to surprise himself as if he were listening to someone else's story, and because he wanted the characters to change organically rather than forcing them to do things the plot demands. This has caused a stir among fans, as not only did it leave the official story with about a dozen unresolved plot-threads and loads of haphazard {{retcon}}s after the franchise's cancellation, but the writer actively encouraged his audience of kids to write this way.

* Creator/{{Wildbow}}, author of ''Literature/{{Worm}}'', makes a point of this as one way of making the writing process more interesting for himself. Virtually every chapter of Worm is written just the day before publishing, often finishing shortly before the midnight deadline, and he has set himself a minimum-length of 6000 words. He has missed an update only twice-both by mere minutes, and both times due to technical issues.

* ''WesternAnimation/YellowSubmarine'' began production without an ending or a beginning because director George Dunning had already animated those. He simply told his writers (20, reputedly--Jack Mendelsohn and Erich Segal were the credited writers) and his animation directors (Bob Balser, Jack Stokes) to fill in the scenes in between those points.

** Amethyst being created on Earth. While her joining the Crystal Gems post-war had always part of the character's backstory, her specifically being made at the Earth Kindergarten was thought up during in the writing sessions for Season 1B; Garnet's "We kept Amethyst" line from early in the show's run wasn't intended as foreshadowing at the time. Amethyst's short height being the gem equivalent of a birth defect was also something thought up later still. %%podcast Vol. 2/Ep. 2

* According to the DVDBonusContent, ''WesternAnimation/{{Freakazoid}}'' was written with very little planning because of time constraints.

** Wrestling/VinceRusso inparticular became an even more notorious example during his stint as writer for Wrestling/{{WCW}} toward the end of the Monday Night War. Characters turned and won and lost titles so often that fans lost track, [[AbortedArc numerous angles were abandoned midstream]] (most famously Wrestling/StacyKeibler's "pregnancy"), wrestlers would retire "forever" only to show up next episode (quick even by wrestling standards). There is a reason bad and nonsensical booking leads to {{c|rowdchant}}hants of "[[XPacHeat Fire Russo!]]" even in promotions he's never worked for. There's also a reason Russo was the {{Trope Namer|s}} for ShockingSwerve- he was more interested in ''surprising'' the audience than ''entertaining'' them.

Others just sit down at their word processor and type whatever comes into their head. This trope is dedicated to them.

** Hirsch admits that during production of the first episode, the writers had no idea what was behind Stan's vending machine. They only came up with [[spoiler:the multidimensional portal]] when they realized their planned reveal of [[spoiler:him owning Journal #1]] wouldn't be all that impactful on its own.

* Parodied in ''ComicBook/SergioAragonesDestroysDC'', where [[Creator/SergioAragones Aragonés]], InUniverse, doesn't decide on who the BigBad is until Batman is about to reveal his identity (pictured above). He then goes on an ArchiveBinge to find the "most disgusting, loathsome villain of all DC history".

* Parodied in ''ComicBook/SergioAragonesDestroysDC'', where [[Creator/SergioAragones Mr. Aragonés]], InUniverse, doesn't decide on who the BigBad is until Batman is about to reveal his identity (pictured above). He then goes on an ArchiveBinge to find the "most disgusting, loathsome villain of all DC history".