Each decision a writer makes when writing a story steers it into one of two of the simplest categories: good or bad. While the response to a story is highly subjective, the majority of opinions will usually tip towards either good or bad.
But bad doesn’t necessarily mean that it’s not entertaining. Over the years, I’ve come to love books, movies, and other stories that fall into the “bad” category. They still bring something to the table, and it has brought fame to those who are passionate about creating stories, even if they aren’t good at executing those stories.
Below I discuss “bad stories,” what makes them bad, and how they can still be entertaining. Let me know your favorite “bad” stories, whether they be movies, books, or another form of storytelling, in the comments!
Elements that make a bad story
Like I said, story quality is subjective. So, it’s tough to pinpoint particular elements that make a story “bad.”
In my training as a writer, I was taught to avoid the following:
- Passive voice.
- Poorly portrayed characters.
- A disjointed tone.
- Spelling everything out for the audience.
- Unrealistic/hokey dialogue.
- So many small spelling and grammar errors that it becomes distracting or makes the story unclear.
- Pacing that is too fast or too slow.
If we’re talking visual media, a bad movie or show can include all of the above on top of:
- Poorly constructed visuals (not so much cheap visuals as those that don’t work for the story or don’t clearly convey what the writer was trying to present to the audience).
- Bad acting.
- A boring plot.
- Loads of continuity errors.
These elements are a recipe for disaster, but sometimes, they can work despite these qualities. Below are some examples of how they can work.
The intentionally versus unintentionally bad
Sometimes the writer is in on the joke when it comes to bad writing. It’s a risk, one that probably should never work, but sometimes it does.
Some writers want to get really campy with their stories, either to prove a point, usually a satiric or farcical one, or because it suits their sense of humor. The point is to not take the story too seriously and to laugh at the ridiculousness of it. It’s not realistic, but it’s not supposed to be.
I remember reading an essay by Dave Barry in college and thinking how insulting it felt to feature him in class when there were so many better writers to use. However, the purpose was to gain a different perspective from a sillier point of view. The silliness is the first to bubble to the surface, and then over time, you begin to see the deeper meanings behind what he’s saying. It’s a slow burn of a message delivery that goes down easier at first swallow.
Comedians have always been great at getting their audience to think about a serious topic by bringing humor to it. It’s after the laugh has faded that you begin to see the philosophy behind what they’re saying, whether you agree with it or not. It can be far more effective than shouting a point into a megaphone at a protest or slamming your fist on a podium in earnestness.
On the flip side of that, sometimes a writer sets out to write a masterpiece and ends up with a dud long before they’ve realized it. The first writer who comes to mind as fitting this personal was the B-movie director Edward D. Wood Jr.
Wood was a genius at coming up with film concepts. But actually writing them down, filming, and editing them? Not so much. His dialogue was typically nonsensical, his takes were sloppy, and his budget was too bare bones to execute the images he wanted to portray on screen.
The reputation has made Ed Wood both a laughingstock and a type of B-movie God among film fans, particularly horror fans. There’s something refreshing about going into a film knowing that it’s going to be bad and going along for the ride. You laugh at parts that aren’t intended to be funny, and you shake your head at the glaring errors in the story and imagery, but by the end, you’ve had a good time and were kept engaged by the imperfections.
Making fun of fiction
No one wants to have audiences make fun of their work, but at the same time, we’ve all made fun of bad lines in books, movies, and TV shows. I remember when the first 50 Shades of Grey book came out and people were pulling bad quotes from the story to laugh at. Yet, the book, and later the movie, was extremely popular.
Social media is now a breeding ground for parodying and poking fun at bad lines from stories. They like to point out the unrealistic dialogue and delivery and misinterpret the meanings of lines to show how unclear and cheesy they are.
Before social media, though, there was, and still are, shows like Mystery Science Theater which are built around poking fun at bad stories. There are podcasts that break down stories line by line and create funny commentary around the bad writing. This makes otherwise unwatchable or unreadable stories not only watchable and readable but also gives them life that they can’t exude on their own.
Obviously, writers would prefer that their work be consumed and enjoyed as intended. But given the choice between infamy and exclusion, I think most would prefer to have their work talked about in some way rather than not at all.
The notoriously bad movie, The Room, was meant to be a serious drama, but its creator and star, Tommy Wiseau, was quick to pivot to calling it a comedy when he heard audiences responding to it as such. In this way, he still got his audience’s approval.
