Author Inferiority

• Tolkien was an obsessive weirdo who cared more about linguistics and mythology than about building a cohesive fictional world. There are huge gaping holes in the worldbuilding of Middle Earth - parts that don't make any goddamned sense if you think about them for too long. But that hardly matters, because The Hobbit and The Lord of The Rings were compelling enough stories in themselves that no-one cared to pick apart Middle-Earth's nonsensical background.

• Wait, who's Baum? Oh right, Google says he's the guy who wrote the Wizard of Oz. Well, it's been ages since I saw any of the movies, and I've never read his books, so I can't rightly comment on his work. Moving on!

• While I'm fond of C.S. Lewis' fiction, calling Narnia a deep setting is downright laughable to me. Have you actually read any of the Narnia books recently? I have, and believe me, they're not the PG-13 fantasy-adventure romps Hollywood made them out to be. They are dull, awkward, stilted, badly paced and clearly written for children. The setting of Narnia itself isn't particularly coherent either - it's a loveably wonky mish-mash of every cool and fun fairytale thing Lewis could think of, coated in a thick layer of Christian allegory. It does not make sense, and it was never meant to - it was the stories and their message that were important to Lewis, not their backdrops.

• George Lucas is a fucking hack who couldn't write his way out of a paper bag. The last time he had free reins on a film project, we got the godawful Star Wars prequels. All the work that went into making the original trilogy great came from all the other writers, designers and editors working around Lucas, pruning away all his terrible ideas until they ended up with something actually good.

As for the "setting" of Star Wars - I would like to point out that none of the original trilogy films gave a rat's ass about the wider world outside the core cast. Those films succeeded on the quality of their drama and characters, not on the depth of their worldbuilding. You said it yourself in your own post - so much of the original films' style came from reusing classic icons of filmography and pop culture. It was only by the efforts of tedious nerds who insisted everything "make sense" that we got the Expanded Universe, and all the masturbatory dreck that came with it.

• In case it's not obvious by now - your archipelago of magic creatures does not have to make 100% perfect sense if your story is solid. Worldbuilding is absolutely, totally optional to writing good fiction, fantasy or otherwise. The only elements of your setting that you need to worry about are those elements that directly relate to your story's central conflict (your story does have a central conflict, right?).

• I don't know about Riordan, but I'm a bit confused to see someone claim Rowling based her books on pre-existing works. As far as I'm aware, pretty much everything in the Harry Potter series sprang fresh from Rowling's imagination, and her own experiences of boarding school. Well, unless you mean all the mythical creatures included in the Potterverse, but almost all fantasy writers are guilty of that to some degree. Or if you think Rowling ripped off The Worst Witch, which, y'know, she didn't (protip: it's entirely possible for two writers to hit on the same idea without one copying the other. Especially a combo as broad and obvious as “magic school”).

• But never mind that – what I want to impress on you is how totally, utterly pointless it is to compare your work to what came before. Truth is, all art is merely a culmination of all previous art an artist has been exposed to, filtered through the lens of their personal tastes, personality and life experiences. Don't worry about being original. Worry about being true to yourself, and making art that is true to you. Because there is no-one else on Earth who is quite like you, and no-one else on Earth who will make quite the same art as you will. So put yourself into your work, and you will achieve originality without even trying.

• I haven't read any of these folks' works, so I can't comment on them directly. But from what I know about stories with animal protagonists, the trick is simply to treat the animals like weirdly-shaped humans. Make them love, make them hate, make them chase dreams and confront reality. Make them remember the past, and fight for the future. Make them into people, and write them as you would any other characters. It's not that hard, when you get down to it.

• Battles and wars are not inherently interesting. Drama is interesting. When a battle serves a story's drama, it's interesting. When a battle is included for the sake of having a battle, it's boring. If a battle wouldn't fit in your story without a lot of awkward contrivance, don't have a fucking battle.

Let me break this down for you: the heart of all storytelling is drama, right? And the heart of all drama is conflict. And conflict occurs when one or more characters have a goal that they cannot instantly and effortlessly achieve. Say a character wants a gold locket for whatever reason, but the current owner of the locket wants to keep it for themselves. Does the character try to reason with the owner, to convince them to give the locket freely? Does the character try to barter or haggle with them, to buy the locket outright? Does the character fight the owner, to claim by force what they cannot obtain by trade or gift?

This clash of character goals, and the resolution of that clash, is the core of conflict, and by extension, drama. “Fight scenes” are just the continuation of that same dramatic process, through the medium of violence. And battles are just fight scenes with greater scope.

• The key to making fight scenes dramatic is to give the combatants clear and understandable motives for fighting. Maybe Alice thinks Bob is the Antichrist and needs to die, while Bob just wants to go on living. So Alice tries to kill Bob, and Bob fights back in self-defense. Their personalities and abilities would inform the fight as well – maybe Bob is a proficient martial artist, and Alice a frenzied nutcase with a carving knife. The stakes also need to be clear: that is, what each character stands to lose if they lose the fight. Perhaps Alice will be shamed for her failure, while Bob will (obviously) die if he fails to defend himself.

All this leads to a scenario where the audience can readily understand what's going on, and thus easily become invested in the struggles of all involved. Plus, this fight scene wouldn't be happening in a vacuum. It would exist in the broader context of the story, and so would ideally serve the story in some way. Does the fight change Bob? Does it change Alice? Does the fight establish either characters' personality? Does it introduce some new plot element? How is the fight resolved, and how does that resolution inform the story going forward?

