The Spiralling
Writer's Commentary Part 12
Chapter 13: Life and Death
In a nutshell, this chapter was designed as further development into Aldan/Grandmaster's backstory. Before this chapter, the Grandmaster might have been portrayed as a little too idealistic, although I would like to contest that this idealism is realistic, as the Grandmaster had been through some less than happy times, and he's lived quite a long time. While some people may fall into villainy, Grandmaster chose the opposite.
Other than to use the wise Grandmaster's monologue to throw readers off from the fact that the Demoness was Mindy and not his daughter, this chapter was concocted (inasmuch as I can remember) to show the other side of the Grandmaster, the one that made some poor decisions and mistakes. What is realistic, in the end, is that no one's perfect, and this chapter is the counterbalance to the Grandmaster's idealism. Not to mention, it finally shows the Grandmaster in a very low state, feeling extremely sad over the death of his wife. This humanises him, or at least I hope it does.
A minor little treat I included for the Grandmaster was the date of his wife's death. She was killed in 2010 in the cross-fire of a drive-by shooting. That was anything between days or months from the Grandmaster's return. He would have been thinking the same thing, and regretted not coming earlier, thinking that if he did, he might have saved his wife, or at least be there for her when it was time for her to go.
This is very important not just for character development, but also for the franchise, as one of the main themes of Kick-Ass is real-life consequences and how an individual's actions could lead up to it. While the core of it was specifically about vigilantism or being a real-life superhero, I'm sure a significant portion of Kick-Ass is also about personal decisions.
Chapter 14: Broken
Seeing that there was no interaction between Hit-Girl and the Grandmaster, this chapter provides it. Fans of TV series have always wanted their favourite characters interacting. If this little fan fiction of mine had any fans, I hoped it pleased them. However, that wasn't the reason for writing this chapter, or at least it wasn't the exclusive reason. Being a writer and father to this story (though Hit-Girl isn't my character as much as I wish it was), I'd want my characters to interact with each other as much as possible. I was basically going with the Gedenkan experiment, stirring some things up and seeing what would happen. In this case, I tried putting Hit-Girl and the Grandmaster together to see what would happen.
The Grandmaster and Hit-Girl, as it turns out, became a stereotypical representation of the generation gap. The Grandmaster is formal and proper while Hit-Girl's very informal and vulgar. The Grandmaster prefers to be cerebral and logical when he interacts with people, while Hit-Girl tends to show her angry, emotional side – the vulgarity helps. A note though – I'm not stereotyping nor giving them a fixed role. Hit-Girl, by all means, could easily be a very methodical, logical person. Otherwise, she wouldn't have survived so many missions against the mob.
Eventually, however, the Grandmaster and Hit-Girl was able to set aside their differences and focus on their similarities: They've both lost someone close to them. The generation gap's been closed, though I'm not sure if it was the most stereotypical way or not.
And now the obligatory what-to-improve-on section. After 3 years have passed, I've read this chapter again, and I'm largely dissatisfied with my old self. Grammar aside, Kick-Ass' dialogue could use a little improvement. "Stop it, Hit-Girl! You're acting just like her!" Makes Kick-Ass sound more naggy or over-feminine. Then there's Hit-Girl breaking down. In the end, realistically, she wouldn't break down like that in front of her fellow superhero peers – she's the type who'd find time after duty to do that. It's extremely clear in the movies, both in the first and second. I have no idea how I missed that. I guess I might have fallen into the telling rather than showing mistake, when there are other ways to show a character's grief and devastation other than to make her cry. Tip for self and you, if you need it: Show rather than tell, don't tell rather than show.
Lastly, I'm divided right now as to my decision to make the team split up. At first, I thought it was stupid, as divided, a team is weak. They should all have known that. Yet, at the same time, I also know that they were just scouting, and that they were rushing to find Demoness, so splitting up isn't so stupid a decision. In the end, I feel that as it is, it works as it serves a narrative function, and that is to trick the reader into thinking that Hit-Girl was taken prisoner when in fact Mindy was Demoness all along. The other narrative function is to let Mindy turn into Demoness without the other characters knowing. Well, there's always a better way of doing things.