donutsweeper | The 15 minute rule (and why sometimes it's just better to give up when you're ahead)

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The 15 minute rule (and why sometimes it's just better to give up when you're ahead)

I've been meaning to do a post on the 15 minute rule for a while but life kept getting in the way. Basically, the 15 minute rule is the idea that a movie has the first 15 minutes (or a book has the first few chapters, or a TV show the pilot episode) to set the rules for its universe. For example: Modern day setting except there are superheroes/secret agency that fight the Big Bad! Or, ancient Britons with magic and dragons! Or, huge robots that fight huge monsters! Sometimes, it doesn't even need that long to set up its 15 minute rule- think about the Gilligan's Island theme song (or Brady Bunch's, etc) or the VO introduction to Pacific Rim or Sleepy Hollow.

The universe created in that window is important for two reasons. Firstly, it gives the fan a look at what the story will be an a chance to say "YES! I want to see a vigilante fighting crime with bows and arrows!" or "Seriously? I just read about a ritual to make the naked Nazi vampires immortal? No thank you!" (Yes, that is a real book. No, I don't remember anything more about it, I returned it to the library IMMEDIATELY.) And secondly, it provides expectations of what to expect from the writers and the assumption they will stay within the parameters of the world they created.

This can create problems because very often the setting is a modern one, either fully and completely could be happening today without any additional mythos/technology (NCIS, H50, Hannibal, Castle, White Collar, all the CSI/L&O shows, etc etc etc) or with a few tweaks (Grimm, Supernatural, Teen Wolf, Buffy, etc) and sometimes the show pushes at the boundaries of common sense and doesn't display their world as we the fan know it works.

Now, there will always be dramatic license, our heroes will always survive being shot and having treatment delayed and nearly dying only be up and chasing the bad guys in the next episode. That's to be expected. But how much you extend your belief and suspend your disbelief for the facts of the show depends a lot on what kind of additions or story it is trying to sell you and how much you can buy.

Sometimes, it's reasonable and it's actually the 15 minute rule being altered or expanded upon like how SPN always had demons, and then added angels. If done well and in a way that can fit, that's fine. Merlin used to be able to talk to dragons, now he orders them around. Okay.

Other times, however.... The best example of this is when cop shows (of all sorts- NCIS, H50, Elementary, Castle, etc) show the cops dealing with criminals. Fans today have basic knowledge of the laws and what is and is not allowed. We're willing to give our characters some leeway and don't expect them show us them reciting the Miranda law (for US shows, the "you have the right to remain silent..." law) every time, but when they DO show us the suspect asking for a lawyer and the character disregarding it or the character actually beating a suspect to get a confession and that being considered a reasonable action and there being no consequences... the show not only breaks its 15 minute rule, it can take a viewer out of the story.

Thus the reason I gave up on NCIS and H50. The 15 minute rule allowed for them to stretch the rules of the day a little, but not that much. It became unbelievable/unacceptable and I just couldn't watch anymore.

Hannibal is a good example of where I could accept the 15 minute rule (one character eats people, the others don't know) but then got fed up with its inability to create a believable setting for telling its story. One nonspoilery/gross example (out of many others) was its complete and unmanageable sense of geography. One cannot fly commercial from the VA/MD area to MN, drive around MN for a while and then fly back all at a moment's notice and within one day. Additionally, add in that we were supposed to believe one character managed some of that when not in his proper state of mind or that another character used that mental confusion (which he couldn't have known would be happening that specific moment without reading the script) to act against them and.... I tried, but I just kept saying to myself, "But how? X doesn't work that way. Why would anyone do Y? How how how, etc" and they never even tried to come up with an answer so I won't be watching S2.

Dramatic license will always give tptb wiggle room, sometimes I just wish they understood the difference between a little leeway and outright disregard for the world they themselves created.

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Yes, yes to all of this!

I have a huge thing about consistency in universe building and how it applies to 'real world' shows as much as it does to sci-fi and fantasy set-ups. I call it the Law and Order Rule, the theory that it is on some level easier to believe that Buffy Summers kills vampires than the fact that every week the detectives on Law and Order solve a case with a twits right at the end.

And I hate when a show starts breaking rules or whips out a new set too late in the run. SPN, which I quit watching, actually did a good job of finessing their universe in adding angels. But I really dislike the way BSG started disregarding rules in S4 just to play with the audience's minds. bleck.

I think too often the show breaks the rules or adds new ones out of sheer laziness- they just can't easily come up with more stores to fit within the framework they've been using this whole time and instead of stretching themselves and brains to write something more they just shrug and throw something else in there and say they're being "edgy" and anyone who didn't like it just doesn't understand their vision.

