01. Intro to Killing Eve: The Ultimate Thriller

11/01/19 • 25 min

What is the hype about for Killing Eve?

We discuss that, Genre, and the conventions/ obligatory scenes of a Thriller.

Also, what is your favorite female assassin in films, television, or novels (or even comic books)? Let us know, write us at [email protected] or visit our webpage at www.sgshowrunner.com.

What is the hype about for Killing Eve?

We discuss that, Genre, and the conventions/ obligatory scenes of a Thriller.

Also, what is your favorite female assassin in films, television, or novels (or even comic books)? Let us know, write us at [email protected] or visit our webpage at www.sgshowrunner.com.

Previous Episode

00. Why we're watching TV shows

Welcome to the Story Grid Showrunners Podcast, dedicated to helping writers master their genre.

If you’re writing a book and you want to make it stand out, we can help you.

How? We’ll be watching and analyzing hit TV series using the Story Grid and will help you apply what we’ve learned to your own writing.

Why the Story Grid? There are many templates and schools of thought that can help you self-edit your book. The Story Grid takes many of these concepts, for example, Joseph Campbell’s Hero’s Journey or Kim Hudson’s Virgin’s Promise or Save the cat! Writes a Novel, and allows you to understand why your novel isn’t working.

So what does the Story Grid have to do with TV series?

In the Story Grid Universe, we believe that you can learn from masterworks. At www.storygrid.com you can find resources showing how and why Silence of the Lambs is a classic thriller, and why Pride & Prejudice is still a celebrated love story even though it was published over 150 years ago.

If you want to see films analyzed, go to the Story Grid Editors Roundtable. We love those guys, and they do an awesome job showing how films work.

We are three Story Grid Editors - Parul, Mel, and Randall - and we met while studying under Editor Shawn Coyne. In an ugly business hotel in the wonderful city of Nashville, Tennessee we bonded as we studied together; we analyzed novels, films, songs together. We’re part of a select group of Story Grid geeks who help writers write better stories using the story grid methodology.

When we work with writers we often find ourselves asking them to look up kick-ass TV series. So, for example, if you’re writing a thriller, I might ask you to take a look at the subversive Villanelle in Killing Eve,

In this podcast, we’ll create shortcuts for you.

Each season we will select a TV series and help you understand why it works, episode by episode and overall. We’ll look at the characters and why they’re memorable or not.

If you're writing a novel, screenplay or TV series, our show will help you look at storytelling from an editor's perspective.

We’ll keep our analysis to around 20 to 30 minutes long, so you can pop the kettle on, and get yourself a cup of tea, and join us.

Are there any shows you would like to have analyzed? Drop us a line.

References:

www.sgshowrunners.com

www.storygrid.com

Editor Webpages:

Melanie:

Parul:

Randall: www.randysurles.com

Podcasts:

Story Grid Podcast

Story Grid Roundtable Podcast

Books:

The Story Grid by Shawn Coyne

Save the Cat! Writes a Novel: The Last Book on Novel Writing You’ll Ever Need by Jessica Brody

The Virgin’s Promise: Writing Stories of Feminine Creative, Spiritual, and Sexual Awakening by Kim Hudson and Christopher Vogler

The Hero with a Thousand Faces (The Collected Works of Joseph Campbell) by Joseph Campbell

...

Next Episode

02. The Assassin and the Detective: Killing Eve Ep1

Review of Episode 1 - "Nice Face"

Some excellent assassinations
A bored MI-5 employee
The Assassin and the hunter meet
As the Spartans would say in the movie 300, it’s a good start

As a quick recap, Villanelle kills an Eastern European Politician/ Human Trafficker but leaves his Polish girlfriend behind as the sole witness. Eve is late to an emergency meeting about this murder and is ordered to protect the girlfriend. Villanelle makes another excellent assassination in Tuscany and is then told that she must kill the girlfriend so as not to leave any witnesses. Eve does some illegal investigating and interviewing with the Polish girlfriend and discovers that her first inclination was correct and the assassin was a woman. And finally, Villanelle, dressed as a nurse, meets Eve briefly in the ladies' bathroom of the hospital where the Polish girlfriend is being held under guard and Villanelle tells Eve to leave her hair down. Villanelle then kills a nurse, all the guards, and the Polish girlfriend (off-screen). Villanelle escapes before anyone knows she was there, and Eve returns from the bathroom to see the massacre. Eve is fired, but Carolyn meets with her briefly to talk about the female assassin.

Introduction to the 5 commandments of Storytelling

This week we will discuss the 5 Commandments of episode 1 of Amazon Prime’s Killing Eve.

These are the five elements that are used to build a scene and should be clearly defined and executed for each scene, each chapter, and each episode.

Inciting Incident, Turning Point/ Progressive Complication, Crisis Question, Climax, Resolution

An inciting incident is the big event scene that kicks off the story. It’s the frisson that the reader/ viewer experiences that excites them.

An Inciting Incident can be either Causal - a result of an active choice by a character, or Coincidental - an event that is unexpected, random, or accidental.

For our complete show notes, check out our website at www.sgshowrunners.com, leave us a comment or question and vote on the next television series we will analyze.

For more information about the Story Grid Methodology (articles, videos, and other resources) check out www.storygrid.com.