The same is true of a battle: the audience needs to know what the two (or more) sides' goals are, what their capabilities are, and what's at stake for all involved. The battle of Helm's Deep wouldn't have been anywhere near as memorable if the audience had no idea why the Rohirrim and the Uruk-hai were fighting in the first place. Likewise, the Death Star Trench Run wouldn't have been so compelling if we didn't know what the Rebels were trying to achieve, nor would it have felt so climactic if it wasn't clear that Death Star Destroyed = Rebels Win.

• To bring this back to your story – as I said, you don't need a battle, if a battle wouldn't serve your story. But if you wanted one, and you wanted it to be “amazing”, you'd need to make it climactic. You'd need to build up to it, clearly establishing why the fight is happening, while putting off the ultimate resolution of the conflict for as long as possible to build tension.

Let me hash out a hypothetical plot to demonstrate, based off the few details of your story you've shared. So, your characters are a group of friends, travelling between islands populated by various magical creatures. Now, I'm going to assume that these friends were stranded on this island chain, and are just trying to get home.

So now they have a goal. Good. Now, let's say they come to an island, with another smaller island next to it. The friends see a village of strange creatures on the small island, but they don't know if they're friendly, and they don't want to get hurt (another goal), so they decide to stop on the larger island, which looks uninhabited.

The friends make landfall, and set up camp for the night. But just as they're all drifting off to sleep, a terrible monster lumbers into their camp, and drags all of them away, save one! The lone survivor jumps on the group's raft in a panic, and puts out to sea to escape (doesn't want to get hurt, remember). Lost in the dark, he accidentally drifts into the creature village on the smaller island.

The villagers quickly wake up, and demand to know who the survivor is, and what he's doing in their village. Fearing for his life (doesn't want to get hurt), the survivor explains how he and his friends were trying to avoid the village out of fear, but the others all got carried off by a monster on the big island, while he escaped on their raft.

Moved to pity, the villagers apologise for their initial hostility, and explain that the monster kidnaps people to eat (a goal), and is the reason they shun the big island. They also explain that they know how to kill the monster, but there is no-one among them with the skill or ability/who is brave enough to do what must be done. Wishing to make their guest at home (another goal), they offer to let the survivor rest in their village as long as they need.

But the survivor wants to save his friends (goal). One young hunter, who wishes to prove himself by slaying the monster (goal), agrees to return with him to the island, and help him find the monster's lair. So the two wannabe heroes cross back to the big island, and begin their search.

Eventually, the two heroes find the monster's lair, just as the monster is leaving on some errand. Sneaking in behind the monster, the survivor finds his friends still alive and intact, but bound and helpless. It seems the monster was putting off eating them for the time being. After freeing his friends, the whole group quickly form a plan to escape the island (goal), and maybe kill the monster while they're at it (another goal). As the monster approaches, the group prepare to put their plan into action.

But the plan goes awry, and the characters are forced to adjust on the fly. Their initial plan to kill the monster falls through, so they abandon that goal and focus on just trying to escape. The friends make a run for it, but the hunter stays behind – he believes killing the monster is more important than escaping (character informing goals) as his people will be trapped on the small island forever if the monster isn't slain (clear stakes).

The friends waver, not sure whether to flee and live (selfish survival goal) or stay and fight (selfless save-the-village goal). This is an internal conflict, and the turning point in the story, where we finally see the characters' true colours. Eventually, the survivor decides that he has to repay the villagers' kindness, and decides to stand with the hunter against the monster. Moved by their friend's example, the other friends decide to stand with him.

And so the story proceeds to the final battle, with everything in place. We know why the monster is fighting (to get food, and maybe revenge against the critters that attacked it before escaping), and we know why the heroes are fighting (to free the village from the monster's terror). We even have some context for why the heroes think their cause is worth fighting for (the villagers are kind, reasonable, friendly people, who really don't deserve the monster), and so we can empathise with their decision.

Anyway, the heroes slay the monster, the village is saved, and maybe the friends receive some kind of reward from the villagers for their efforts. But they're not home yet (over-arching goal is not yet achieved), so they wave goodbye to the villagers, and set sail for the next island, and the next adventure (the story goes on).

There, plot done, with a totally justified and genuinely climactic final battle. It's not a titanic clash for the fate of the world – it's a 1v4 brawl for the fate of a pair of tiny islands. But with firm context, that brawl could provide more drama than all the Armageddons ever written. You're welcome.

• Remember my earlier point about originality? It applies here too. Write honestly, write sincerely, write what feels true to you. New writers are told to “write what [they] know” for a reason – if you base your work on your own, real-life experiences, your work will feel “real” without even trying (so long as you keep in mind the need for drama – you're telling a story, not writing a diary).

• Although, if you want to write about things that you haven't personally experienced, like the rise of Nazism or life under Nazi rule, I'd say go and read up on it, and read deeply. It's one thing to make your antagonists Nazi clones, but if you really want those characters to stand on their own, to stick in the mind as their own special brand of evil, you need to look into how and why the Nazi regime worked in the first place. You need to understand the economics, the sociology, the history that led to that event.

Because once you know what you need to keep, and what you can freely change, you can start mixing up the elements however you please, to make original fascists that still feel “right”. That goes for anything that you haven't personally experienced, really. Read up on it, as much as you can. Then when it comes to writing about it, you can convincingly bullshit your way through. Because that's what all fiction is, anyway – convincing bullshit, by professional bullshitters.

And yes, I know I said above about not worrying about realistic worldbuilding, but this isn't about building a realistic world – this is about building a realistic conflict. This is about ensuring that your antagonist – whether they be a person with goals or a force of nature – has actions that make sense. Characters can have stupid and insane goals, of course, but they ought to be stupid and insane by design, not by accident.