I *really* hate in the Law and Order type shows when the disregard the law/common sense because the detective 'knows' X is the badguy and they are ALWAYS proved right. There's never any 'oops, sorry, my bad' or 'well, we were wrong, who would'a thunk it' and it's ANNOYING.

I think too often the show breaks the rules or adds new ones out of sheer laziness- they just can't easily come up with more stores to fit within the framework they've been using this whole time and instead of stretching themselves and brains to write something more they just shrug and throw something else in there and say they're being "edgy" and anyone who didn't like it just doesn't understand their vision.

yes, exactly!

I think too that a show can write change into their universe. And that the earlier and more often a show finesses the easier it is for that change. Buffy changing Big Bads, adding the second slayer, and then other new characters is a successful example of this for me. It allowed Buffy to get away with things later in the run because the act of change was set-up and I trusted it to play out in the bigger plot.

Not all of Buffy's changes worked (the Initiative, for example) but overall the changes seemed more like just additions and slipped into the greater mythos of the show without too much difficulty and by starting with the idea of changing the landscape of its world from pretty early on (the Master being killed and that kid (the annointed one?) being poised to be the next big bad only to have Spike dust him without a by-your-leave) made the changes seem more organic, which was nice.

But a change like the Initiative would have been a disaster on another show, like the 'going to college' season is on most high school based shows can be actually.

Very true. BtVS seemed to realize the idea wasn't working and went in a different direction without much difficulty.

I always thought that the Initiative was an interesting idea, but it actually was adding too much to the existing universe to not seem clunky.

Yeah, I agree. It could have been great, but just didn't quite work.

I think that if it had been introduced as season earlier as an American answer to the very British Watcher system vying for Buffy or even better Faith's allegiance it might have been great. (But I have this theory that bigger changes work better in odd numbered seasons.)

an American answer to the very British Watcher system

Oooh, I like that idea. It never quite made sense to me they didn't seem to know about/believe in slayers where they had such a history with the supernaturals creatures and whatnot.

which was the issue with the Initiative, and a great many changes to a show and its universe, it wasn't quite well thought out enough to integrate seamlessly when it could have been.

Unfortunately, that seems to be the case for most canons. A lack of tptb to put that extra bit of effort in integrate new ideas properly.

A lack of tptb to put that extra bit of effort in integrate new ideas properly.

And this is where we end up back to that feeling of things being lazy and unmotivated. All it would take is that extra effort in planning. *shrug*

Unfortuantely *sigh*

Voiceovers are quite useful for aiding the 15 minute rule - think Dresden Files and Highlander as well as the ones you mentioned. Highlander especially did well with the voiceover intros, even if they verged on the side of cheesy at times, as they did use it to introduce new concepts like the Watchers and where the characters stood with regards to each other (thinking of Joe's change from "In the end there can be only one; he is Duncan MacLeod, the Highlander" in S3 to "In the end there can be only one; may it be Duncan MacLeod, the Highlander" in S4 here).

And now I want to watch some Highlander again. I still love that series.

VOs are *great* for that. I could probably still recite Star Trek, Highlander, Forever Knight, the original Battlestar Galatica and others. And you're right, sometimes they do change them as some of the mythos is altered or the focus shifted or whatever which can be really useful.

I see nothing wrong with a Highlander rewatch! It really holds up to multiple viewings :)

There is an interesting example in the Torchwood episode 'Adam', where an alien has altered their memories to convince the team it has been part of them all along. The BBC actually reshot part of the opening titles to show 'Adam', as if he'd gotten to them too. The episode was creepy even before it started.

I forgot about that! I loved that they went through the extra effort to do that! There are a few other times shows have done similar things and it really helps set the mood, it's such a nice touch.

Oh man, the geography on Hannibal is laughable. Travel time in general really gets me, but the show *is* good enough (and enough, uh, to my taste >.>) that I will probably watch anyway ;p It is a great example though!

Yeah, the travel issue was just one of the many reasons for my giving up on it, although I'm sure I'll continue to pick up on the show via fannish osmosis. I am interesting in the characters overall, there's just too many things that make me headdesk to keep watching.

Very interesting. Makes a lot of sense. My problem is that often I slog through anyway just because. *sigh*

I am very familiar with that action :)

I don't necessarily believe a show, or movie, has to establish to set the rules of its universe. Sometimes I like it when the exposition is spread out.

Sometimes I have a higher tolerance for suspending disbelief, depending on how into the show I am. I tend to be a character fan first. Plot holes can definitely annoy me, take me out of a show, and maybe even make me stop watching, but as long as I care about the characters I'll probably stick around.

Stacey

Caveat: I'm commenting late without having read other comments. The latest episode of Teen Wolf illustrated perfectly the principle and its violation, showing a mental institution with absolutely rampant Cuckoo's-Nest-like abuse and prison-like qualities.

