In Praise of Great Exposition

Hey folks, I recorded this video before it was announced so I didn't have time to include it in th ad-read but you can now give Nebula as a gift: gift.nebula.tv/thomasflight

the only "hello, brother" i accept is Buster from Arrested Development

One aspect of forced exposition is the phrase "As You Know", which tends to be clunky. If the character apparently already knows the vital information, then why are you telling them? It's purely for the audience's benefit.

Oh my god I spend so much time thinking about bad exposition, thank you for this. “Diana, we’ve been married for seven years, I think I know what kind of cake you want for your fortieth birthday party. My name’s Steve by the way.”

Another factor is just how interested is the audience in getting the information delivered by the exposition? Like, in the Matrix, there's a scene where Morpheus just tells Neo what's going on in the real world. It's an extended minutes long sequence of pure exposition, delivered mostly through dialogue of one character talking. But it works, mostly because it's information that the audience has been teased with for the whole first act. They care a lot about getting all this revealed, so their tolerance for an extended exposition dump is as high as it can be. I think similar exposition dumps usually don't work because the viewer doesn't care enough about what's being revealed. The movie hasn't invested the time to make them care.

Thomas giving exposition on exposition is the meta I need to start off my week.

The fact that Dave Bautista also puts on glasses tells us early that even though he's a replicant, replicants age and deteriorate like human beings, foreshadowing Harrison Ford appearing later and still potentially being a replicant, but also showing the humanity inside a replicant that this world ignores.

I think the spirit of "show don't tell" becomes clearer when you realize the rule applies not just to visual media, but also to novels, where we can't literally "see" anything that happens. Everything is "told" to us in some sense, but within that we can still make the distinction. "Show don't tell" really means something closer to "Don't state, demonstrate."

That exposition scene from Three Body Problem is so unforgivable to me because the book has such a brilliant cinematic scene that explains how the accelerators are going against all of physics. The POV character is talking to a physicist friend of his who is drunk. The drunk friend is at a pool table and does an experiment. He knocks a ball into a pocket. Then he makes his friend move the whole pool table around the room three times to repeat the experiment in different parts of the room. By the end he's out of breath and barely finished his metaphor: the pool tables give the same result no matter the location of the table, but the accelerators are all giving different results. And as soon as he explains it, he passed out. End scene.

My favourite "exposition" is in the original Blade Runner when Deckard goes to the burlesque dance club and there's a boa snake in the changing rooms. He asks the dancer "is this real?" and she responds with "if that were real do you think i would work in a place like this?" to this day it blows my mind. that bit of dialogue tells you about the state of the fauna on earth and the economy and her social status ahhhh

surprised fleabag wasn't mentioned, i feel like that show is the prime example of good exposition dumping

Your video made me realize something about the exposition in "Arrival". When you watch Dr. Banks watch television news, the exposition is no longer about aliens arriving. The most amazing thing in the history of the world JUST happened - and she's watching it alone in a dark house. She doesn't even rush to be with her mother. in one minute, we understand just how profoundly alone Dr. Banks is - and she never utters a word.

"Do you remember that time when you..." with a LOOOOOT more detail than would be necessary in a normal conversation.

I can't believe that the opening of Lord of the Rings doesn't get a mention here. It's a couple of minutes of pure exposition, before any characters are introduced, takes place outside of any scene, is a monologue aimed solely at the audience, and even starts in a made-up language. It breaks every rule. And yet it's absolutely amazing. Sometimes, the trick might just be to have great exposition to tell, and not be shy about it; poorly disguised exposition might be the worse sort.

0:07 me and my sister DEFINITELY talk like this.... but to your credit, we probably do it because it is awkward, and inspired from awkward media.

Honestly, I think unless its absolutely necessary, there is no need to firmly establish characters relationships with each other. You can infer from peoples interactions that they're likely siblings, or past lovers. Having that aire of mystery about it just adds to the intrigue.

my favourite FAVOURITE instance of exposition / infodumping is the opening to Hot Fuzz, where we get fed bullet-fast background info on nicolas angel telling us how proficient and overly-seriously he takes job as a cop. any other movie would have taken the show-don't-tell rule literally and decided to show us the protag at a crime scene and solving the case quickly, while the other cops roll their eyes and whisper among themselves about how stick-in-the-mud the protag is. that technically works, but it also 1) takes a lot of time 2) has been overdone to hell and back. by going the complete opposite route of just telling us everything right away, Hot Fuzz can get to the main story as quickly as possible WHILE STILL being able to give us ridiculous extra info (such as angel being a biking expert) that doesn't really matter to the story but tells us a lot about who angel is as a person. it also fits the overall vibe of the movie, a fast-paced over-the-top comedy. also, the crafty part of this infodump is that it doesn't tell you everything--it tells you JUST ENOUGH to get the story started. it doesn't tell you that angel's coworkers are jealous of him and dislike him and want him out of their precinct; they show this to us later on. it doesn't tell you angel takes his job so seriously that he has no friends and has trouble keeping his girlfriend; this is revealed when he has an argument with her later. and one last bit that makes this infodumping work: it's a voiceover that makes sense within the context of the movie itself. it's not just the protagonist telling the audience his own backstory; it's his sergeant reading through angel's profile before meeting with him. does it break the "show don't tell" advice? yes. but does it work? is it entertaining? does it give you the right amount of information without feeling forced and awkward? yes, and i think that matters more!

“Somehow Palpatine returned”

Every time I hear someone say "hot water heater" I die a little inside.

look at that subtle off-white room lighting. the tasteful script writing. oh my god. it even has a nebula ad read.