The story you thought was good but wasn’t
Sometimes a bad story is disguised as a good one in childhood and becomes apparently clear later on that it was terrible, or at least is terrible to watch as an adult. I’ve reread a lot of books and rewatched a lot of movies that I had loved as a kid only to find that they did nothing for me as an adult.
I chalk it up to cynicism as you age or just being more judgmental towards a piece of writing later in life. Or maybe it’s that you’re more likely to say you liked something that you didn’t as a kid, just because it was made for your age group and was popular among your peers. But some stories just can’t hold up to the test of time.
A generational example of this is for fans of the 1969 Batman TV show. More often than not, you’ll hear people talk about how seriously they took that show if they watched it as a kid. The tongue-and-cheek sense of humor went right over our heads, and we took the actors’ serious tones to mean that this was heavy adult business, and they were making rational decisions in response to a storyline that made sense.
As you grow up, though, you can suddenly see the winking at the camera and the nonsensical script choices meant to move the plot along with no rhyme or reason behind them. It’s still enjoyable but now in a different way.
Sometimes the story just ages terribly too. It could have outdated messages or even some that are downright hateful and offensive. They can make you uncomfortable and raise eyebrows in terms of what used to be acceptable to say or do.
The shock factor of these outdated stories can still be entertaining, though. Watching from a modern lens really helps to see how far your own tolerance and viewpoints have come and why it was necessary to abolish that way of thinking based on the messages a certain book, film, show, or even song conveys.
The story that ages remarkably
Some stories get released to the world and land flat on their face. The Great Gatsby is one of the most famous examples of a piece of classic literature that rose from the ashes of obscurity to become an American treasure.
Maybe a story is ahead of its time. Maybe it didn’t find the right audience the first time. Or maybe it got slammed by critics or was poorly promoted and found its way into the zeitgeist over time.
There are dozens of films from the 80s and 90s that tanked at the theaters only to find fame through home video, HBO, and cable. Just presenting it as a choice at a video rental store or playing it over and over again until you have no choice but to catch parts of it over and over until you love it. Today, we call them classics, but back then, they were considered duds.
It’s a long shot to expect a story to find fame gradually. The typical process is to find it right out of the gate. But we all love an underdog story, and the transformation of seeing a story, especially a deserving story, thrive over time is so satisfying.
Giving a pass to first attempts/low budgets
Writing is definitely a muscle that needs to be stretched. It takes time to get good at it, even with a natural talent for it. It’s also scary to start to put content out into the world and allow it to be judged by others, whether it’s just a few individuals who you’re trying to get to invest in it, or the masses who you hope will spend their hard-earned money on your story.
Fans of indie books and low budget films understand the lack of funds and marketing that small creators face when trying to put their story into the world. As a result, they’ll overlook small, or sometimes even numerous, errors in the story and give it an A for effort. The first tries and solo attempts are worth celebrating, even if a writer hasn’t hit their stride yet or you can tell that they really don’t have what it takes, but why diminish the dream for them until they learn it for themselves?
Sometimes you just want to watch a low-budget, old school Godzilla movie over a mass produced, high budget version. Sometimes you just want to be down in the trenches with the little guy, sharing a love of stories and ignoring the imperfections because it brings with it something that the popular versions don’t always capture: heart.
The community of bad story fans
Speaking of fans of bad stories, there’s something communal about sharing a love of an obscure piece of writing. It feels like a secret club where only those serious about a genre are welcome.
When I was in college, I found a local cable access horror show where the hosts would dress up as various horror archetypes and play a bad horror movie while interjecting between local commercial breaks to share trivia or poke fun at a certain scene or actor. It made me feel like I had found others like me who shared a common interest.
Throughout the years, I’ve gravitated to other horror hosted shows, such as Elvira and Svengoolie, who do the same thing, only on a national level. This led to me attending horror conventions where you get to share the same air with other horror fans as well as horror creators, from small vendors to huge movie directors.
You can tell those who are there by choice versus those who are dragged along as a plus one. There’s an enthusiasm that they carry with them that is unmatched by any other experience, and they shell out hundreds, if not thousands, and sometimes hours of their time to get a piece of memorabilia signed or a photo with their favorite actor or director.
A non-fan will look at the same creators’ work and wonder why a fan would choose this type of story over something more polished and popular. But bad horror fans see the character in bad stories, and it makes them feel like they have a second sight in the ability to see underlying greatness beneath the poorly constructed external shell.
There’s a secret language and understanding that comes along with loving bad stories. It reminds us that we devour them because we wanted to be entertained, and their imperfections make us love them even more, just as we should all be loved by our own unique imperfections.
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