I can--barely--suspend disbelief on the current-day existence of a loony-bin kind of place where people are committed because they have hallucinations or visions. I can't do it for a boy with an actual diagnosed brain disease being assigned to "group therapy" in such a place, or for such a place continuing to be in business when all the caretakers are Nurse Ratched.

The fact that there are people in the show's canon who grow fangs and claws and facial hair under various moon phases in no way makes it okay to fuck around with the real-world elements that ground the story. I will never understand why producers and writers think "But, werewolves!" makes every other implausibility okay.

The fact that there are people in the show's canon who grow fangs and claws and facial hair under various moon phases in no way makes it okay to fuck around with the real-world elements that ground the story. I will never understand why producers and writers think "But, werewolves!" makes every other implausibility okay.

Exactly. It's breaking their 15 minute rule because they went through great effort to say "Hey, this is an average, everyday small California town peopled by normal, everyday teens whose lives are turned upside down by WEREWOLVES". That's the world they set up. Yet they keep pushing the boundaries of what they expect us to accept as 'normal' to the point it in no way resembles the real world anymore.

And then there's their presentation of mental hospitals. Which was.... *sighs* yeah. I knew we were in trouble on how they'd portray it from the moment there was that suicide. At first I hoped it was an illusion, something Stiles was seeing that wasn't real and that would have been interesting, but unfortunately no, that was not the case.

Oddly, the thing that bothered me the most about it was they broke their own facts about the institution. Two episodes ago the sheriff runs in and says "Show me your basement!" and boom, basement. No problems, no going through locked wards filled with the dangerous patients (which why did they specify that was the case when Malia and Stiles (and Oliver) had no trouble whatsoever getting past them?) so why was it so hard for Stiles to get there this time? Also, why didn't Stiles just ask Ms Morell?

Also, there is NO way Ms Morell would just hand Stiles a container of pills. No medical facility of any kind allows patients to wander about with several doses of powerful medication. For her to have handed him two pills and say 'take these, I'll find you again in X hours for another dose' wouldn't have taken any more time and would have been 100x more believable. *sighs again*

The Stiles is missing/Stiles is sick episode was SO GOOD. And then they write this. Come on show, you're better than that.

Come on show, you're better than that.

Well, two or three really clear, really tight, really internally-consistent eps indicate that the show can be better than that, but it's so wildly inconsistent that I can't drum up your faith.

I hadn't spotted the Eichen House basement problem, but you're quite right. And then, they keep playing with "nothing is real, it's all a dream, Stiles is hallucinating," so who knows?

Apparently I'm almost alone in having arrived at the "who cares?" part of the equation, but I'm going to have to admit defeat on a show that requires me to do homework to make sense of it. Especially when even with homework, half of it will never make sense anyway.

S3a was such an absolute mess I had been about ready to give up until I'd read this season Dylan was being given a lot of meaty material and he'd really shine and that there would also be a lot of Stilinski family interaction and history so I kept watching. They have not disappointed on that front, but yeah, logically they've fallen short of the mark a lot.

I'm going to stick it out until the end of the season and then see. I have a feeling you're taking the saner route.

Oh, don't get me wrong: I'm definitely in it for the rest of 3B. Watching Dylan O'Brien blossom from "incredibly naturally gifted comedic actor" to "seriously amazing dramatic actor" has been gratifying and fun.

Heh. I keep hoping he's going to be written out of the show in order to release him to pursue his movie career, and that will give me an excuse to quit watching, while providing lots of Dylan O'Brien.

He needs to be in decent things. I tried to watch that episode of The New Girl for him, but it was so painful and I just couldn't watch The Internship. He's really going places though, he's so talented.

I paid premium rates to see The Internship when it was in theaters. I enjoyed it in parts, and Dylan was fantastic, but it was pretty cringeworthy overall. I saw only the key selected clips from the "New Girl" episode--that show is so very far from my cup of tea. I fast-forwarded through a pirated copy of The First Time--it seemed to have a certain charm, and, again, Dylan was very good in it.

I'll admit that I'm looking forward to Maze Runner. The books are...decent, I guess, of their kind, and the lead role should give Dylan some scope. There's no danger of his becoming a Pattinson even if the movies are terrible. Seriously, he could be his generation's Tom Hanks if the right scripts come his way.

I've been hearing good things about Maze Runner. And you're right, Dylan really has the potential to make it big, but there's a lot of chance involved. At least he is working steadily and putting himself out there, he's not just sitting around and twiddling his thumbs when Teen Wolf isn't filming.

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The 15 minute rule (and why sometimes it's just better to give up when you're ahead)

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